Touching the North American and European plates

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Dream come true and I got to do it with my best friend, Axel.
We arrived at the National park where Silfra is. Here is where we took a bit of time to look around at the landscape. It’s quite amazing to see and a must for those going to Iceland.. Silfra is a fissure created by the separation of the North American and Eurasian tectonic plates cutting through Iceland. The Silfra fissure fills with glacial water that has been filtered underground for decades through hardened, porous lava rock. The filtering process of the glacial water makes Silfra one of the clearest bodies of water on earth with up to 120 meters of visibility. Once we arrived at Silfra, we found our dive meeting place and were intruded what to do next. Then our guide, Thomas gave us dry suit and snorkeling equipment. He explained to us how to use this equipment and how to ensure that we would be warm and comfortable during our 40 minute snorkeling tour of Silfra Hall, Silfra Cathedral, and Silfra Lagoon. He was really quite good to talk to us a little about Iceland and the language. He told us how we were going to get the best dive. Axel and I both had our own masks and a bit of other things but the dry suit was a new experience for sure!
During our dive we explored the four main parts of Silfra. We didn’t have to swim as the current slowly took us through Big Crack, Silfra’s narrowest section. The continental plates are so close we could touch them. I did. This for me was almost like a religious experience. It gave me goose bumps and not because the water was ice cold. The fissure then widens into Silfra Hall. Here the full spectrum of Silfra’s colours and clarity become all the more apparent. At this point we could look at the right angle you can see all the way to lake Thingvallavatn, over 150m away. Near to the opening to Thingvellir lake we entered the Silfra Cathedral; as the depth reached 23m we felt like we were are flying over the boulders and glacial silt. We finished the snorkel in the endless visibility of Silfra Lagoon. There is spent a little more time then the others looking down into the fissures. It almost took my breath away as I thought about going through the caves within the fissures. Following the snorkel we had hot chocolate. It was a fantastic time!

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