Iceland - Day 9. Seriosuly, Bjork?!?

Well, today we completed the Ring Road. After just over 2000km in our car, we arrived back in Reykjavik. Over the past week and a half, Teri and I have traveled around a thoroughly beautiful place unlike any other we have been to. You've seen the pictures. The geological diversity is unmatched anywhere for such a small place. We have 8 rolls of film and 300 digital photos. Don't worry though. You won't be asked to look at them unless you want to. We took the one above earlier today at a turnoff just off the Ring Road. It's barely mentioned on the map of the region we were in. But there it was, a 70m waterfall into a stream with rainbows in it.

It's odd that the natural marvels occur in a place with so few citizens. Nature creates the beauty here for itself. And maybe for the sheep and horses. The volcanic activity and glacial movements assure the view is always in flux. And though the towns we have passed through have been populated by 1000 people, or 800 people, or if it is big, 6000 people, I still find it striking that there are only 300,000 Icelanders. That's the size of Toledo, OH. When they told us Iceland's silver medal in handball was the smallest country ever to medal in a team sport, it was weird to think that Iceland had such a small population, and yet we had traveled through almost all of her towns. Yes, 70% of the country is uninhabitable. Yes, the weather is fairly harsh, even in late summer, but after driving through it, Iceland seems like it would be a country of a few million. Back in Reykjavik, it just seems that across the entire land we were playing in, more than Toledo, OH existed.

Here's an example to explain. Teri and I were wandering through the botanical gardens today in Reykjavik. and stepped into a cafe. Sitting at the table with her friends was Bjork. Now she's not that famous, but she's probably the most famous person in Iceland since Leif Ericksson. She's the joke everyone made when they heard we're heading out here. "Say 'hi' to Bjork" was EVERYONE's joke. The ridiculousness of it all compounded when we ran (near literally) into her again, walking into a book store on Reykjavik's busiest shopping street. Is Iceland this small? Do people routinely see Bjork or Magnus Ver Magnusson in cafe's or shopping?

Another example: everyone is listed in the phonebook. Including the Prime Minister. Probably Bjork too. I can call them right now. Then I can walk up to the parliament building and walk in and say hi. The building itself looks like an small educational building at liberal arts college in the middle of nowhere. I'd say DePauw, but my school's buildings were larger than this. Hell, DU was nearly as large as this building. It's just a striking realization to the country's actual size when things like this smack you in the face. And you can tell Icelanders enjoy this aspect immensely.

It is an entire country as a small town. No one locks their doors. Every driveway and farm along the Ring Road has a sign marking what it is. Not an address or street sign, but a sign like you are entering a town; reflective and official. Strollers - with babies - are left outside a cafe while the person pushing it grabs a quick coffee. There is an incredible trust/respect for personal space and belongings that you only find in places where everyone knows each other.

Some other quirks:
** Is it racist to say that all Icelandic children look alike, yet none of them look like their parents? Teri has really blonde hair. But hers looks brown compared to these kids' mop tops. Every physical stereotype about Scandanavians presents itself in Icelandic children. White, White, White, hair, and bright, bright, bright, blue eyes. Large physical traits and clearly homemade clothes. (Though by the time they are teenagers, I'd say half have turned goth - probably also fulfilling a stereotype). Here's the thing though. There are shockingly few toe headed adults. The adults still have the Viking traits of high cheek bones, sharp chins, and prominent brows, but everyone has brown hair.

** The above mentioned phonebook lists people by their first names. (Therefore, the J section, for Jon, is very long - but not too long, because the country only has the population of TOLEDO!). This is because the way people are named here is different than most western countries. When two are married, the woman does not take the husband's surname (in fact it used to be against the law). However, when the child is born, they get a unique first name and their last name becomes the first name of the father + son or dottir. Hence, Thor Bjornson is Thor, son of Bjorn. And Anna Sigurdottir is actually Anna, daughter of Sigur. This probably is why genealogists love this place. It becomes very easy to track lineage. And this also means everyone addresses each other by their first name. Even the Prime Minister. There is no Mr. or Mrs.

There are others, but you will have to discover them on your own when you visit. And when you do, find Teri and I to talk about the trip. I think we both came to the conclusion that it would be hard to live here (not that we ever really wanted to), despite all of the convenient perks. The dark winters would be tough to get through. The smallness would probably become pretty apparent. And if you lived outside of Reykjavik, the simplicity of life might not be totally enjoyable. But it is appealing. There is plenty still to discover so we really hope to come back sometime. We didn't even get up on a glacier. I never tried whale or shark or puffin. We never visited any of the islands off the coast. We left the great park Asbyrgi unexplored, and we easily could have spent a few more days hiking in the southern and eastern coasts.

However, we leave tomorrow totally happy with this trip. Breathtaking. Unique. Friendly. Even Little Yoder had a great time. S/he kicked his way all the way around the Ring Road. S/he'll have to join us the next time we come out. We have one last trip to the famous Blue Lagoon and it's hot springs on the way to the airport. tomorrow. An afternoon of warm baths and soothing mud to cake on our skin before getting on a plane for 5 hours at 5pm. All part of the loving good bye Iceland leaves you with. It was a lovely time, but Big Papi probably misses Teri.

Day 8 - Iceland

We rounded the final turn today and are coming down the home stretch. The scene you see above was found at our first stop, Jokulsarlon. It is here that a glacier has retreated about 5km in 70 years. What it has left behind is two things. One is access to the Ring Road. The glacier used to run right up to the black sand beach making it very hard to get to Reykjavik from all points east. Second, a very deep lagoon filled with icebergs has formed. Just another eye popping scene provided by Iceland's Route 1. These icebergs break off the glacier, float around the lagoon for a few years losing mass, then float out to sea and melt away. See, global warming has its good points.

We took a duck boat out into the lagoon and learned all sorts of fun facts about glacial ice. (Its 1500 hundred years old. Its 5x more dense than normal ice - making it perfect for drinks as it takes longer to melt. 90% (!) of each glacier is underwater.) As the boat petered around the lagoon, Teri and I gawked and chatted up the guide. It was quite an experience.

When we got off the boat we wandered down to the beach. The black sand was littered with boulder sized chunks of ice that looked like someone casually dropped billions of dollars worth of diamonds all over. The contrast in color was almost as striking as the fact that Teri and I were standing on a black sand beach in Iceland surrounded by icebergs at the base of a glacier. WTF, mate?

From there we moved on to the gateway to the Skaftafell National Park. We weren't able to venture too far in because our little toy wind up car can't go off-roading. However, the information center offered a great hike up to a glacier, and fantastic video of the massive volcanic eruption in 1996.

See, in September 1996 there was a major earthquake followed by a volcanic eruption underneath the Vatnajokull glacier at Grimvotn. Over the next couple of days there was a 10km high cloud of steam that shot up in the air. Then the glacier began to cave in along the caldera as the lava below melted the ice at a rate of 5000m3/second. This unbelievable amount of water began to collect in a lake under the glacier, pushing it up from the bottom. After nearly six weeks, in early November, this lake burst through the glacier on the southern side of the glacier and rushed toward the sea. Ice chunks the size of three story buildings floated like they were sticks in a river. A 900m bridge was broken and twisted, then disappeared in the sea. Anything in the way of this 20km wide "jokulhlaup" was pushed to sea. When the glacier was sufficiently drained, all that was left below was a few more streams running through the sandur (huge, flat, barren, wasteland of rocks and debris). See if you can find any of the video on you tube. The entire process was filmed by aroused geologists with video footage justifying and proving their lifetime of research.

After learning about the massive river that went running down the glacier, we decided to go check it out. Our short hike ended at the base of one finger of this ice giant. Because of the cloud cover, the ice, water, and sky all blended together as the same dirty white color. Except for the green lichen, the view looked like an Ansel Adams photo. Our pictures however do not.

We finished our day with a trek across another sandur, then behind some large green plateaus and ended at the beach side town of Vik. Cliffs are rising above the town on all sides and there is a rock formation out in the water that looks like a church organ. There are only 290 people that live here and the town church sits above, looking over them. This is also the safest place to run to in case the volcano on the glacier above the town erupts again. If it happens tonight, we'll only have 25 minutes to get to the high ground. Hope to talk to you all tomorrow.

Day 7 - Iceland. Teri's take: "Redonkulous"

I know, I know … every night we write our post and talk about the intense beauty of Iceland. We talk about its vastness, its uniqueness, the expected unbelievable surprise that’s certain to lie around the next bend. Every day we seem to be floored by the beauty – and today would prove to be no different. Today we basically drove through the set for “Return of the King”.

We started off the day leaving our room in Lake Myvatn (which overlooked the Lake and came with our own herd of Icelandic horses) early in the morning, as we had a long day’s trip ahead of us getting to Hofn, a small fishing village in the southeast corner of Iceland. Our first stop, however, was just 5km out of Lake Myvatn at Hevrir, a geothermal field of boiling mud pits, steam vents, sulfur deposits and fumaroles. The liquid exceeds 200 degrees, and is not only rank with the smell of sulfur but actually has sulfuric acid in contents. We were told the best time to visit Hevrir was the morning – and I think that’s because the wind is usually blowing north, which means the smell drifting away from you. Much appreciated at 8:30am.

We continued driving for the next 200km through an empty lunar landscape. Seriously, envision the moon, and that’s what we were driving through – black, basalt, barren land. After a few hours, we moved from the moon to a lush mountain valley; from a lush mountain valley to the rugged, untamed beach; and finally to end at the Vatnajkull glacier. It was a great scenic tour, and it made me very glad that we decided to drive the Ring Road from north to south. I feel like these last few stops are the perfect end to our road trip.

Tomorrow we’ll leave Hofn and it’ll be all glaciers all day. We’re hitting up the Stafakell National Park, the largest national park in Europe, visiting Jokulsarlon along the way (a bay full of icebergs), as we move ahead to another small village, Vik. Vik will be our last stop on this wonderful road trip, as we’ll head home to Reykjavik the following day.
Until then …

Iceland - Day 6. Settle down, Iceland.

Well, Iceland showed us some incredible stuff today. It was almost like she was bragging. "Hey look, I have waterfalls. Hey look, I have volcanoes. Hey look I have pseudocraters in the middle of a lake. Hey look, my beaches are all black sand. Hey look. my arches national park was made from lava. Oh and did I mention you can see this all within 20km of one spot?"

Settle down, Iceland. We get it. You're awesome.

So we left the farm this morning bright and early to hit the road. Like we said, we had a lot to get accomplished today, but we didn't expect the stunning uniqueness of what was ahead. We hit seven major sites today. Six of which we found around the incredible Lake Myvatn. We'll get to that in a bit, and will probably dwell on it for a while too.

However, our drive was short to the first spot. Above is a picture of Godafoss. This is a simple and beautiful waterfall just off the Ring Road. But it is not all good looks. This waterfall also holds special importance to Icelandic lore. In 1000 AD, Iceland converted from paganism to Christianity as the national religion. The country's bishop meditated at the Pingvellir (see day 2) for 24 hours and decided that Iceland would become a Christian nation. On his long walk home, he sadly threw all his pagan idols into the waterfall you see above, as a sign of closure. Hence, the name Godafoss, or waterfall of the gods.

The bulk of our day was spent at Lake Myvatn though. And Myvatn spends it's life on top of the Mid Atlantic Ridge. This explains a lot of what we saw. Our first stop was a brisk but scenic climb up Vindbelgjarfjall. Try saying that three times fast. Actually, try saying it once. This was a steep climb up loose basalt. There was a small path, but the view at the top was to show the entire lake and all the places we were to be heading during the day. Teri bravely made it half way up before the baby demanded her to stop. Wisely, she listened, and forced me to finish so I could show her the photographs. It was hard to take pictures today at Lake Myvatn. The range of beauty really stretches from horizon to horizon and you can't decide what needs to be in the picture. We kind of decided not to do long trains of photos of horizons for this trip as it is wasteful and hard to look at. So our pictures really only show portions of views.

The middle of our day was spent around the southern part of the lake at Skutustadagigar and Hofoi. The first is a collection of psuedocraters you can hike around. A psuedocrater is a crater about 100m across and formed when lava hardens over water. The water then heats up and violently explodes with boiling steam and flying lava rocks. The landscape sort of looks like a British Open golf hole, only if it was played by giants. After a quick lunch of chips, cottage cheese, and half a roast beef sandwich we headed to Hofoi. This had to be fake. Somehow, a small forest of evergreens grew naturally on a peninsula between all these rock formations and otherwise barren landscapes. There was a small meadow, berry bushes, and lots of different birds.

As we got to the east side, the volcanic activity became even more apparent. This side of the lake houses Dimmuborgir and Hverfell. I'll let Lonely Planet explain Hverfell:
"a classic tephra ring. This near symmetrical crater appeared 2500 years ago in a cataclysmic eruption of the existing ludentarhio complex. Rising 463 meters from the ground and stretching 1040m across it is a massive and awe inspiring landmark in Myvatn."
Basically, it is an enormous crater made of loose gravel. Unfortunately there was no lava inside. Teri and the kid made it up this hike, as it was a tad easier. It was good because the views from atop the crater were the best of the day.

Before this, we were at Dimmuborgir. This is very similar to Arches National Park or The Canyonlands in Utah, except these were smaller and made of lava rocks from steam vents 2000 years ago. Little shrubs and lichen grow on the sides and you are walking below them like you were in an Indian Jones Movie. There are steep crevasses throughout so it is advised not to wander off the trail.

We were drop jawed see these sites one right after another. Each being only about 5 miles from the previous, yet they were so different.

We ended the day at the Myvatn Nature Baths, one of the famous hot springs in the country. Here the water was between 90 and 100, and was a perfect way to end the long tiring day of exploring. Don't worry Grandmothers to be and worrywarts. Teri was very careful. She was only in the 102 degree water for 30 minutes. Kidding. She was never in anything warmer than a soothing bath, and left after only about 10 minutes. She was drunk though.

Kidding again. Calm down. That should be it for today. we have a long drive tomorrow morning before we get to Hofn on the southeastern coast - from volcanoes to Glaciers and beaches in about four hours.

Check for pictures tomorrow. Holy crap, was today spectacular.

Iceland - Day 5. A Break

Well, we reached the midway point of our travels today. It's too bad. We've loved the trip so much, and have really enjoyed touring around the country. Today we awoke to this scene outside our little cabin window. You are looking at Eyjafjordur, which is the name of the body of water, not the horse. It was a slow day today. We took some time and slept in, shopped around for souvenirs, and did very little. Much to Teri's delight we even worked in a nap. We haven't moved from yesterday and are still at the farmhouse. However, tomorrow we head out toward Lake Myvatn on what promises to be a jam packed last half of the trip. So today's respite was probably a good call.

While wandering around Akureyri and its surrounding towns, we stumbled into an Icelandic Christmas store. We are unsure of the exact details but Christmas here involves a very large ugly woman who lives in a mountain cave. She has a dopey husband, 13 "yule lads" which seem to be like the hidden people, as well as a black cat. The story used to be that this big, nasty woman would collect the bad children of the towns and taken them back to her cave and bake them. However, this tale became too scary for Icelandic kids and as a country, Iceland changed the story. Now, for the 13 nights before Christmas children set out their best shoe in the window sill and each night a different lad comes down from the mountains and leaves a present. Also, a pig is involved somewhere. We're not sure where, but there were a lot of pigs, including one pulling a sleigh. So maybe it is like Rudolph.

One thing we haven't touched on is the food here. I have yet to find puffin (which may be out of season) or fermented shark. There has been plenty of (passed on) opportunities to buy what seems to be fish jerky. I WILL try the shark before I leave, and am constantly looking for puffin and reindeer. Teri and I have been getting by on street food and stuff we make in the kitchens at the places we stay. It isn't glamorous, but it has been fairly good. Also, it's not like if you spend more you get really good food. There isn't really a true Iceland dish, though skyr, an Icelandic yogurt with a thicker consistency and slightly more bitter taste, is about as close as you get that isn't something you'd see Andrew Zimmern eat on the Travel Channel. I enjoy skyr and have been eating it every breakfast. Teri loves the pastries.

What I am getting at is that you save a lot of money by eating the lamb hot dogs, or donner kababs people sell in little markets or street kiosks. You also don't miss out on what true Icelanders eat by doing this because they are mostly eating here as well. At an average restaurant, meals will be between $20 and $40/person and usually not great. Whereas at my favorite sandwhich shop, Batur Hlloli, I got a footlong "boat" (sub) and a soda for about $11. Expensive, but not bad. And Teri got a soda and pizza for just about 6 bucks from a bakery.

A final note on the food. There have been no sightings of Starbucks, McDonald's or Burger Kings, but the country seems to love Subway and Quiznos. We've also seen a Pizza Hut and KFC, and if you want to shell out $22, you can get a medium one topping Domino's Pizza. We passed.

Tomorrow we're up early to see more volcanic hot spots!