Three weeks in a David Attenborough documentary - #2

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Iceland’s main artery is a ring road that loops around the edge of the entire country. The buses are sporadic and expensive and we liked the idea of having our own car, free to stop as long as we like, wherever we like, camping whenever we were tired.

However, hiring a car proved a little more difficult than we anticipated. Getting out of Thorsmork (where we finished our hike) was difficult in itself. We payed a lot of money to get onto a bus that looked more like an old battered loaf of bread sitting very high above extreme tyres. But the reason for this soon became apparent as we went cross country across the giant rocks of a dry river bed. We had to cross what remained of the river at one point, which was not a gentle trickle but a surging fury of white water that really didn’t look navigable. The enormous tyres paid off, and we made it across alive.

We were planning on hiring a car from the biggest town near Thorsmork, where the bus would drop us off. Turns out there aren’t any big towns near Thorsmork. The town we had originally planned to go to turned out to be a campsite at the entrance to a national park, something we were lucky to find out before we went from a teenager at a petrol station. We were told we would have a possibility in a town called Selfoss, which was back towards Reyjavik. However the one car hire place in town was shut and was very expensive regardless. The kindness of the Icelandic people came to our aid again in the form of Iris, a hotel receptionist who not only let us use her phone to call the company, but then let us use her computer to find a car hire place in that was affordable! Unfortunately the only affordable option was in Reykjavik, which we had not wanted to return to.

Eventually we managed to get our car, after a fair bit of hassle and faffing around. While we waited we stumbled upon the celebrations for Iceland’s National Day. The streets were full of happy, wholesome families wearing ribbons in the national colours and eating fairy floss. We even found a flea market where I bought some new shoes, with soles and everything! I threw my old, taped up pair in the bin with glee. Finally people would stop staring.

We drove along the south coast of Iceland for the next couple of days and had the most amazing time. In summer it stays light all night, which means that you can keep sightseeing and driving for as long as you want! The sky being light seems to make you feel less tired and we often drove till quite late, pulling into a campsite at 10 or 11 at night. On our first night it was dark and woolly and rain was hurling itself out of the sky with a vengeance. We rescued some sodden hitchikers and drove them to the next town. You couldn’t see much but we were happy to be on our way. And then, a couple of kilometres before our first camping spot, we spotted them. Huge, white glacier tongues were snaking through the mountains, right by the side of the road. Glacier tongues are the edges of a glacier that has spilt over the edges of mountains and flowed down, forming huge icy valleys. Pete and I were deliriously excited, parking the car and braving the ferocious winds just to have a look. They were awe-inspiring and we leapt around like excited kids. That night we camped at Skaftafell Camp Ground, able to see one of the glacier tongues from the door of our tent.

The South Coast was just the dramatic kind of scenery we were expecting of Iceland. Giant brooding cliffs were carved in impossible shapes from years of ice growing and retreatingOn the other side of the road stretches fields of volcanic rock being engulfed by vibrant moss, or the ocean, flat and tin-coloured. . Directly between all of this was Route #1, a long straight road that seemed to stretch forever. It was only two narrow lanes, and was often unsealed, with frequent one-way bridges and huge flocks of skittish road-side sheep and goats thrown in just to keep you on your toes. Occasionally you would pass farm houses or tiny villages, always forewarned by the ‘People ahead’ signs. Sometimes you can stop there for waffles with rhubarb jam or hot coffee that warms you from the cold. There are frequent lookouts with information points that we often stopped at just for a chance to take a photo of the incredible landscape. And all along are the glacier tongues, enormous slabs of ice creeping towards the road, leaking off the biggest glacier outside of the Arctic, Vatnajokull. The great expanse of shifting ice takes up 10% of Iceland, a huge white splodge on all the maps, and the south coast is riddled with incredible signs of its existence. We camped every night, happy for our flexibility but not so thrilled about the cold. We cooked meals on our little burner and drank our duty free gin to keep warm, sometimes sitting in the car. Then we put on all the clothes we had and got into bed. With a beanie, scarf and eye mask (because it was still broad daylight) I couldn’t actually see any of Pete’s skin!

One day, we picked up another hitchhiker, Katka the Slovakian carrot farmer, who had moved to Iceland and had no intention of going back home. Although she did say that winter was a little rough, light for only a few hours a day and the road so icy that you it was too dangerous to drive anywhere. She basically stayed inside her house for 3 months solid.

She was very excited however, because she would be with us when we arrived at Jokularson. She had been there many times before, but wanted to see our reactions when we saw it for the first time. And she wasn’t disappointed. When we first pulled up we were in a stunned silence, I’m pretty sure my mouth had dropped open. When we got out of the car we looked at each other and then starting whooping and jumping and staring! There, just on the side of the road, was a huge lagoon at the foot of the glacier, where it had melted in the summer time. And the lagoon was filled with enormous, beautiful icebergs, that had cracked off the edge of the glacier. They floated along in incredible amorphous shapes, some brilliant white and some an icy transparent blue. We decided spontaneously that we wanted to do a glacier walk and jumped into a huge block-like brown van. Our driver/guide/bad-ass was a 7foot local guy called Thor. He wore shiny aviators, chewed gum the whole time and casually offered us safety gear (walking poles, helmets etc) adding with slight derision “You don’t really need it.” No-one took the extra gear. We just put ice-clamps over our shoes and set off up one of the tongues of Vatnajokull, tramping with the heavy tread of monsters up the side of the looming block of ice. The first part of the tongue is very black, ash from the nearby volcano. As we climbed the ice grew whiter and the sheer size of just this one tongue became a little overwhelming. There were huge ravines carved through the ice and perilous holes, dropping up to 100 metres down. Water trickled down it in parts and some tunnels and holes were that ethereal blue. Thor taught us that ice only turns white after the sun has been on it, and the blue parts haven’t been changed by the suns rays yet. We tramped and stomped up and up and up the tongue, taking hundreds of photos and marvelling at the endless expanse of groaning white ice. Getting close to the deep swirling holes carved into the ice was amazing, but we couldn’t get too close because it was so dangerous, and even from a distance Pete held on to the back of my jacket.

Coming back from our glacier walk we were elated and so glad we had decided to do it! The lagoon actually feeds out into the ocean and we had been told that sometimes the beach was covered in ice, which was meant to be quite a site. Before the walk we had gone and seen one or two pieces on the sand, but it was a little underwhelming. But when we got back we saw the strange sight of giant icebergs floating across the lagoon, under the bridge and being sucked out to sea. We tide was in now and that changed everything. The icebergs were pulled out by the current and then pounded by the waves, resulting in about a kilometre of ice formations strewn across the black sand beach. Some larger and tougher icebergs were still intact, bobbing about in the water. We ran ecstatically along the beach, through the amazingly varied shapes and sizes of glittering ice sparkling on the sand. The sea wind and the inclement day meant that it was FREEZING but we were so excited we didn’t care, leaping about and inspecting every lump of ice for it’s individual shape, bubbles, cracks and fissures. Eventually our photo-taking hands had almost frozen off so we had to leave, but it was an exhilarating end to the day.

The furthest we got along the route was a town called Hofn (pronounce Hup, kind of like a hiccup). Along the way we stopped at a “hot pot”, a steamy yummy glacial hot spring that got the cold out of our bones. It was very idyllic, looking out over the misty mountains, yet another glacier tongue in the distance. We had been talking about seeing reindeer the whole time, but it was said to be rare in the summertime. I had been singing Christmas carols to try and lure them out, Pete thoroughly enjoyed this. And then I spotted them. Just two, wandering in the distance. I leapt out of the hot pot, put a coat over my bathers and walked quite a long way to get close to them. I was freezing but they were magical, with ridiculously big horns and shaggy coats, just casually grazing underneath snow capped mountains. It was perfect. Driving back to Reyjavik a day or two later we suddenly saw a whole herd just walking through farmland on the side of the road. We stopped at watched them for quite awhile, Pete had pretended not to be fussed about seeing reindeer but he couldn’t hide his excitement at this enormous pack of them!

Just because we hadn’t got enough hiking with our first epic adventure, we went on a few more (much less strenuous) walks on the South Coast. We did a couple of hour walk in a place called Skogafoss; where the trail just starts behind some ladies house. We climbed up and up beautiful lush mountains with an incredible view of the ocean. Just tramping through the mossy and mountains was great, with strange wildflowers and the odd goat here and there. And then over one hill, there was an enormous glacier tongue. Right. There. We sat and ate our lunch just looking out over this awing slab of ice. Where it had started melting was an abrupt drop, we went and stood right underneath it and were stunned at the sheer size of it. It looked black like rock because of the ash, but it creaked ominously and when you touched it, it was cold and wet. Definitely ice. I was a little frightened it would suddenly engulf me, despite knowing that was impossible.

We also had a lovely short walk at Skaftafell National Park where we camped twice. There is a popular route to a waterfall but we just hadn’t had enough of glaciers, so very early in the morning we took advantage of the sunshine and went to check out this particular tongue. From here you got to stand right above it and could see where it expanded right to the top. The sun was out, the sky was blue and you could see for miles, it was gorgeous.

We actually got very lucky with the weather for the most part. Sure we had snow and rain and fog and some hail, but that’s pretty normal. On our last few days, driving back along Route #1 the sun came out in force (it got to 16 degrees!) and the sky was an amazing blue. Most importantly the fog cleared. Driving back the way we had come, we saw brand new sights! We had had no idea that above all those shrouded broody mountains were huge snow capped volcanoes and mountains! The ride back was very slow because we stopped so often to take photos of their blindingly white faces poking out behind the other now dwarfed mountains. The sea was now sparkling and blue, but still far too cold for a swim.

The best choice we made was to pop back into Jokularson to see if it looked different with the sun out. Oh boy. Not only can you see a lot more of the huge glacier but behind it stands Iceland’s biggest mountain! We had no idea! The sun sparkled off the water in the lagoon and made it look like a magical silvery grove of icebergs. Birds skimmed in frenetic flocks around them as they bobbed and floated along in their impossible shapes. We actually couldn’t tear ourselves away, so we pulled out our camping oven and made our pasta dinner right on the banks of the lagoon, enjoying a chilled beer that we had left for awhile in the water. We didn’t think it was possible for Jokularson to get any more amazing, but the longer we stayed, the better it got. We sat eating our dinner, drinking our beer and feeling like we were in a David Attenborough documentary. Flocks of birds wheeled and plunged at fish; an iceberg cracked, dropping a great chunk of ice with a boom into the water, sending out huge ripples that rocked the other icebergs and tipped them upside down or made other ones crack; and then seals poked their furry little heads out of the water as they slipped silently through the water. From then on we started comparing everything to that day.

“Did you like the movie?”

“Oh it was no glacier lagoon.”

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