|
|
|
|
Iceland - August 2003
This was our second visit to Iceland. In 2001 we stopped there for 4 days while returning from Norway, and what we saw in that limited time convinced us that we wanted a longer visit some day. The 2003 trip was with a group…”Walking The World (for people 50 and better)”. We had done New Zealand, Costa Rica and Norway with this tour firm in past years.
Iceland is about the size of Kentucky. There are only 260,000 people in the whole country, 150,000 of those live in the capitol, Reykjavik. A quarter live in the next largest “city” Akureyri, which leaves about 45,000 scattered about in small villages and towns, or just farms. It is sparse to say the least. The landscape is quite varied and remarkable. There are volcanic mountains, huge lava and boulder fields, BIG glaciers and glacial valleys, iceberg lagoons, arctic desert, sea coasts and fjords, glacial rivers, canyons and more waterfalls than you can count. Not much in the way of trees or arable land. Much is covered with mosses half a foot thick of every color green imaginable, and grasses. The air is clean. Anyone who says Iceland is flat and colorless has either not been there, or just saw the area around Keflavik airport near Reykjavik.
There is much geothermal activity, and this is where the country gets most of it’s electric power and heat for homes and buildings . In the countryside you will see sheep, cows, smallish horses, foxes, and birds. Icelanders would not look out of place in America, are friendly and well educated. Most speak good English (as well as Danish and Icelandic…which is incomprehensible)! Icelandic children are adorable.
Our group of 16 from all over the USA, and tour guides Kathleen (USA) and Brian, a native Icelander, came together at Reykjavik on day 1. Over our 13 day tour we stayed in six hotels and inns along the way. This route mainly took the ring road (Route 1) in a small bus counterclockwise around the whole island for 1200 miles. This two lane “main” road hugs the southern and east coast and northern fjords. The closest we got to the arctic circle was about 30 miles. Our weather was unexpectedly good, for it typically rains in Iceland 60% of the time. What rain we got did not do much to interrupt our outside activities. Temperatures ran in the 50’s and low 60’s during the day, low 50”s at “night”. The day we left Reykjavik to come home it was in the low 70’s and sunny. Night is in quotes above because in summer they don’t do Night! It is light enough to read a newspaper outside any time.
Our routine was to breakfast at 7 or 7:30, load up our gear, and bus to a trailhead, National park or some special place like Thingvillier where Iceland created the first parliament in the world in the year 940. We would then hike on well defined trails for 4 to 7 hours, taking a packed lunch break, or stopping at a cafeteria . Most of our walking was in wilderness, up and down mountains. Almost no town walking or shopping. Trails were mostly narrow and rocky, often interrupted by glacial streams which required hopping from rock to rock across them…or, as in one case, fording barefoot in water that was melting from glaciers. Brrrr. The scenery was breathtaking! Pristine and primordial are words that come to mind. Spectacular waterfalls. After our hike we would board the bus and head either back to the inn or ----on to a new one. Dinner at 8 and then bed. Not much partying…too worn out. But I must say…all in our group (some in their 70’s) were darn good hikers.
Now to the photos for this report. There are 5 batches of three photos per screen. The commentary starts with the top photo of a set of three.
Top: A typical farm near Skogar on the south
coastal plain. The mountain in the background is the ubiquitous purple-gray and
you can see the green mosses and grasses hugging the sides. Most of the farms
and small towns have white buildings with red roofs. On the right hand side is a
stack of hay bales wrapped up marshmallow- wise in white poly to keep them
dry.….very typical of most farms. We stopped at one farm in the north to watch
these bailers and wrappers at work.
Middle: A view of a coastal plain and farms from
one of the mountains we ascended.
Bottom: Skogafoss (waterfalls in Iceland are called “fosses”) near the village of Skogar. You can see my wife in red at the bottom…gives scale to the size of the falls. We could see this falls from our hotel room window. Notice the green moss growing on the vertical sides of the mountain to the left.
Top: A lighthouse on a coastal cliff. We saw several lighthouses on our trip, but this was the fanciest.
Middle: A lava field covered with several inches of spongy moss. Our guide and driver Brian (Brjann in Icelandic) is in the middle, Pat in the red rain jacket. This is to show that even though they are jagged rocks, they are covered with enough moss to make it soft as a pillow. Brjann was well educated and traveled, and a professional musician…plays bassoon in the Iceland Symphony Orchestra. While driving he would entertain us with his hilarious short versions of Icelandic sagas.
Bottom: A typical ravine cut by a glacial stream…looks much smaller in this photo than it actually is.
Top: Fairly typical scene for many of our hikes.
Middle: Puffins on the side of a steep and high cliff (headland) --the ocean below.
Bottom: The Icelander who took us on a “hay ride” to see the puffins. The hay ride did not involve hay at all. We stood in a wagon pulled by his huge tractor as he towed us across miles of marsh and tidewater up to several feet deep. Our destination was a headland out in the ocean! In addition to puffins at the top of that headland there were Skuas…large nasty sea gulls that would not hesitate to buzz our noggins when we got close to their nesting grounds.
Top: Our gang taking a much needed break above a tongue of glacier Vatnajokull near Skaftafell National Park. This glacier is the largest in Europe (Iceland considers themselves part of Europe).
Middle: Pat standing near a marsh…you can see that the mountain in the background is no small affair. Iceland is not flat…as some people seem to think.
Bottom: At our inn at Hofn, after dinner we are entertained by an Icelandic dance troupe (many more dancers than photo captures). An accordion provides the music. We all have to join in.
Top: A fantastic boulder field caused by the collapse of a volcanic rim many years ago. These boulders are the size of locomotives and slid miles down the glacier that was present during the era of the collapse. Guide Brian is fetching a map from a box to guide us on the trail through the maze of boulders.
Middle: Crossing a glacial stream in the bolder field. Kathleen, our American tour director is on the right with the light blue backpack.
Bottom: An Iceland sunset at Myvatn. This sunset lasted about an hour, but the sky never got really dark.
THE END
