Friday, June 10, 2011

Iceland: Day 7

On Day 7 we hopped in the car and started driving. It was a bit of a grey, misty day which made for some beautiful scenery:


Our first main stop was at Jökulsárlón glacier lagoon, a spot where one of Iceland's glaciers meets a lake that feeds the ocean, creating the largest glacier lagoon in the country.

All of the glacier chunks/icebergs were covered in black ash from the eruption a few days prior. However, the freshly flipped icebergs gleamed a brilliant blue in contrast:

We debated on going on a boat ride through the glacier lagoon - we thought it might be hokey, or expensive - but it wasn't too pricey and it was a lot of fun. I managed to snap a quick video of when we took our boat RIGHT BESIDE an iceberg:
This conversation happened:
Guide: "Only 10% of an iceberg is visible on the surface, the other 90% is probably under the boat right now! Eventually parts will melt, the weight will shift, and the iceberg will flip"
Me: "Since we're right beside it, how do we know when it will flip?"
Normally-quiet boat driver with strong Icelandic accent: "We don't."
:-|

Robyn captured some incredible shots, I'm so jealous of her camera. Everything I took was only 1600x1200 on a puny 1GB card. When I was your age, I paid $130 for a 128 MB USB stick at Staples!

But a point-and-shoot has its advantages as I captured DOGS ON BOATS

We didn't really want to leave the glacier lake - we spent a lot of time just watching icebergs slowly drift, hoping that we'd see one flip. No flips, but a few bumps, crashes, and disintegrations. It's hard to rank and shortlist the BEST things from the trip, but this would definitely be in the Top 3 sights to see.

Next up was Svartifoss in Skaftafell National Park. I think we checked into our hotel and ate supper first, and made this an evening hike because we knew Day 8 would be very busy.

We hiked up to this view from the flattest part of this picture:

This is Svartifoss. Click to see the big version, it's worth it! Check out the unique basalt columns. Very amazing.

We went back to the hotel and that was it for Day 7! STAY TUNED for Day 8, where we explored more unique geology, saw a huge glacier covered in ash, TWIN waterfalls, a black sand beach, another waterfall, an insanely cool and terrifying canyon, and another waterfall that we go behind! Day 8 was very busy compared to Day 7 (but the sights to see were closer together).

1 comment:

  1. That ice chunk is my favourite picture from that place but I need to photoshop that guy's hat brim out of the bottom!

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