Sunday, August 20, 2017

Vatnajokull - Iceland's Largest Glacier

The entire "Sedalia" crew.

Unfortunately we got little sleep last night because we were up looking at the Northern Lights streaking across the night sky. They say its unusual for them to be seen this late in the summer.

Our drive through the south of Iceland took us near the largest glacier in Iceland,
one that covers 8% of the land even though it is shrinking. Vatnajokull has many 'tongues' where visitors can explore the glacier in safety and still be awed by its magnificence. This glacier is also famous for being featuried in a couple of James Bond movies like 'Die Another Day', 'Live and Let Die' and 'Interstellar' staring Matt Damon.

Our first stop took half of our group on a hike up the mountainside to view the Svartifoss or Black Waterfall in a basalt valley. The other half walked to another part of the glacier for a close-up view.

A long drive later we stopped at the Jokulsarlon Glacial Lagoon where we rode in a 'Duck' (a truck that also serves as a boat) into a lagoon full of icebergs. The lagoon empties into the ocean where some of the icebergs end up on the black sand beach. This bunch is crazy enough to pick a chunk of ice, chop it into pieces and serve 1000 year-old ice with 5 year-old Jamison whiskey. A toast to Iceland with fire and ice!

The sad news is that the 80 year-old lagoon is getting bigger meaning that the glacier is melting and getting smaller. It has been shrinking for the past 10 years.

We had a long three hour drive with the glacier, mountains and fiords on the west side of the bus and the plains and ocean on the right. Always a beautiful scene which ever way you looked.

We are spending the night in Breiddalsvik, a quaint little village with a new brew pub that we 'had' to visit.





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