August 8 - Back to the South

We had a pretty busy day today. We flew back to Reykjavik and experienced air travel as it was supposed to be -- no long lines for luggage or security -- no security checks at all! No shoes to take off, no problems bringing water and toiletries onto the plane, quick take off, quick baggage pick up. WOW! Too bad we can’t do this in the US!

Central Iceland from our plane

Our bus met us at the airport and we got a drive through parts of Reykjavik we hadn’t seen before – past our guide’s house, and we visited a couple churches, both designed by the man who did the Akureyri Church. The Catholic Church was more cathedral like and I loved the way they had painted the columns and the arches a different color from the roof. The Lutheran Church (Hallgrimmskirkja) was the one Jim and I had looked at our first day in Reykjavik – this time we went inside and the organ there had amazing pipes! Our last sight in Reykjavik was the geothermal hot water plant for the city – there are several water tanks arranged in a circle, and on top of that, a glass dome was built that houses a fancy restaurant. It has the best views of the city from an observation deck built over the water tanks.

Organ at Hallgrimmskirkja in Reykjavik

The Pearl on top of the city water tanks.

Natural geyser (not a fountain) inside the Pearl

Thingvellir National Park is interesting on a couple levels: not only is it the site of the original democratic assembly (Althing) of Iceland, starting in 930, the Mid Atlantic Ridge runs through it and you can get the sense of how the valley between the hills was created by repetitive magma flows, pushing the hills apart. An important role was that of ‘law-speaker’, whose responsibility it was to recite 1/3 of all the laws each year, so that every 3 years, all laws would be heard by those assembled. This continued until writing became more common in the 1100s. As part of the annual assembly, laws were written and judgments made. Convicted women were put in a bag and tossed into the ‘Drowning Pool’. Men were beheaded, but this might not have been an easy death, as there is some question about how sharp the executioner’s blade was. Today it is a lovely park with lots of hiking trails.

North American Plate at Thingvellir

What's left of the Drowning Pool. I think it was deeper when the river was diverted there in the old days.

From there, we traveled to Gullfoss (Golden Waterfall), so named because of the rainbow that forms in the mist, which also provides a cooling ‘shower’ as you approach the upstream part of the falls. If it were hot, this would be quite welcome….. We spent quite a while walking around here, admiring the amazing flow.

The falls throw up a LOT of spray!

Gullfoss rainbow

Our last stops before driving the rest of the way to Selfoss was the site of the Geysir Hot Springs, and then Kerith Crater. Geysir is the spout that gave its name to all water formations of this type. Unfortunately, it is no longer active, but an other geyser, Stokkur, blows every 3 to 5 minutes.

Geysir, now inactive, looking a lot like the Morning Glory Pool in Yellowstone without all the colors

Lynn attempting to film Stokkur's eruption

Kerith Crater

Selfoss, our home for the next 2 nights is a pleasant little community with a few hotels and restaurants and 6000 inhabitants. The hotel was second best of our trip so far. I find it interesting that all the hotels have had hardwood floors and a very modern design theme.

August 7 - Lake Myvatn

We were really busy today visiting a lot of volcanic features around Lake Myvatn. The day also featured lunch at a cow shed – the owner happened to be Bjorn’s (our host last night) cousin!

Lake Myvatn is located ON the mid-Atlantic ridge and the area has a high degree of volcanic activity, currently and in the past. It also has some unusual volcanic features found in few other localities. Iceland is slowly splitting apart (as we saw in our city tour of Reykjavik on 8/2) and today we got to stand with one foot on the North American plate and one on the Eurasian plate.

On our way there, we stopped at a waterfalls called Godafoss – Waterfall of the Gods. About a thousand years ago, the Icelanders decided to become Christian and the law-giver, a local chieftain with a national presence, decided to lead the way by disposing of his pagan icons, which he tossed into the falls. As we drove there, I was expecting to see high ground, but it was very flat and I wondered where the falls were and what the big deal was. Well. There is a river that falls thru a cleft in the basaltic stream bed and it was VERY impressive. I also found a sweater there I couldn’t live without, and given how chilly and windy it has been, it will be a welcome addition to my wardrobe. Too bad I didn’t bring a turtleneck tee to wear with it, especially since none seem to be for sale in the summer. (Some summer! We are REALLY glad we brought some warm clothes and hats!)

Jim at the main part of Godafoss

Lynn, a bit further downriver at a subsidiary falls.

 Next was a ‘pseudocrater’ field at Skutustadir. These formations look like craters where magma came up and erupted thru them, leaving a lopped of cone. But what really happened was that lava flows covered up water/boggy land, creating steam that exploded through the lava. This created the crater look without the magma source from below.

Pseudo craters at Lake Myvatn

No, this isn't a volcanic formation, but there was also a herd of cattle there, and I had never seen one quite this color before.

Then we went to visit the ‘trolls’ or ‘Yule lads’ at Demmoborgir. Icelanders have a tradition that trolls are night-time creatures who become frozen in stone if they don’t get back into their caves before dawn. Apparently quite a few of the trolls have been careless about the clock, because they are all over. In this case, the formations are also called Yule Lads, 13 sons of vicious trolls who live in a cave and appear around Christmas with names like Spoon Licker and Door Slammer. These are another unusual volcanic formation, caused when lava forms a lake (blocked from flowing by the pseudocraters) over boggy land. This time, instead of exploding thru the whole pool of lava, a pillar of steam escapes and cools the lava, creating pillars. Eventually, the rest of the lava drains, creating these shapes. Snorri lead us through a maze of characters and the provided us with a short trumpet concert in an area he called the Palace Hall.

Vogafjos Café (or Cow Shed Cafe) is located in half of an actual working milking shed that also had a bull and several calves in residence. This is a way to expand on the capabilities of a working farm – the food served was mostly raised by the café owners on their land.  After lunch, we went to a very large explosion crater at Vita, looked down onto the thermal electric plant at Krafla (captures steam from below and converts it to electricity for the island-wide grid), and stopped at the boiling sulphur mud pots at Namafjall. There were also a couple fumaroles there – with steam pouring out of rock piles.

Vita Explosion Crater

Volcanic mud pots

Jim walking thru fumarole steam

Our last stops in the volcanic area were at Grjotagja Springs and the rift zone created by eruptions in the area for 9 years in the 70s and 80s. The Springs had been a nice comfy bath-like temperature before the eruptions, but is now much warmer. More interesting was the rift zone where the North American and Eurasion plates pulled apart back then. There were also caves with warm pools of water below – they weren’t too far down, so I actually explored them – we were careful not to get too close – Jim did test the water and thought it was in the 115 degree range, but it started to get crowded and space was limited, so we escaped. A few minutes later, some less careful tourist fell in and got wet to above his knees. Lucky for him it was shallow and not too deep.

Inside of the rift zone cave

Straddling the North American and Eurasian tectonic plates (in theory)

After our ride home, we walked through the botanical garden and into the Catholic Church (primarily used by Polish immigrants) and the large Lutheran Church, designed by the same architect who did the cathedral in Reykjavik – the similarity in the designs was definitely noticeable. We learned that the genders sit in opposite sides of the aisle in Iceland, even for weddings – there is no grooms side or brides side, other than the men all sitting on the right (behind the groom) with the women on the left. 

We were on our own for dinner and decided to get bold and try sushi. A very different experience – miso soup was an actual serious BOWL of fish soup, a green tea request was delivered as black, and the rolls were huge and available as halves (thank heavens Jim asked and so we got 2.5 rolls instead of 3). Taste-wise it was a bit unusual too – hard to point out quite why – and very expensive – nearly $100 for 2 soups, 2 teas, and 2.5 rolls!

August 6 -- Whale Watching

We drove to Husavik for a whale-watching adventure, which I have to say was MUCH more successful than the two times we tried it in San Francisco. We started out wearing ALL our layers – shirt/sweater/wind-block fleece/rain jacket and rain pants, along with hat and gloves. They were handing out coveralls, so we finally agreed to add them too. We looked like blue Michelin People! BUT it was warm. I didn’t realize how warm til the end of the trip when I took off the coveralls and got a bit chilly!

The newest thing in Michelin fashions...

The wind was out of the Northeast (think Arctic Circle) and the direction the boat traveled meant we were traveling between the waves rather than into them. LOTS of side to side rocking. Not good. Plus, other groups who arrived first locked down the lower deck area and some in our group noticed a space a couple decks up so we went up for the view, which was very good. Unfortunately, the side to side rocking was also somewhat more noticeable. I did well for about an hour or more, then headed to the lower deck to avoid embarrassing myself and decorating the coveralls. Jim stayed up on the upper levels and since we both had cameras, we actually got quite a few photos of the humpback whales who showed themselves several times. Jim also saw a minke whale, but he came up and went back down, and I was resting at the side of the boat with my eyes closed waiting for the next sighting announcement, so missed it.

Three hours later we landed and had a lunch opportunity before meeting at the Whale Museum. My tummy improved on dry land, so we had $20 hamburgers (food is NOT cheap here….) and met the group at the museum. It was pretty interesting in showing the different kinds of whales and they even had skeletons of at least six kinds. Unfortunately, the enclosed space and my formerly unhappy but now maybe overloaded tummy suggested a rest or departure were in order. I found a chair, Jim finished the museum, and we went back outside to walk, where I felt much better. What we discovered in this tourist town on a Saturday was that virtually every souvenir type shop, except one, had closed at 2pm. Seems kind of short-sighted with bunches of tourists getting off the boats around 1, but maybe it works for them.

This was the other main attraction in Husavik, site of our whale-watching adventure. We did NOT go in...

Back in Akureyri, we got ready for dinner with a local family. We divided into two groups, and the 7 of us had a wonderful time with ‘our’ family. Probably was the most enjoyable and educational of all the family visits we have done on these trips. It didn’t hurt that they were fluent in English, but they were also very eager to discuss Iceland’s politics. The father, Bjorn, had been a rock musician and then a TV journalist until the crash here in 2007-08, when all the most experienced people were let go. The mom (Artis (ar-teese') is the executive director for a museum here. They both had kids in their late teens/early twenties from previous marriages along with a 3.5 yr old boy and almost 1 yr old girl. When Bjorn lost his job, he apparently became a househusband and has taken to writing books, including one about his job-loss experience….it is called Homecoming and features a photo of his youngest son on the cover. They expressed pleasure at paying 40% of their income in taxes to support their social programs – free school through University (including grad school), free health care, 9 months of baby leave, 2 years of jobless benefits, state-supported alcoholism rehab, etc. At the end of the evening, Bjorn played two piano pieces he had composed. Plus the food was really good – Bjorn has fishing rights on the lake he grew up on (Lake Myvatn: only 10 families can fish there and can only take 200 fish/year) and they served us fresh-caught lake trout with home made French chocolate cake and whipped cream for dessert. All in all, a terrific evening.

August 5 - Travel to Akureyri

After yesterday's bright sun, it was a shame to see heavy clouds this morning when we woke, but it did help us sleep better, not having the bright sunshine filtering thru the blackout drapes. Today was mostly spent on the bus, driving 345km, partially over gravel roads, to Akureyri, known as the capital of the north here. We did have a couple of interesting stops.

The first stop was at a reconstruction of Erik the Red's homestead. Because timber was scarce, home design used stone foundations, wood structural members, and sod coverings. The wood was joined to allow it to be easily broken down and carried to the next home site. For this reason, there is very little information about what homes in this era (800s) actually looked like. The supposition is that they are similar to homes in Norway, where the people originated. This had VERY short sleeping compartments and a couple rooms -- an ante-room or mud room at the front, a communal living/dining/weaving/sleeping room, and a food pantry. The sleeping compartments were only about 4 ft wide, not because people were that short but because they slept in a sitting position, the better to defend their home if needed. Jim and I happened to sit in the middle bed, the main position, so we became the re-enactors when the guide demonstrated the helmets and dress of the people. We also walked up to the area of the original home, but the wind was nasty and being early, it was still chilly, so we beat a hasty retreat for the warm bus.

Mr & Mrs Erik the Red

In the afternoon, we reached a horse farm where we were given lunch and a talk and riding demonstration of Icelandic horses. The original horses came from many countries, but horse import was eliminated maybe in the 1400s, so the breed has become island specific. Because of disease fears, horses cannot be brought to the country today, and if they leave for any reason (like a competition or a sale) they cannot be brought back in. The family we visited had a large ranch of 8200 acres supporting an extended family group (4 homes), with 100 horses and a small herd of cattle. They have been very successful in raising and training horses. A fully trained horse that is not good enough for breeding might sell for $50,000, and brood mares and stallions can go for 10 times that as a starting point.

Photo of professional photo of champion stallion

Their training regimen is unusual by US standards. Foals stay with their mothers a full year, then are kept in the pastures without any training for another 3-4 years. They say this develops the horse's native intelligence and independence. The horses are also unusual for 2 natural gaits that are not found in other breeds. The Toelt is a smooth, fast walking pace, and may be similar to the Tennessee Walking Horse. The other pace is not normally maintained as long and is called a pace, apparently a bit faster than a gallop. The 12 year old daughter and her cousin demonstrated on the horses, which were quite friendly and approachable. They are shorter than many horses in the US, but NOT considered ponies.

From the farm, we were only a short distance from Akureyi, a port town at the base of a fjord. There was a European cruise ship (looked like no more than 200 passengers) docked for the day. We wandered around the town and found a wonderful black boiled wool jacket on sale (half price!), so I made my first serious purchase and immediately wore it to dinner.

20,000 population is a big city by Icelandic standards: Akureyri

August 4 -- Explore Snaefellnes Peninsula

Today was our sunniest, warmest day yet. We walked on a couple beaches, lift heavy weights, ate lunch outside, sample fermented shark with a schnapps beverage called "Black Death" and went for a boat ride to see birds.

Just before we got to our first official stop, we made a quick stop for a waterfall that reminded me of Bridalveil Falls in Yosemite.We continued to Budir and walked over a lava field to a 'shell beach' (sand from ground up seashells). Back on the bus, we made an unscheduled stop to photograph the main volcano on this peninsula, Snaefelljokull, which is normally covered by clouds. The mountain is famous as the one that is featured in Jules Verne's Journey to the Center of the Earth.

Budahraun sand and lava

Snaefelljokull with an interesting cloud 'hat'.

We continued on to Hellnar, where there were magnificent basalt formations along the coast, including a couple of arches and collapsed caverns on the sea. At one point, looking west, you could have sworn we were in Mendocino instead of Iceland. When we finished our walk here, we learned that our bus wouldn't start, so we had a wait to find someone to help with a jump start.

Basalt columns and honeycomb, but NO railings!

Jim over a collapsed cave

Kittiwakes nesting inside the cave remnants

Lunch above the beach

A bit further on, we had lunch on the deck of a VERY small restaurant. So far the meals here have been VERY fish oriented. This was the 3rd day in a row that fish soup was featured. As a non-soup fan (I do like a few...), I jumped at the chance for a vegetable quiche instead, which was a pleasant change and very good. Jim said the soup was great too. We finished it off with a cheesecake made from Icelandic yogurt (skyr) and it was also yummy. The weather was wonderful -- we even got out of our coats for a bit.

Our illustrious guide recovering from a strenuous morning of guiding.

Then we went to a black sand and pebble beach that featured the wreckage of a boat from 1948 and a collection of heavy stones that were used as sort of an employment test in by-gone days. The beach was awash with polished basalt rocks of all sizes. I probably picked up a pound of them! There were also 4 large stones weighing 50, 100, 200, & 300 lbs. that were used to gauge strength and employability in the past. Our driver and guide each easily managed the 100 lb stone, but neither were up to the 200. No one in the group wanted to give it a shot, so I lifted the 50 pounder, just to have us represented. Jim could have done the 100 lb stone with ease, but declined the 'opportunity'.

Snorri's 100 lb rock.....

My weenie 50 pounder...

At this point, we had a lot of driving to do and I dozed off, partially to avoid any potential problems with motion sickness. We made an interim stop in a small village to pick up adult beverages to try with the upcoming shark sample. Snorri sang the praises of the Black Death, and he was the only one who ventured a purchase. Possibly the most interesting part of the liquor store was where it was located -- inside a knitting shop! All liquor stores in Iceland are state-owned, but the country can't afford to set up shops in all the little villages around, so they license shops in smaller places. In this case it was the yarn shop, but it could have been a hardware store or a florists' or a gas station. A couple ladies bought yarn too.

Back on the road, I dozed til the shark stop. We first walked back a shed at the back of the property -- when we got there we quickly understood its location -- VERY stinky! The Greenland Shark is poisonous unless it is properly treated. They have no kidneys so their uric acid stays in their bodies, where it is offset by another naturally occurring chemical. Depending on the concentration of this other stuff, shark meat can be okay or not. It turns out that this extra stuff also works as an antifreeze, and since the water around Greenland is typically within 2 degrees of freezing, the sharks there have high concentrations of it. Luckily (?) you can allow the shark to hang, drain, and ferment, and they become safe to eat. If the Vikings hadn't been desperate to get enough to eat over 1000 years ago, we probably wouldn't care. We each got a small sample of shark to be chased with a shot of Black Death. One lady went back for seconds!! I tried my best to avoid the whole process, but was shamed into it and barely survived.

Draining shark meat

Photos of Greenland Sharks

That evening, we headed out on the fjord for a bird-watching boat trip and a seafood dinner. We saw bunches of puffins, kittiwakes, cormorants, and fulmars, including some chicks. Too many photos to put here! I uploaded some to Picasa, but could have added more. Picasa Photos Then the crew dropped kind of a dredge and hauled up the freshest seafood you could find and people (not me!) had scallops and sea urchins right then and there. This was followed by a nice cruise back to the harbor while we dined on more fish below. This was all a bit too much raw fish for me, but Jim enjoyed it.

Still in the capture net

Sea urchin and an itty bitty starfish in a broken scallop shell

August 3 - Drive to Stykkisholmur

This morning, we left Reykjavik to start our exploration of the western half of Iceland. The island is entirely volcanic, and being stretched because it sits on top of the mid-Atlantic ridge. Millions of years ago, it was MUCH narrower -- the eastern-most and western-most rocks came from the same eruptions. The island is getting about an inch wider each year. You can really see the volcanic impact as you drive. Areas where there were more recent eruptions are barely vegetated. Older areas show the layer upon layer of lava flow that built up the hills, and the results of erosion that created scree down the hills and eventually arable land at the bottom. There are a lot of fjords, formed by fingers of lava reaching out where lava had flowed before and leaving deep bays digging into the country side. One of these bays became a naval base for the British, and in mid-1941, for the US during WWII. Most remnants of the bases are gone now.

Hvalfjordur -- Whale Fjord -- site of WWII British and US Navies

 At a rest stop, we looked for and FOUND Magnum Bars -- these are the world's best ice cream bars, which we discovered in Turkey and looked for in the US unsuccessfully, until they recently appeared at Safeways. These were really expensive (over $5 each vs. $3.50 in Turkey and about $1.50 in the US) but we indulged anyway. A girl needs her 10am snack!

Our next stop was the largest hot spring in Iceland, which supplies 2 cities, about 40 miles away, with hot water. If you have seen Yellowstone, you have some idea of this, but the water here is boiling as it appears and comes out at an astounding rate. Even the trickles of water down the hill above the spring were steaming. I think if I were thirsty and came upon a stream, I would be checking the temp carefully before just gulping it in!

Boiling hot springs

 There are also a lot of waterfalls where ever you look and we drove to a set of two in the western country side. One is called Lava Falls -- water is literally falling out of the rock, apparently from nowhere, into the river. The other is Children's Falls. The story is, a LONG time ago, 2 kids were left at home while everyone went to church. The kids walked over a rock bridge across a falls and fell in so their mom destroyed the rock bridge so no one else would get hurt. The place was pretty amazing, whatever the truth is. There was also an interesting white flower called the cotton flower -- looked kind of like a smallish cotton boll on a stem. It used to be used to make wicks for the oil lamps.

Lava Falls -- the water seeps out of the rocks

Site of former rock bridge at Barnafoss (Children's Falls)

Upper part of Barnafoss

Next we stopped at Reykholt, home of Snorri Sturluson. Born in 1179, he married well and became a writer and diplomat. His writing is still understandable to the Icelanders, a measure of how little the language has changed. He is famous for his sagas. He ran afoul of the King of Norway, and was assassinated when he was 62. We saw the hot pool where he bathed, a possible burial site, and a cute little church now used primarily for weddings.

Poppy with 2 visitors at Reykholt

Lunch was in a small town (Borganes) that features The Settlement Museum, which showed how Iceland was settled. The most surprising thing to me, (considering that on the way from the airport to Reykjavik our guide told us we were playing the game "Spot the First Tree" -- a landscape tree on the edge of town) was that Iceland was originally heavily wooded but got logged out early on for building and firewood. They haven't quite got the idea of reforestation, tho they are working on it.

After Borganes, I snoozed on the bus til we got to the Snaefellsness Peninsula, where we will spend the next couple days. We were challenged to walk up a holy mountain, Helgafell, without talking or looking back. If we touched the remnants of a small church and made a wish, it was sure to come true. Fortunately for me, thought it was a bit steep, it was a short walk and I managed to make it 15-20 minutes without a word, as did Jim. Now we can only hope our wishes are granted.

Snorri explains the challenge before we start.

Jim at the top of Helgafell

I watched for sunset tonight -- around 10:30. Time for me to go to bed even tho I am still wide awake.....

10:30 PM in Stykkisholmur