Ice and Mountains (East Iceland): Day 5

I climb up a large boulder, scrambling with hands and feet against the rough, semi-porous volcanic material.  I stand up, and look around.  Mountains.  Glaciers.  I turn slowly while balancing myself on the rock.  There's only mountains and glaciers as far as I can see in any direction.

***

There's so much land here.  It's either completely flat, or mountain-filled; there doesn't seem to be anything in between.

I struggle, as always, to put this into words.  I've typed and deleted about seventeen sentences since I've sat down to write.  I don't know how to bring you here.  The land feels simultaneously alien and yet very familiar.  It's hypnotic, the never-ending mountains around every corner.  By the end of the day, we had no words left.  We just sat in the car, trance-like, watching the beauty.  We are immersed in the land, in this place where time seems to have stood still.




Mysterious mounds of land with grassy knolls at the top appear every so often.  Natural?  Made by an ancient culture?  It's hard to tell.  Iceland is so untouched, undeveloped - there are very few signs telling you what anything is.  It adds to the experience of it.  It feels as if we are driving on another planet, undiscovered and unknown to anyone.  The endless flat, barren stretches of land beckon us.  You can't drive off road (it damages the delicate flora), but I can see the allure.  What lies there in that distance?  What secrets still undiscovered?

Vestrahorn is one mountain we make a special stop to see.  You follow a dirt side-road just before you reach the tunnel on Ring Road 1, and tell your GPS to navigate you to the "Viking Cafe".  The property owner charges a fee to access the road that leads to the black sand beaches and the stunning views of the mountain, so we hop out of the car to get our ticket before continuing on.



It's well worth the visit.  The horned mountains tower above the black sand beach like something out of a science fiction novel about uninhabited worlds.  The steep brown and soft green slopes lead straight into the sea, and the mirror reflections in the shallow water by the shore are equally as breathtaking.  Black sand dunes with dry yellow grasses just starting to take hold complete the other-worldliness of the scene.  We walk around on the beach, mesmerized.

My memories of the day tumble onto the computer screen out of order.  It's been so much to process.

The day started at Hofskirkja, one of Iceland's six remaining turf-roofed churches.  This fascinating little church is remarkably well-preserved, turfed roof and all.  The town it's situated in was extremely quiet on this Easter morning, and for a short while we were the only ones there.  We celebrated Easter with a little chocolate-ginger-lemon truffle I had brought from home for this occasion.  We stood there, by the little church with green and yellow grass for a roof, tucked into the mountains, surrounded by silence and joy, and savoured our chocolate.

***


The middle of the day was full of glaciers and icebergs; we made several stops in this glacier-heavy party of the country.  The impromptu gravel road we followed earlier in the morning, prompted by a "picnic table" sign, led us to the stunning views I referred to earlier when I was standing on a boulder and looking all around me.  We had found a perfect viewpoint for the glacier Hvannadalshnukur.

As we drove eastward from there, we saw many other glaciers nestled between mountains; too many to count, or figure out the names of.  A ways down the road, we made another unscheduled stop when we saw a promising lookout point for another glacier, and were able to park and then walk right down to the shores of the glacier Fjallsarlon's lagoon.  The rocky beach held scattered pieces of broken iceberg, and we were even able to sit on one.  I again marveled at the interesting properties of glacial ice, full of intricate patterns, cracks, bubbles, and embedded materials.

Continuing down the road, we stopped at yet another glacial lagoon, the popular Jokulsarlon.  This lagoon was full of floating pieces of bright blue iceberg, and we took a walk down the shore to get a better look at them.  As Jen was taking some photos, I gasped and pointed - "Seals!"  I grabbed my zoom-lens camera and looked through.  Yes, they were definitely seals.  I quickly passed the lens back to Jen so she could have a look, too.

Grey seals, just lying on a piece of floating iceberg in a glacial lagoon.  I couldn't help but smile, amazed at our luck at finding these little creatures.  The other day at the black sand beach, we had also spotted a seal - just one, its bobbing head floating in the crashing ocean waves, periodically disappearing under water and then reappearing. 

Across from the lagoon view is the famous "Diamond Beach", the place where the lagoon empties into the ocean and all the pieces of iceberg float down and end up on the shore, glittering like diamonds in the sun.  We took some time to walk around here, too, climbing over broken icebergs as if they were boulders.

Diamond Beach

***

The evening was spent driving to Bragdavellir.  The winding mountain roads were reminiscent of New Zealand, but also so very different.  The colours of the mountains and endless flat land are ones I've never seen before - so many pastel and muted shades of all the "traditional" colours I'm used to seeing in landscapes. 

Then we turned a corner and involuntarily gasped at another unexpected view - the gorgeous coastal cliffs and black sand beaches.  We couldn't help but stop and pull over at one of the indicated safe spots, to take it all in a little more fully than just driving by.  The wild, untouched black shores and crashing white foam painted itself deeply into my mind's eye, and I couldn't help but think how lucky I was to even be here. 

Iceland is a land of contrasts; every corner of the landscape is different than the last, and it's overwhelming, hypnotic, stunning, mysterious, and, like I've said before, somehow strangely familiar.


Tonight, we sleep snugly in a warm cottage, our treat to ourselves and a small break from campervan life.  We are surrounded by the ever-present mountains, and peaceful silence.  Every part of me is tired - perhaps sleep will weave today's multitude of fantastic experiences into some coherent whole.  For now, the different images of today dance in my heart unpredictably, like the northern lights (which we haven't yet seen), and continue to colour my thoughts and feelings in unexpected ways.




To whoever is out there reading this, thank you for being on this journey with me. Without a Reader I'm not sure I would be as disciplined as I am to sit down and write every night.  Thanks for bearing with me as I struggle to put into words what Iceland is trying to say to me.