Day 8: Monday, August 21, 2006

As soon as we got up, we drove east to the glacial lagoon. This finger of Vatnajökull used to extend all the way to the ocean, but as it has been receeding, it has created this lagoon of glacial chunks.

As the chunks break off, they slowly float out to sea.

While we waited for the first boat of the morning, I tried to take some photos of a seal that was swimming around.

Then we hopped on one of these duck boats.

Icebergs!

The glaciers retain a record of volcanic activity, as you can see here from the layer of ash on this one.

Looking over the lagoon toward Hvannadalshnúkur, Iceland's highest mountain (2119 m / 6952 ft).

This iceberg had recently flipped upside down. The undersides are hard and smooth, so for the first few days after they flip they look like this. Then they melt on the outside because of exposure to air, and turn white like the rest.

Here's another seal from a little closer.

An employee in a small boat buzzing around beside us broke off a piece of ice and gave it to our guide, who passed it around the boat.

Also quite good to eat.

After the boat tour, we drove all the way back around Hvannadalshnúkur, back toward Skaftafell National Park.

An oasis in the middle of the sandur.

Along the way we stopped here, because we had some time and it was marked from the road as a place of interest. I went inside the white gate...

and found several graves...

and this plaque: "Here stood Sand-mountain-church"

We got back to Skaftafell with a little over an hour to spare before our tour, so Liz napped (in the car) and I went for a hike up as far as I could go in the little time I had here. First stop: a waterfall very close to the parking lot.

I went up through this field

and followed a sign that said "power plant" down to these falls.

This is the power plant, built in the 1920s by local farmers, and used up until the 1970s.

The door was open, so after reading the description, I just went in!

Then I walked up to the dam

Where part of the river was diverted to the pipe leading to the power plant.

I kept going up until I reached the first peak from the road, and saw this sundial at the top. The sun is near the zenith, and it's about 1:30pm... time to head back down!

But first, the view. Hvannadalshnúkur:

A volcanic crater

An enormous glacial finger in the distance:

And the Skeiðarársandur:

On the way back down, I took a photo of this rare Icelandic "forest". I was crouching down, because the trees were about as tall as I was.

Now it was time for the glacier walking tour. In front is our guide, a New Zealander who usually guides glacier hikes at home, but who came to Iceland for the summer to work.

Another recently flipped iceberg:

Before getting onto the clean ice, we put on our crampons.

Closeup of a small hole in the ice:

Ben, our guide, said that the ice axes could only be used for two things: walking sticks, and photos. They were not the right type to hold your entire weight.

Our guide found a cork-screw shaped hole that was actually safe to get near: an incredibly rare phenomenon.

The next hole was not safe. Ben explained in detail how, if we were to fall in, we'd be suffocated from sliding progressively deeper each time we took a breath, even before we'd drown or die of hypothermia. Then he stood in front of the hole and said we could go no farther than him, or he would use physical force to hold us back. Don't have to tell me twice.

After the hike we relaxed at the hotel for a bit. Then we decided to drive as far east as we could, toward Höfn (just to say we'd gone that far, and to find some different food than the hotel offered). We saw this unexplained statue in front of a village along the way.

Now that's isolation.

Some ruins populated by sheep and horses.

Höfn turned out to be a pretty unremarkable town, and the food at the place we ate was not very good. Better than sitting around, though!