The trip around Iceland, Tue 19th of July Day 3
Next morning I went Reykjahlið by the lake Mývatn and made a plan for touristic activities with breakfast and coffee provided by local supermarket. First I visited Hvera where hot mud springs and not the most pleasant smell of rotten egg. It was nothing special but nice (still I took some pictures, just in case).
From Hver I went near by geothermal power plant Krafla, which looked like a scene from scifi movie because lots of smoke and pipes runing all over.
Just behind the powerplant is Víti (shortened version from Helviti = hell) an explosion crater, it looks like a lagoon with high walls.
From top of the Viti is a view to Leirhnjúkur lavafield, which is still steaming. To get there I have to walk fifteen minutes but it was worth it. There I touched warm lava, from erruptions between 1970 till 1985. The erruption was caused by a crack in a bedrock (phenomeno of European and American plates departing from each other - same kind of division should be made in politics too between EU and US... - okay, lets not get more political...) see more information about Krafla: http://www.lv.is/EN/category.asp?catID=277
The wonders in north side of the lake Mývatn were checked out and I went back to Reykjahlið. I wanted to go bathing in local blue lagoon but it did not look too appealing so I skipped it and also Grjótagjá caves with hot water did not attracted me because plenty of turist wondering around. After a short visit to Reynihlíð church, (which survived lava, which went both sides of the church so it still stands there, maybe the higher hand made the lava turn, who knows?) where was an art exhibition by local artist - funny looking paintings.
I was kind of ready to leave Mývatn but there was still something to visit, Dimmuborgir, the dark castle. For a balance of this trip, after visiting The Elf castle, I wanted to visit the dark side, the home of Trolls. It was not scary but if being there around sunset or in night time it would propably appeal more scary and mystical. There I chose the most diffucult walk path, which even went through a tunnel and over steep rocky hills. There I suddenly felt really tired after walking whole day and I got really angry for some unexplaned reason. I was really in a bad mood and I could not find a reason for that. Later when driving towards Akureyri I managed to get rid of the bad mood by listening really loud Hjálmar, Icelandic Reggea band. By when I was drinking a cup of coffee latte at Laugar I did not even remember being in bad mood.
http://www.nat.is/travelguideeng/plofin_dimmuborgir.htm
Before Akureyri I had a short visit at Goðafoss. When getting closer Akureyri, around Vikurskarð hights, a cloud mass overtook the whole view. It was like a wall between clear sunny weather and grey cold darkness and into the darkness I went.
I passed Akureyri and drove to Dalvik and 'Olafsfjörður trying to find sun. To be able to go 'Olafsfjörður, one have to go through tunnel more or less 6 km long, and there is a traffic sign outside that you have to give a way for cars that are coming from opposite direction. The tunnel had only one lane but plenty of meeting points, there was 5 cars coming from other direction, quite exciting to drive through especially when water was dripping from the seiling.
'Olafsfjörður was one of the most interesting places in this journey, it had strange vibes, vibes of lost glory and history. - houses lack of maintenance, empty warehouses and sadness covering everything. It was sadly romantic, or melancholic place, which I really liked.
Back to Akureyri, where I stayd over night in a farm Grænhóll just 5 kilometers from the centrum. Presently occupied by Þórunn Hyrna Víkingsdóttir aka Tóta frá Grænhóli and her boyfriend Raggi. Around the farm were loads of horses on hay fields. During the second world war the farm area was occupied by US Army and Tóta's grand father took over the area.
Me and Rakki desided to go downtown for one beer, but we ended up drinking quite few after all. We went first Kaffi Amour which was full of turist from Norwegian cruiser, people were really drunk and the bar ran out draft beer, so heavy was the drinking there. There was one man, which was extremely drunk, he was trying to go bar to order drinks but he could not because a huge mirror on one wall. He was trying to go the bar reflected on the mirror and there was reflection of him blogging his way there. This was going on for an hour, heh!! We quikly went to Kaffi Akureyri before cl0sing time but it was really empty...
posted by Aleksur @ 15:48
1 Comments:
Amazing pictures!
-riikka h.
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