Iceland 2014 Day 3 ~~~ Mývatn ~~~

THIS BLOG WILL BE UPDATED LATER WITH PHOTOS!!

Today I had my only whole day around Akureyri, so I decided to use it well to visit the area of lake Mývatn, which is about 100 km driving to reach and a few more to circle it. Well, it wouldnt be me if there wasnt some kind of act of stupidity involved. Sometimes I truly believe Im living my life on the edge of what is normal and what is safe. No I didnt put myself in danger this time.

When I drove through akureyri I needed to refuel my dedicated black disaster. I was looking for an Orca or Shell as they gave a discount, but the one Shell I passed literally I didnt really see how to get there, and I just thought well... Akureyri must have more gas stations and I still had 25% in the tank.
But like my own car, the last stripes always go faster and it quickly went from 4 tot 2 and I had left Akureyri behind me. A quick look on the map showed me the next gas station just around the mountain. I better turn back... But then I saw a sign next gasstation in a town off the ring road, 23km.
I think besides at Hvalfjorður the kilometers didnt pass by so slowly as then. And the last remaining line started blinking. No where ahead of me I could see anything else than mountains and farms. Last time I felt like this was when returning from UK when I managed to drive from Calais to the Flemish-Dutch border in this doubtfull stage.

And then finally I reached this little town and saw a gas station. I felt my world fall apart as it looked so abandoned. But well it wasnt. It was selfservice and it was such a relief. So now I never again pass any gasstation if I am left with only 25% of fuel.
Happily I drove back to the ringroad, which now of course felt much faster. The weather was awesome now, with clear skies, less wind and sun shining in my face. The area to pass was stunning, with mountains and open plains, and soon it became more volcanic too. The climbs were higher than before and smooth rolling down the hills was now sheer pleasure without the winds.

My first stop would be at Goðafoss. I had no idea where I was because I miss the navigation. So funny how you can get used to things like that so quickly. But then on a volcanic rock plain I saw mists rising up. I thought that must be Goðafoss. But the parking was empty and I almost passed the sign because my expectation was different.

Goðafoss, waterfall of the Gods

Looking away from Goðafoss, stunning autumn colors are on its canyon edges

So I was all alone with Goðafoss for time being. And thats amazing, to take unspoiled pictures. Goðafoss is one of my favorite waterfalls, I dont know why. Unfortunately the winds came south, and Goðafoss was partly hidden in its own mysterious mists. The tickling on my face was amazing however. I climbed some of the rocks, you can go to the top of the waterfall quite easily because you approach it from above. The autumn colors of the herbs growing there are stunning. But all the berries have been picked. I enjoyed my moment alone with Goðafoss and felt blessed to be somewhere touristic without Chinese or Americans. Then 2 cars arrived. But they were Icelandic people :-)

I continued my way and more and more lava creations appeared, and finaly lake Mývatn, with its many pseudocraters from a time when lake Mývatn was a whole 'sea'. During under water eruptions those pseudocraters developed. The are no real craters, but when they were still lava, the interaction with water was so explosive that crater shaped hills remained. Other less explosive lava created lavarock formations you will encounter at Dimmuborgir. The place I wanted to visit for sure today, and I came across not much later.

The raincurtains on this picture will come closer and eventually pour out over me. On the left you see the polution plume from Holuhraun eruption.

Dimmuborgir is a place where tales about trolls come naturally. There are faces and shapes every where. There even is one formation called cathedral, because it looks like it. And once a year in August there is a special church service held in it. I didnt see this cathedral because the clouds that loomed above the south reached Dimmuborgir and were quite nasty rainshowers. Now I could wait or move on to come back later. I decided to put Dimmuborgir on a next trip list, as it deserves much more than a quick visit and left.  












The to my surprise Grottagjá was almost next to it. It is a wonderfull crystal clear blue water underground geothermal pool, most of the time you can take a bath, but temperatures vary a lot. But to reach it you need to cross a gravel road. With this wether Im not tempted. So Grottagjá also goes on the next to do list.

Then it was my plan to visit Krafla volcano but had no idea how to get there. I followed a sign to Krufluvirkjun which means Krafla geothermal energy plant sort off. Thinking that must be close enough to the source. Another steep rise to get over one of Kraflas eruption craters, here you see the slid streams of lavarock, and what Holuhraun must lok like in a few years too. On the other side of the ridge, I already smelled the sulphur.
Hvelir is a field with active sulfators blowing out sulfur stream. There are also bubbling mudpools. But it still rained and it was still windy, I decided to not leave my car when I saw a bus of tourists wearing plastic covers over their shoes. Your car would become just as muddy as this whole area.

I moved on and I was sure to be on the way to Husavik to make a bit of the Diamond circle. I drove a long way through isolated lavafields. Nothing lives here, not even sheep.
And then there is a sign to Dettifoss and Asbyrgi. Strange.... How can Dettifoss be on the left of this road.... And then I noticed I actually was on the ringroad towards Egilstaðir.... I opted to go to Dettifoss, but it was a gravel road and there was a sign of restriction due to the eruption at Holuhraun and the massive flood that would pass here if the glacier melts. So I didnt opt for Dettifoss and returned to Krafla. The sun started to shine and at Hvelir I took a few photo's outside the car. And my car looks like a mudpool now too :-)

I decided to take a look at Krofluvirkjun, the place where geothermal energy from Krafla is harvested. There was not a lot to see there, but there are quite a lot of walking trails there in a beautifull area. I did not take one however. Its not that I dont like to take a hike, but was not prepared for longer hikes. I should do so in a next visit when I spend some more time in this interesting area.

I hopped back in my car and took some more pictures on my way back to Skjalðarvik. I now finished the roundway around lake Mývatn. I stopped at a silica lake, the water was as blue as at Blue Lagoon, but it could not beats it stunning nature around it, as it was in a sort of sandpit.

While driving back I just had going home on my mind. I wonder why I sometimes have this on my mind. So much beauty to see and I just have going home programmed. I think it has to do with the amount of impressions, the better the day is, the quicker I want to go home. In any way I am happy there are so few tourists here. Well lots of busses to Nature baths, which I wanted to visit too. But as soon as I noticed it is today not the less visited version of Blue Lagoon, I changed my mind.
Like I say its better for me to visit this area in more days. The amount of beauty I saw and impressions I got is too much for me. I already feel like Im here for weeks, but its just my third day in Iceland.

I stopped at a supermarket to buy some things to eat, and went back to my guest(rest) house.

At night I got blessed with my best northern light experience so far. I went out quickly after sundawn, because in Scandnavia the sky was on fire already. I went down to the little beach belonging to the guesthouse. It took a while to see something, because it was not completely dark, but steady flares of northern light crawled up from the east, and soon a ribbon was cast from east to west. It sadly wasnt dynamic, but just a glow. I worred why all photos seemed to fail, but it was just the nature of todays lights I thought. I watched for an hour, together with a local friendly cat who came snuggle up with me. The whole sky was green and first time ever I saw it faintly green with my own eyes too and not white. After I returned from a short break inside, there were a few flares of dynamic lights (dynamic means in my terms, you see the curtain in the wind like mmoving northern lights). I just have to see back home if I managed to capture it. My camea appears to have a hidden setting that turns all photo's a bit on the dark side :-(

I didnt stay much longer to watch it. I went inside and told the receptionist the lights were out. They dididnt even realise it. I dont know what their wake up service is, but this time you could even see from insude the northern lights were playing big games in the skies. It was awesome!

On my ipad I was very sad that most photo's turned out almost solid black with bits of green. And I saw the ISO was set on 400, which was impossible as I put it on 1600 manually and auto iso is switched off. But it seemed to have screwed all my photos. ***Back home I retrieved back most auroras like you see them here, however it had to sacrifice most of the quality of the photo's. So thats why I put them up small size here, they look best due to the bad resolution that left of it***