Back from the remote highlands, we were back in the more accessible parts of Iceland. Not too touristy, yet, but getting more crowded by the day.

I am a Rock, I am an Iceland

After another pretty waterfall, it was time for a surprising change of pace. In the little village of Stöðvarfjörður there is a garden of delight. Ljósbjörg Petra María Svanhvítsdóttir was born on christmas eve in 1922 and grew up to be nothing like what was expected of a girl in rural Iceland in the early 20:th century. Showing a keen interest in in both science and physical activity, her fascination with the rocky landscape led her to a lifelong passion of collecting rocks.

She also collected other random tidbits, such as pens, matchboxes and playing cards, but the vast rock collection will forever be her legacy. Presented in the coolest, most cosy and chaotic garden ever, rubbing elbows with garden gnomes, rubber duckies, monster sculptures and lots of greenery, Petra’s Stone Collection is a pleasant surprise along the way, and is highly recommended.

The fact that her name is Petra* makes it even cooler.

Rocks on exhibition seemed to be the theme of the day, as next up would be Djupivogur with its granite eggs, each representing a different specimen of all the bird species in the area. Also famous for its seafood and pizza, I naturally had a lobster pizza for lunch. Others on our group went for the infamous Hawaiian pizza, to the horror and disgust of our resident Italian.

Unfortunately, the supposedly quirky little gallery Freevilli was closed, with only its outdoors section available, adding wood and bone to the rock themes of the day.

The Shape of Hue

Jökulsarlon is a lagoon, formed by erosion from the mighty Váttnajökull. While the largest glacier in Europe has many such lagoons, this is the only one with connection to the ocean.

As such, the constant exchange between the icy glacial waters and the comparetively warmer sea water makes the ice, calfed from the main glacier, a chaotically beautiful kaleidoscope of blue-tinted, ash-streaked and transparent icebergs. The extremely compacted ice contains little to no air, resulting in all colours but blue being absorbed. As the mixture of warm saline water and cold fresh causes the iceberg to flip, the breathtaking turqouise-blue hue comes out from the depth and into full view.

As the icebergs break down, the tide eventually brings them from the lagoon and out to the open sea. Some of them strand on the nearby black beach, though, creating a pearly pattern of shimmer on black.

The mixture of saline and fresh waters also creates fertile conditions for fish, attracting both seabirds and seals.

We had already booked a tour on an amphibian boat to get up close and personal with the icebergs. Little did I know, that they also had kayaks for rent. Unfortunataly, there was not time to do both, so I’ll have to save the paddlin’ for next time.

After having exhausted the camera battery at an absolutely wondrous place, Tallulah bumped onwards, stopping at a building that combined the two most Icelandic attributes of such: being covered with soil and grass, and being a church.

Crampon, crampoff

Hofskirkja was our last stop before reaching Skaftafell, the largest national park in Europe, where we were to spend two (2) full nights. Ah, the luxury of not having to take down the entire camp at fuck o’clock in the morning!

Skaftafell is one of the more popular entry points to the actual Váttnajökull, and as such, we went on a glacier hike in the morning. Equipped with helmets, boots and harness, and carrying crampons and pickaxe, we trotted off the rough 1.5 km walk to the edge of the glacier. Putting our crampons on, the actual time spent on the ice was rather short and relaxed. The upper age range of our group was close to octogenarian, so the effort had to accommodate for that.

Filling our bottles with the purest, coolest water one could hope for, and striking alpine poses, we headed down again, for our transport back to base camp.

And so, it finally came.

The rain.

That didn’t stop us from taking an afternoon hike up the mountain for, primarily, yet another waterfall. This one, named Svártifoss (Black falls) is hardly spectacular in and of itself. The main selling point is instead the dark basalt columns in front of which the water falls, and from where it derives its name.

A few relaxing days by the foot of Váttnajökull ended the more unique part of the journey. We were about to enter the touristier part, sometimes referred to as the Golden Triangle.

Caroline’s Corner

Leaving Seyðisfjörður early but with spirits high and eager to experience all what the day could offer. We did see plenty of waterfalls from the truck but some waterfalls had to be seen up close. Fardagafoss waterfall is one of them. 35 minutes trek uphill but with stunning views and plenty of photostops we were just a teensy (!) bit winded when we rushed back to the truck. Because the time schedule is not to be meddled with.

Our fearless tourleaders K & L steered the gang in very polite, friendly, but very organised manner. You do not want to disappoint them. They did rule our little overlanding world with kindness, straightforwardness and impeccable manners. Some leadershipskills that should be implemented by so many other individuals in leadership positions.

Our lovely English tourleader started almost all of her informative chats with -“I have a treat for you”, and every single time you came back to the truck awestruck. Treat upon treat upon treat. Iceland is a place filled with wonderous and spectacular experiences. One treat that took my breath was the Petra’s (Petru’s) small rock garden. A woman who loved rocks and stones created a garden filled with flowers, rocks and quirky sculptures . She spent her life trekking around Iceland collecting small (relatively speaking) rocks and bringing them home. She could be carrying as much as 40 kg in her rucksack. Sometimes she would roll the heavier stones or get the help from several friends to carry the larger stones back home. A person living her true life and following her passion and joy despite outside pressure to conform and not collect rocks.

One would think that a place like Petra’s rock garden would be an uninteresting tourist trap but it is so far from a trap. Immediately when you enter the place you start to lower your voice and decrease your pace. A tranquil and soothing space with an abundance of beauty. I could have spent an entire afternoon just moseying along. A perfect little pause for me.

Djupivogur is a small fishing village with some rather surprising artistic expressions. We have certainly been made very aware of the vast artistic talents among the Icelanders. I guess that one must find ways to entertain oneself during the long dark half of the year. Music, poetry, litterature, painting and so forth. Sometimes one stumbles across unexpected expressions. Well, stumbling? Not quite a happy coincidence but rather a planned stumble by our well prepared tourleaders. After a delish Icelandic pizza and a short local history lesson by the maître d’ we plodded on to an installation by the local artist Sigurður Guðmundsson. 34 large, very large stone eggs representing local birds. Polished until the hard stone were smoother than a baby’s bottom.

We were lucky to be able to visit the work shop/atelier/home belonging to an artist creating magic from items washed ashore or found out in the countryside. Gallery Freevili had one more day until shutting down. I did not understand if the artist were moving his studio somewhere else starting his retirement. But the driftwood sculptures and the jewlery made of bone, animal teeth or feathers were very, very original and pretty cool.

We ended our day in the town of Hofn where one could have one of the most encompassing views of Váttnajökull. Well one could but we did not. The view was impressive but the clouds were low and very, very fluffy aka we could only guess at what we might have seen. Still impressive though.

Why does one keep on getting up at 5 every morning? And why do we decamp for departure at the latest 0700? Well, one reason is to be able to experience amazing places before a wall of humans obscure the views. A very well planned timing and smart logistics and the tourleaders have created magic for the gang.

We got to see the ice sculptures by the inlet to the Jokusarlon iceberg lagoon pretty much undisturbed. A lot of squees, oooohs and aaah:s were heard among the smattering of camera shutters. One of the gang prefered the black sheep plodding around the Inlet, I tried to take som pictures of the fine pair or ravens that met us upon arrival. But they did not want to participate, nor did they want to be photographed so I amused myself with icebergs, seals, terns, and of course some pictures of the iceberg turned ice sculptures.

Jokusarlon Iceberg lagoon was something else. A deep glaciermade lake/lagoon . Unfortunately the lagoon will cease to be in approximately 50 years as the Vattnajökul glacier is receding with an alarming speed. But even though we felt the gravity of the situation we truly did enjoy the boat ride among the icebergs. Nope, no attempts to emulate the Titanic, we stayed well away from the majestic and ginormous chunks of glacier. The water is a haven for little fish and therefore a haven for the animals who prey on fish. Seals, terns and skua were very present and made good fodder for the homo cameratus.

We met up with a few travelmates and stumbled upon a free educational tour given by the national park rangers. Very enjoyable. If you ever visit the Jokusarlon iceberg lagoon do try to partake in the rangers educational walking tour. Very informative and very enjoyable (especially since the Icelandic ranger looked like a small Iceland version of the American actor Matthew McConaughey.

The final stop of the day was a very moving stop. The last turf church ever built in Iceland. The Hofskirkja was like a fairytale church but with very shallow graves. A lot of the women buried at the church yard were around 100 years of age when they died. Many graves were so old they lacked a gravemarker. Many had large trees growing from them so you could tell it was an old grave. It was a very well-maintained burial site and still used by the locals today.

I did not feel very comfortable as it felt a little bit disrespectful to take pictures and then dash off. So I walked around in silence, picked a few stray straws of grass from some of the lesser maintained resting places and then returned to the truck.

Anyhow, this somber feeling did not last long as we drove off to the campsite where we would spend two nights.

Skaftafell National Park!

The afternoon was yet another sunny afternoon. The husband and I took a leisurely stroll to the end of the glacier but other than that we spent the afternoon chatting and socialising with our travelmates. Well one of us did do an afternoon jog but the other one (me) did not.

The second day at Skaftafell we went to a glacier guide and did a trek up the glacier. We all carried crampons although my did slightly malfunction but with some adjustments from our guide they worked perfectly. In addition to the crampons we wore helmet, harness and a big ass ice axe (ok, more of an ice pick but still, we felt badass).

A cool trek up and then some nice ice-scapades or should I say glacierscapades we returned back after some 3 hours. That is when the sky opend up. Iceland decided to show us its multifaceted summer weather. But our tent was dry, we had functional rain gear so two happy Swedes (or Nordics as we apperently became known as) went for a long hike up the mountain to see the Svartifoss basalt waterfall. And also got to see the remains of the old homestead abandoned after volcanic euruptions as well as flooding in the late 18th century. The area had been inhabited since the settlement of Iceland but the fields and meadows in the lowlands became buried in sand as well as flooded by glacial floods. Not very safe. Even in the 1970ies the problem caused the Icelandic government to build flood defence system. But in 2009 the river Skeiðará suddenly changed course and now flows further to the west. Iceland is very much a country in a constant evolutionary state.

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*) which simply means “Stone” in greek