Hofn was where we awoke to find ourselves totally fogged in. We were given a postcard picture of the sunny view from our room to realize that the view should include three glaciers that are about forty km away beyond a beautiful stretch of ocean and beach. Today we will drive about 260 km.
Jokulsarlon was our first stop
. Here we took an amphibious vehicle tour of the lagoon that has formed because the glacier has retreated over the past century. The glacier had been calving icebergs and we toured between these learning about theses ice wonders and photographing to our hearts' content. We then went to the black beach for some close-ups of icebergs. We learned that the blue colour results from waterlogged parts of the ice,due to rain or the iceberg flipping over, reflecting light only in the blue range .
About 30 km of our drive was through a field of black gravel with very little to no vegetation due to an eruption in the area about twenty years ago under the glacier. This eruption covered the area in small rock and ash causing what looked like a desert of black sand as far as the eye could see.
Holarjokull is the next glacier viewing area we visited that comes down from the same gigantic Vatnajokull Glacier, the largest in the country or Europe for that matter
. Here we walked about a quarter km to a hill to view the ice. Minna tripped over a rock in the path and became airborne for about four feet distance, twisted onto her side and landed on her right side thankfully not hitting her head or landing on her wrists or hands. Thankfully Howard was there to encourage and force her to keep walking to see the view that helped her keep moving and not dwell on the fall as she was quite shaken up. Chivalrously he held her hand. Such a mensch. She became sore, but not at him.
We stayed overnight near the city of Vik in a small but very cool hotel called Volcano Hotel. It lies under the evil sister volcano (Katla) that had not yet erupted after the big one three years ago as it usually does. Yes, that is the one that sent up so much ash that it ruined air travel for days in April of 2010. It usually does! It is in a longer period than normal of calm, but there is an evacuation plan in place that can clear this area of Iceland in 30 minutes. They do not know how long it takes us to pack! We stayed at the hotel for a wonderful dinner of Arctic char with melted butter and garlic yogurt sauces, a Chilean Chardonnay and homemade vanilla ice cream with chocolate sauce.
Tomorrow we go to Eyjafjallajokull volcano - the famous one of the 2010 eruption.
Glaciers in the south
Thursday, September 26, 2013
Vik, East, Iceland
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