Category Archives: 2018 Trip to Iceland

Golden Circle Tour

2018 Trip to Iceland, Geology, Nature, religion, waterfall

 

Our last day of the Iceland tour was something called the Golden Circle Tour. This has nothing to do with Trumpian hijinks. The Circle Tour is a famous one-day trip around many sites within a couple of hours of Reykjavik. That is all most tourists see of Iceland. Don’t get me wrong, it is a a wonderful part of Iceland, but it is only a small part. We were very fortunate to be able to see large part of the  island from west to east and north to south.

Skálholt, which is Iceland’s first Bishopric (that is not Bishop’s prick). Christianity in Iceland  has been a powerful religious force for more than 1,000 years. This power was carefully built up over hundreds of years by an influential dynasty of chieftain priests. Naturally, like the rest of Europe no one believed in the separation of church and state. The first of the bishops was Gissur the White a bombastic priest who led the pro-Christian faction at the AD 1,000 Alpingi where the people’s leaders decided to convert to Christianity mainly to improve their chances of trade with Europe rather than out of any sincere religious convictions. The people of course had no say in their conversion to Christianity, not unlike the princes of Germany in the German Reformation. Commerce was more important than religion. Sort of like it is now.

Often the best part of church interiors is the stained glass. This was one of those churches.

 

On the Circle Tour was Geysir which has lent its names to all water spouts around the world. Actually Great Geysir started erupting in 1294 and reached heights of 60 metres (200 ft.) but it has not kept up for decades.  In the 20thcentury, eager (read stupid) tourists tipped gravel and garbage into its mouth hoping to cause an explosion. They also used soapy water on special occasions such as Independence Day but that did not help either. As a result of this abuse, the geyser became nearly dormant. Surprisingly, in 2000 it sprang back to life spouting 40 metres (130 ft.) into the air. It is no longer that robust but still lifted off impressively.

I am supposed to be the orchid guy, but while we were looking at the geyser and some hot pots of water, Chris spotted an orchid with her eagle eye. According to a German tourist near us it is called Knabenkrautin German. I think the common English name is marsh orchid or Common twayblade.  I tried to photograph it, but we were too far away and were not allowed to walk closer.

 

After that we drove to Gullfoss(Golden Falls). No this was not a golden shower either. This is one more spectacular waterfall. Actually, it is a double water fall. First the River Hvítá tumbles 11 metres and then the lower falls drops 21 metres. The rock of the riverbed was formed during an interglacial period. Apparently it has flowed for thousands of years. It was a very impressive falls.

We learned that at one time Iceland was planning to build a hydro electric dam and plant here, but a heroic protester led the opposition. She said, “I don’t sell my friends.”  Now it is a UNESCO world heritage site, one of two we visited today on our golden circle tour. No doubt Iceland has earned more money from tourists visiting the site than they would have from the electrical power from one more damn dam. I promise this is the last waterfall I will show from Iceland.

Our last stop on our Golden Circle Tour was Thingvellir National Park the historical heart of Iceland and now the second UNESCO world heritage site we saw in one day!  It is a fantastic natural site as well as the site of the Viking Parliament, the first in the world. The National Assembly was established there by the Vikings in 930 AD and was regularly convened there until 1798. As well the geology there is incredibly important because one can see the continental tectonic plates pulling apart.

This was the end of our tour around the island of Iceland. we finished our visit with a  couple of days in Reykjavik.

 

 

The Most Dangerous Animal in iceland

2018 Trip to Iceland

I don’t know if the rabbit is Iceland’s most dangerous mammal, but it could be.  Really Iceland has no dangerous animals. In fact the only land based Icelandic mammal to predate human settlement is the Arctic fox which is believed to have crossed to Iceland over the ice during the last Ice Age. Mercifully it even has very few insects. The midges (very tame by Manitoba standards) can be pesky only because of their vast numbers in only a few places. Most of the island is spared. The way I explain it is that the climate is so bad it keeps the insects away.

 

Actually as everywhere, the most dangerous animal, by far is Homo sapiens—Us. this guy in particular–J.P he is mad. Watch out. He is determined to enjoy life wherever he is.

 

 

 

Heaven: 2 wonderful waterfalls in one day

2018 Trip to Iceland, waterfall

 

Skógafoss.

AO and my guidebook both said this was one of Iceland’s top waterfalls. It drops 60 metres from the upper cliffs. Who  am I to argue with them? It really was a splendid waterfall. I was a happy guy.

 

Chris in front of Skógafoss

 

Chris and Hans by Skógafoss

We also drove by Surtsey an island created by the  tourist eruption in 1963. That eruption began on the floor of the ocean just south of the Westman islands and lasted for 4 years. That makes even Nicholas’s birth seem short. Fishermen were the first to notice the signs of birth when they saw smoke rising from the sea in November of 1963. Molten lava was spewing out of the seafloor and hit the sea cooling instantly. It did not take long for volcanic debris to hit the surface 130 metres (430 ft.)  above the ocean floor creating a burning island.  A pillar of black ash mixed up with steam was sent 10 km. (6 mi.) into the air. This looked very dangerous to people on nearby Heimaey and was even visible from Reykjavik. The flights confirmed that a new island was being formed out of liquid lava that was piling up over a huge mound of tephra. It solidified into a giant volcanic refuse heap that is still visible today. That’s how volcanic islands are born.

 

Seljalandsfoss

This was a day that a waterfall guy (me) was satisfied. We saw 2 outstanding waterfalls in one day I got tt photograph them both. The second one was Seljalandsfoss. All my earlier misgivings about not having a chance to photograph them disappeared. Life was good again.

 

Seljalandsfoss is gorgeous waterfall that is fed by the famed glacier-capped volcano Eyjafjallajökull  that erupted in 2010.  We were allowed to walk behind the falls but our guide advised against it because we would get very wet. I did not want to take my camera behind the falls and feared I would not have enough time to photograph it properly, so I opted to stay in front as did most of our group. However, I was sorry to miss the unique viewpoint of the waterfall.

 

 

 

Reynisfjara iceland

2018 Trip to Iceland

 

Our next stop Immediately after Vik  was very interesting. It was only a few miles down the road. In fact it was on the beach just past the 4 pillars. This was called Reynisfjara.

It surprised me that this place was not even mentioned in my Guidebook. How could that be? Reynisfjara is a world-famous black-sand beach found on the South Coast of Iceland, just beside the small fishing village of Vík í Mýrdal (Vik).  There were huge basalt sea stacks with  roaring Atlantic waves and stunning panoramas, Reynisfjara is widely considered to be the most beautiful example of Iceland’s black sand beaches. In 1991, National Geographic voted Reynisfjara as one of the Top 10 non-tropical beaches to visit on the planet. It is really the same beach as Reynisdrangur that we had just passed. It is all connected. This time we came close to the stacks and walked on the black sand beach.

 There were also basalt columns that reminded me of Giant’s staircase in Ireland. Facing the sea was a huge natural pyramid made of basalt columns that looked like a staircase to the sky. This basalt cliff is called Gardar. The rocks are nearly perfectly shaped. It is difficult to conceive how nature could do this. After all nature never works in a straight line. Nature meanders! I think there is a lesson there for my friends who hate to meander. So many of my friends always want to get “there” as soon as possible. Perhaps this is why Chris calls me “a meanderthal.”

The symmetrical columns were shaped when many years ago, lava flowed out and then cooled and contracted. The slow speed at which the lava cooled made it crack and create these near hexagonal forms. This process is called columnar jointing. Such columns can be found at other places in Iceland such as Svartifoss waterfall or Dettifoss waterfall. The process is interesting but I decided not to include it in this post.

There are some very similar names for some of the sights. The tallest of the pillars reach as high as 66 metre. The black sand beach is literally made of lava. It is not a tanning beach. After all how often can you tan in Iceland? It was created by lava flowing into the sea which cooled it almost instantly.Reynisfjara is not a fine sand beach. It is actually small black pebbles of varying sizes. Like so much of Iceland., it was rugged and wild.

I also enjoyed looking the opposite direction away from the pillars. There was a pierced rock that reminded me of Perce Quebec. We were told that one brave flyer flew threw the hole in the rock 3 times.

When we were done we drove by another lovely church. Iceland has so many of them.

 

Vik

2018 Trip to Iceland

 

 

We stopped at Vik for lunch. A.O. recommended a burger joint and a more elegant establishment. We chose the burger joint.   Chris and I were the last to be served which made me nervous as I wanted to go out and photograph the pillars with lupines in the foreground, but I had to wait. Maybe not patiently, but I had to wait.

The real treat here though was not the burgers but  Reynisdrangur or the 4 pillars as they are called.  They are towering fingers of black volcanic rock jutting out of  the ocean surface nicely framed by large patches of lupines along a dramatic stretch of the coast. It was a spectacular sight. One of my favorites on this trip with many favorites. According to my guidebook, “The relentless battering wind adds to the Gothic scene—helping to make this the only non-tropical beach to be rated by Islands, a U.S. magazine, as one of the world’s top 10 beaches.”

 

I  also took a number of photographs of a fine church standing on the edge of a hill overlooking that beach. I particularly liked the foggy background with the Iceland flag out front and, of course, the lupines on the hillside in front of the church. It was a pity (again) that time did not permit us to go in. We just had time to eat, grab a few photos and move on. That is how motor coach tours go. They have some advantages but lingering at photogenic spots is not one of them.

I really thought this was one of the most photogenic stops on a trip with many photogenic spots. I don’t know how many times I have said that. I know at least twice today. I do tend to wear my enthusiasm my sleeve.

Arctic Terns

2018 Trip to Iceland, Birds, Natural History

 

We saw a colony of Arctic terns in southern Iceland. One of these birds attacked me. I guess I got too close to its nest. They are very protective.

One of the most fascinating aspects of birds is their ability, often truly amazing, to migrate, often over amazing distances, and in amazing circumstances.    Why do birds, unlike most animals migrate in the first place?  How do they navigate?  How do they know where to go?   How can they migrate so far, often under very adverse conditions?  In fact, to me the very notion of migration is a vast mystery that I will never understand, no matter how much I learn about it.   Just as one example, among many, some species of shorebirds, a relatively short time after giving birth to their young abandon them to their own devices while they fatten up for the long migration.  Then the adults head south many thousands of miles away, often to South America.  Amazingly, the young, who have never been anywhere in their short lives other than northern Canada, fly south on their own without any guidance from the adults, and turn up at the same place as the adults some weeks behind the adults.  How do they do it?  It is very difficult for us mere humans to fathom such incredible abilities.  It is a profound mystery.

Why does the Arctic Tern migrate literally from one end of the earth to the other, and then later back again?  What drives the bird to do that?  Why do they travel so far to go from one seemingly inhospitable place to another?  I will never understand these things, but will never tire to trying.

Some recent information about Arctic Terns is just downright amazing. The Arctic tern is justifiably famous for its astonishing migration. It is one of the most astonishing stories in a natural world filled with astounding stories. It flies each year from its breeding grounds in the Arctic in the spring and then back again after the summer. The shortest distance between these two points is 19,000 km (12,000 mi). This is the longest migration of any animal in the world! It flies about 2 times farther than scientists earlier believed because its route is not straight. It meanders.

Recently scientists have been able to install very small transmitters onto them so that their track could be monitored. One Arctic tern followed a zig-zag pattern from Greenland to Antarctica and back again each year and in the process racking up 44,000 frequent flyer miles (or 71,000 kilometers), as National Geographicdescribed them.  This is 4,000 miles or 6,440 km more than its nearest competitor the sooty shearwater. The researchers who found out this new information estimated that because the birds often live to be 30 years old over their lifetime they travelled about 1.5 million miles (2.4 million kilometers) which is equal to 3 trips to the moon and back![1]

Until recently scientists could not find a tracker light enough to be carried by a tern. Now they use one that is 1/20thof an ounce or 1.4 grams. The researchers also learned that terns often stop for month in the open Atlantic Ocean possibly to “fuel up” on small fish and crustaceans before continuing their awesome (for once that word really does apply). Even more surprisingly, they don’t take the shortest route. Instead they zig and zag literally across the ocean and back again! Some wondered why they would zigzag so much. For example, the terns from Greenland don’t fly straight up or down the Atlantic. Instead they “hopscotch from Antarctica to Africa to South America to the Arctic.”[2]Even though this is a detour of several thousand kilometers because they zigzag across the Atlantic Ocean, The birds appear to be following huge spiraling wind patterns in the atmosphere, avoiding flying into the wind,” according to Carsten Egevang one of the researchers.[3]

Though scientists are not sure why these amazing birds take such a long journey nearly from pole to pole, they believe it must be that the terns find rich feeding grounds in the waters of the poles. Why else would they do it?

 

 

[1]“World’s Longest Migration Found–2X Longer Than Thought,”National Geographic(Jan 2010)”

 

[2]“World’s Longest Migration Found–2X Longer Than Thought,”National Geographic(Jan 2010)

[3]Carsten Egevang, “World’s Longest Migration Found–2X Longer Than Thought,”National Geographic(Jan 2010)

Jökulsárlón: Home of Icebergs

2018 Trip to Iceland

 

Jökulsárlón is an amazing place. Recently it has been discovered that the lagoon is really a fjord that was carved out by the glacier.  The eastern part of the glacier eroded the sediments of Breiδamerkurjökull to a depth of 300 m below sea level. The river carried the sediments forward. That created a deep basin. This would have been impossible if the river had not carried the sediment. Without that river the basin would have been plugged up with sediment.

Oddly, the lagoon is actually privately owned. So you could buy it. Wouldn’t you like to own a lagoon filled with icebergs? To me it was the most surprising sight in Iceland. I never expected to see them here.

Some of the icebergs were beached. We could walk partly around them. When icebergs land on a black sand beach that is an incredible sight. I could not get enough photographs of them. They were amazing.

From 1890 to the present the glacier has retreated. The large chunks of ice break off the glacier and are carried by the current of the river to its mouth where many of them get stranded on the bottom. Those that are floating only show about 1/10thof their mass above the water. The rest is under the water. Tidal currents move the bergs back and forth and often they scrape the bottom depending on their size and the depth of the river. The smaller ones drift out to the sea.

Most icebergs are milky white except for the dark sediment that they carry, but some have a bright blue color caused by the interplay of ice crystals and light. Often seals are seen in the bay but I was not lucky enough to see any. Shoals of herring often enter the bay providing a feast for birds such as Artic terns that come here in large numbers.

Glaciers and Icebergs

2018 Trip to Iceland,

 

Iceland is more than waterfalls. It also has amazing glaciers and icebergs that calve off of them. In the south we got to see the world famous Vatnajökull glacier. This glacier is not only the largest glacier in Iceland, it is the largest glacier in Europe. In fact it is larger than all of Europe’s glaciers combined! At its thickest it is up to a kilometer thick. (3,200 ft.). Think about that if you stood on the ground at the base of the glacier, the top would be 1Km up!

In the southeast part of Iceland this massive glacier pours through every crack in the coastal mountains.  At every turn it seemed we saw one of the tongue glaciers spreading out from the parent glacier. The glacier was used as a setting for the recent HBO series Game of Thrones. The glacier here is called Breiδamerkurjökulland it is a tongue glacier or extension of Vatnajökull glacier.

In the southeast part of Iceland this massive glacier pours through every crack in the coastal mountains.  At every turn it seemed we saw one of the tongue glaciers spreading out from the parent glacier. The glacier was used as a setting for the recent HBO series Game of Thrones.

These are icebergs in front of the massive glacier floating in the lagoon.

We stopped at a glacial lagoon where giant pieces of the glacier calved into the ocean leaving icebergs floating in the war, or stuck to the bottom.  It was fantastic. With ice floes or icebergs floating on a lagoon with mountains in the foreground it  is certainly one of Iceland’s treasures. Frankly, I had not expected this. It was  a most pleasant surprise.

 

The lagoon is called Jökulsárlónand it was unknown until this part of Iceland was opened up by the construction of the ring road. There were no bridges over the rivers here until then. This area was the final phase of the ring road. Now people can drive from Reykjavik to here in one day. Since then it has become a major tourist destination and I can understand why. It was fantastic.  The lagoon served as the background for two James Bond films: A View to a Killand Die Another Day as well as other Hollywood films such asTomb Raiderand Batman Begins.