ICELAND, GREENLAND & ARCTIC 2014: 2 Vik to Lake Myvatn, Iceland

Friday, August 15, 2014

After a brutal night fighting foul feather duvets which caused havoc with my allergies, which Marilynn cured by using the cover of the duvet and a couple of towels for sheets, we obviously fell into a deep sleep, as we slept right through breakfast. Marilynn woke up half an hour after check out time, which was at 11 AM. We finally arrived at the desk at noon where the very nice lady receptionist said not to worry about the time – her husband also has an allergy to feathers so she understood.

The hotel restaurant does not open for lunch, so we drove back to the place we had drinks before dinner last night for sustenance. For about an hour and a half in rain showers we crossed broad lava fields, including debris from the big eruption under the Eyjafjallajokull glacier that in 2010 shut down airports across Europe. There were also areas of farm land nestled against the high escarpment, usually with their own waterfall cascading down the cliff behind. There were so many high waterfalls along this stretch that we quit pointing them out to one another! It was 5C (41F) this morning, and it rained on and off all day. The warmest it got for a short while was 15.5C (60F) with strong winds.

The glacier we hiked into yesterday was an arm of the Myrdalsjokull glacier, and today's spectacular views were of the biggest glacier in Iceland, Vatnajokull. As we drove past Fjallsarion we noticed water with icebergs floating in it, so turned in to find a small lake created by an arm of the Vatnajokull. The many icebergs had calved from the glacier. We spent some time walking along the shores of the lake within only a few feet of beached icebergs.

A short drive later we came to a much larger display of floating ice at Jokulsarlon Glacial Lagoon. A 1,500 meter (4,920 ft) long, powerful river runs from the lagoon under a highway suspension bridge to the ocean, carrying with it smaller icebergs. The larger ones hit bottom at the beginning of the river, and sit until the running water melts them down enough to float out to sea. The bridge is designed to have its entire centre section break loose in case of a surge of water sufficiently strong and deep to carry big bergs into it. The Breidamerkursandur arm of the Vatnajokull glacier at the end of the quite large lake is very wide, and calves off ice regularly. There are various boat tours, including in amphibious "ducks" on the 100 meter (328 ft) deep lake.

For much of the rest of the drive to Hofn we could see glacial arms crowding down gaps in the high, snowy mountains and at times could see the edge of thee ice cap itself.

Once at Hofn we quickly found the very nice Hofn hotel and checked in. This is lobster central, with a very important crayfish-lobster fishing industry. Hofn has an excellent harbour, the first we have seen on this coast, and there were a lot of lobster boats tied up, along with rescue ships equipped to brave the worst of storms.

Our hotel, the receptionist said, has was one of the three best lobster restaurants in the town, but we took the advice of Marget at Iceland Travel who said the Humarhofanin restaurant prepares the best in all Iceland. Fortunately we arrived early, as the restaurant was soon packed, and they do not accept reservations. The meal was fabulous, although pricey. After dinner we drove around the port, and out onto a point of land were the road ends, taking in the majestic scenery. From the balcony of our hotel the entire coastline we drove today was visible, along with the icecap and four of the major glacial arms, including the two where we stopped .

Saturday, August 16, 2014

The roads in Iceland are narrow, with no shoulder, but so far have been in excellent condition. Even gravel roads were smooth and well maintained. So far the roads have been fairly straight, with lots of places to overtake slower vehicles. The highway speed limit is 90 kph (56 mph), but I've noticed locals drive about 100 (62), and I'm perhaps a bit above that. There is very little traffic, making driving good fun. Bridges along the route are usually one lane wide – the first vehicle there has the right of way. When skirting the ocean there are some dramatic drops down sheer cliffs into the sea with no guard rails.

After the best breakfast of the trip so far we drove to the fishing village of Djuplvogur on the east coast. While I explored the town by vehicle Marilynn braved two tour bus loads of people to shop in a local souvenir shop, coming away with a very serviceable local cold weather hat made of wool, reindeer leather and fish skin. There are tanneries in Iceland that turn the skin of fish into something resembling leather. The 15% sales tax charged in Iceland is refundable on purchases for tourists.

The next stop was to be for lunch at Sjodvarfjordur, a fishing village, but after a considerable time of being ignored in the only restaurant in town we carried on to Faskrudsfjordur where we had a good lunch looking over the harbour. Street names and other signs in Faskrudsfjordur are in Icelandic and French, as it was a major port for the French fishing fleet at one time. It even had a French consul in residence.

There were two routes to get to today's destination, Egilsstadir, one fairly short one up a valley and the route we chose that follows shoreline of each fjord It is a much longer drive, but very beautiful. The weather alternated between sunny spots and rain, with heavy winds on the open coast that grounded waterfowl, who collected in large groups along the shoreline. This included a lot of white swans. In the largest fjord, 30 km long Reydarfjordur, we passed an Alcoa aluminium smelter on the far side that apparently produces 340,000 tons per year. It is the first heavy industry we have seen.

Once in the modern city of Egilsstadir we checked into the Iceland Air Hotel before going exploring. It is inland on the shore of Lagarfjot Lake. Today is a big holiday and celebration in town, with a parade and fireworks, however we met a couple of locals enjoying the half price drinks at happy hour and didn't make it out of the bar. It was cold and rainy, which didn't seem to dampen the spirits of the locals, however we chose to dampen our insides with spirits. One of the fellows we were drinking with dates his family back to the 900s when the Vikings were settling the country. He was a wealth of information.

Egilsstadir is a new city, founded after the second world war. During the war Iceland was occupied by British armed forces, who built a large airport at Egilsstadir. The airport and the central location of the town, soon made it the main supply and trading centre for eastern Iceland..

Sunday, August 17, 2014

As we still had half a tank of diesel I didn't buy gas at Egilsstadir, not knowing that the next stretch of road was 130 km with no habitation at all – there weren't even sheep most of the way! This gave us a good idea of what the interior of the island was like. While the low fuel situation caused a bit of concern, the ever changing volcanic scenery was amazing – everything from cold desert to lava flows to rugged boulder strewn plains. There was some cloud, but for the most part it was a bright, sunny day.

In one area we were travelling below a high escarpment with dozens of waterfalls. We stopped at one point and hiked up to the base of a large, high waterfall. The area was beautiful, full of tiny wild flowers and green ground cover, yet our next stop was in a huge area of boiling mud pools and steam vents with absolutely no vegetation of any kind. The steam shot out of piles of rocks with a very loud roar.

Our destination today was Lake Myvatn, famous for its huge population of various types of ducks and swans. After exploring some of the areas around the crystal clear lake we checked into the hotel and headed for the bar, even though it was earlier than normal. When talking to an Icelander we found we had missed some spectacular waterfalls about 25 km back. We recalled the large suspension bridge over a fast running river which originates at the Vatnajokull glacier, but didn't know about the falls further down stream.

He also told us that Iceland's highest mountain, Bardarbunga, 2009 meters (6,490 ft) high, is a huge volcano many hundreds of meters under the ice of Vatnajokull glacier, and it is showing disturbing signs of coming to life. The news is reporting the growing strength of hundreds of earthquakes at the volcano. This would be disastrous to the whole area, as it is a wide valley ending at the glacier, and massive flooding would occur when molten lava melted mountains of ice. There are also signs that it may be connected underground to the Grimsvotn Volcano to the south. If that went as well it would cause damage and flooding in the south coast where we saw the lakes with ice bergs.

After a beer we drove back to the Detifoss and Selfoss waterfalls, which require about 3 km of walking. The falls are about 600 meters apart on the Jokulsa a Fyollum River – the river that runs from the Vatnajokull glacier. Both were spectacular and well worth the return trip. We were lucky to have bright sunlight, which caused bright rainbows above the falls.

On the way back to the hotel, also on the recommendation of the fellow in the bar, we took a side trip to Krafla, about 7 km off the main road. Here we found a large steam collecting plant that heats and supplies hot water to the homes in the entire district, and beyond that a volcano with an emerald green lake filling about half the caldera. Some distance across the crater was another roaring steam vent blasting a tower of white cloud into the air.

All cities in Iceland that I'm aware of enjoy steam heat provided to their homes. Even remote farms need only to drill down a short distance to capture the steam to heat their houses.

Back at the hotel we enjoyed a superb, well served meal. We have yet to have a meal in Iceland that was not delicious!