My main motivation for stopping in Iceland was to witness its geology on the ground. One of my aims was to actually walk down into the Mid Atlantic Rift, which is what I was able to do on the first day’s tour. The rift runs from southwest to northeast across the island, but is highlighted in Thingvellir National Park, which is found on Iceland’s “Golden Circle.”
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| Lake spanning the rift in Thingvellir National Park. |
On the official Rift trail at Thingvellir National Park.
Not wanting to rent a car and drive to sites alone, I joined a bus tour thinking that it would be better to experience Iceland’s features with others. As it turns out, little socializing took place on this tour. Our guide, a woman named Hilde, gave a brief geologic or historic lesson as the bus drove to each featured spot, along with instructions to meet back at a particular time (“And this means you should be in your seat with the seat belt buckled, so we are not delayed in arriving at our next destination,” she announced. While the other Icelanders I encountered seemed laid back, Hilde was not.) Once the bus had stopped, passengers poured out and went their separate ways. Perhaps this was just as well when we got to the Rift. It was a big enough deal for me that I actually teared up being there.
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| Standing on the Eurasian side of the rift, it is easy to see how the lava flowed and hardened. Feet included for scale. |
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| The North American side of the rift is the tall cliff on the left. The Eurasian plate in the shorter cliff on the right. |
While the bus neatly got us to several interesting destinations, it was frustrating not to be able to stop when I saw something I personally found interesting. After the official Rift stop, where we followed a paved path down a wide cleft (perhaps fifty feet) between the North American and Eurasian Plates, our bus passed a spot where the two plates could be spanned with outstretched arms. I wanted badly to stop and do exactly that, but I was not calling the program.
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| The geyser field near Geysir |
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| Geysir no longer erupts on a regular basis. |
Our next destination was Geysir, the Icelandic name for a particular feature. The word “geyser” is one of few in the English language to be derived from Icelandic. It was interesting, but if you have visited Yellowstone, the features at this spot seemed unremarkable. What is remarkable is the widespread nature of Iceland’s thermal features. They’re just everywhere; it’s not uncommon to look out the window of a moving vehicle and see steam rising in random spots from the landscape.
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| Gullfoss |
After Geysir we traveled to Gullfoss, a glacier-fed waterfall that was so enormous that it created its own microclimate and a deep, deep canyon. As we drove back into Reykjavik we passed through a broad valley dotted with steaming hot springs.
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| Iceland's gray and gold color palette, with touches of glacier white |
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| Thermal activity in farm country. Where there's hot water, there's a spa, power plant, or greenhouse. |
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| Along the highway between Reykjavik and the airport: Fractured lava hump colonized by moss |
Along the way we drove through farm country. Having only experienced the southern side of the island, I was left with the impression that the palette of Iceland is gray and gold, with occasional touches of green, ocean blue, and glacier white. Yet the agricultural south was lush compared with the scabby lava beds the lie between the airport and Reykjavik. I was able to photograph some of this terrain from the bus as I rode back to the airport. In many spots, fractured maroon domes of lava dot rocky plains where hardy brown grasses struggle to take hold. These domes reminded me of the tops of muffins that have risen sufficiently that the surface cracks. Unable to support any but the most meager vegetation, mile after mile of this land lies wild.
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