Goodbye Iceland!

 

Here the map of where we have been, with all these unpronounceable names!  

I’m glad I managed to blog every day, because I’ve already forgotten what we did on day 1…..

Last evening, since we were in the south, we came close to seeing the sunset….  It actually does set for almost 3 hours….. but it sets at midnight, and we had a 6:30am pickup, so this is as close as we got to it…..

We loved Iceland, its grand scenery, its interesting history and its friendly inhabitants.   It’s an easy trip from NY…. May be worth planning something in the winter…..

I'll finnish this blog by quoting Halldor Laxness, the only person from Iceland to win a Nobel prize in literature (in 1955).   He said:

"Where the glacier meets the sky, the land ceases to be earthly, and the earth becomes one with the heavens;  no sorrows live there any more, and therefore joy is not necessary; beauty alone reigns there, beyond all demands".

Tectonic plates, waterfalls, geysers and…. Tomatoes????

This is our last day in Iceland and we certainly made the most of it.  We are docked near Reykjavik, in the suburb of Harnarfjodur.  We will disembark early tomorrow morning for our flight home.

 This last day was a busy one, as we toured the most well known area of Iceland - the so called “Golden Circle”.  Our first stop was the Pingvellir National park - a UNESCO world heritage site.  It is both historically and geographically important.  I’ll spare everyone a long lecture on the history of Iceland - and will only mention two important years - it’s first parliament was established in 935 - in this park, where it would meet for 2 weeks every year around the solstice.  The second important year is 1944- when Iceland declared its independence from Denmark, on June 17th - so today is independence day!  They did it in 1944, in part because the Danish were busy, what with being occupied by Germany and all that, so they thought that was a good time….  For everything in between and since - there is Wikipedia….

  Anyway, back to the National Park - its beautiful lake is sitting right where the North American and European tectonic plates meet, and is getting larger (slowly) as they pull apart.  Here, Joe is walking in no man’s land- right in between the two plates.  The park is both beautiful and awe inspiring.

Here is what may be the seat of the first parliament - at the base of the North American plate.  The reason they believe this is that this mound is man made, and facing the right way for the Viking's type of meetings. (The green mound is man made- the wall is the tectonic plate).  

 Joe is doing his thing at the “drowning pool”, where criminals were executed.  Interesting side notes - Vikings did not execute criminals (with the exception of slaves who killed they masters). This started with Christianity - but even then, it was only men who were executed.  Only when the country became Lutheran did they start executing both men a women - sometimes for petty crimes…..

 

 We then stopped for lunch a a farm. They raise the well known Icelandic horses.  It’s a very unique breed with a very pure blood line since no horse has been imported to Iceland for over 1000 years!

 I know nothing about horses….  But they were beautiful and gentle, and have 5 unique gaits (which is a record) - one of which is so smooth that you can ride while holding your beer…..

 The big surprise at that stop though was the magnificent hot houses - completely powered geothermally- that grow 2 tons of tomatoes per day!  (Also flowers, cucumbers, basil, lettuces, etc).  We had a presentation by the owner - you can guess how interested in it I was!!!  To me, this little farm looked like paradise! (The tomatoes were really sweet!  The owner attributed that to the water that comes directly from the glaciers and the fact that they use no pesticides at all).

  And then we had the best and simplest lunch ever!  Just a tomato soup from the just picked tomatoes, with grilled chicken and the best bread ever!  Really a treat! Desert was both pretty and tasty - cheesecake with sweet tomato jam  

 

From there on, we continued on the golden circle to the Gullfoss (Golden falls), surely the most visited water fall in Iceland.  It is a two stage fall, and carves a deep canyon. Even though the weather was beautiful and warm, I’m wearing a rain coat in one of the pictures because the spray was very strong!  Interesting note:  These are privately owned (although now protected) - and in the past, there have been many attempts to buy them to produce hydro electricity, which the owners always resisted.  They now run the tourist center and gift shop.

 

 

From the road on top of the falls, you can see the big glacier that feeds the river - seems like it’d be cool to go closer! (It’s hard to see on the picture…..  sort of looks like clouds - but it’s there!)

Last stop was the Geysir Geothermal area (the world Geyser is indeed an Icelandic word, that is now common in a lot of languages). The Stokur Geysir erupts prettily every 5 to 8 minutes, to the delight of the tourists. (See top of blog). The entire area is full of hot water holes and steaming grounds… 

There were a lot of people at all attractions, but not so crowded as to be unpleasant or difficult to see (must be bad in July!).

  This entire area is just one big geothermal spring….  Steam seeps out of the ground everywhere you look.  Some areas look like they have big smoke stacks - but no, it’s just steam from the ground….  People have a lot of weekend cabins around here, because they enjoy all this hot water!

 

On the way back, while we enjoyed the scenery, our guide regaled us with old Icelandic tails of trolls and elves.  Did you know that trolls can only come out at night and that if they get touched by sunlight, they turn into stone?  Here are two trolls who got caught while kissing….

About elves:  it’s not that Icelanders believe in them….  It’s more that they don’t NOT believe in them….  So why take chances…  so when they build roads or tunnels (still now), if it’s in an area that legends says has an elf church, they’ll actually will move the road a bit, or have a ceremony to ask for permission…. Because hey- can’t hurt……

I meant to take a picture of our last cocktail on board…. But forgot….  So instead, here are some more wild flowers….

The power of volcanoes.

 

 Yesterday evening, we left the very north of Iceland, and sailed along the west coast to the very south of it, the small volcanic island of Heimaey. It’s a long way to go - so it took all night and morning.  Which gave us a relaxing morning (all this wonderful sight seeing is exhausting!).  So we slept in a bit.  I took a “walk” on the treadmill where I was again rewarded by the visit of whales- this time a large pod of killer whales (did not manage to take pictures).

   The sun and fog had been fighting all morning - as we arrived in port, the fog lifted enough for us to see the dramatic rocks of this double island (although not enough to see the top of the volcano). It is the only inhabited island in the Vestmann archipelago, with a population of about 5000.  

The rocks that mark the entrance of the harbor are beautiful and dramatic, but make  the narrow harbor tricky for a ship of our size. It took all of our captain’s skills to position us carefully along the dock!  Not only is the harbor very narrow, but it is also full of large fishing ships going in an out for extra challenge!  It is Iceland most important fishing center. 

  What makes this island most interesting is the large volcanic explosion that almost completely destroyed it in 1973.  In the middle of the night in January 1973, the Heigafell volcano started sending huge flames, ash and lava.  The town is basically built on its side and the danger to the 5000 people who lived there was extreme.  In an odd bit of luck, there had been a storm the day before and all the fishing boats were in the harbor.  The government issued a complete evacuation order - sent a few planes for the sick and elderly and the entire population of the town evacuated by boat.  Only about 200 refused to leave.  No one died - which is miraculous.

The lava flow lasted 6 months.  The harbor was threatened which was dire, because without it, the town has no industry.  Extreme measures were taken to divert the lava flow- building huge cement barriers, which were soon overcome.  

 What worked at the end was pumping huge amounts of water from the sea to cool the lava enough that it stopped before it reached the harbor. Thus the town was saved - although many houses were buried by the lava flow and many more by ash.  Little by little, people came back, rebuilt pretty little housea on the same volcano and the town has regained almost the entire population.

As some of the buried house were excavated, they decided to build a museum using the ruins as its core - reminiscent of Pompéi.  (That’s were the pictures of the explosion come from- the museum - not Pompei....).

 

 I took a hike to the top of the volcano, across the lava fields, where you can see the huge crater.  As you walk up, there are markers of the streets that got buried and of the houses that were there.   From the point of view below, we can look down on the town- the town that is buried below our feet used to be at the same level. We are standing on a lava bed about 200 feet tall!  

 

 

The trail to the edge of the crater was very cool looking in this fog, which (almost) made up for the lack of view at the top.  On good days, the view is supposed to be great…

At the bottom of the lava field, just where it ends, this little church is still standing….

 

Joe instead took a tour of the island before he too went to visit the museum.  

 

 

 

 

 

Here are some wildflowers….  Apparently, lupines really like ashy ground…..