This is going to be a very photo heavy post because the Myvatn region, near the town of Reykjahlid, had so much beauty packed into such a small space! After half a day in Akureyri, the largest city in the North of Iceland we headed East on the ring road towards the geothermal wonderland of Myvatn. We stopped at Godafoss waterfall on the way, and we were a bit overwhelmed by the number of people. Up until this point we have spent most of our time in Iceland off the beaten track, in less traveled areas, so seeing crowds of people was a bit of a shock for us and was the one thing about the Myvatn area that we really did not enjoy. 

Just outside of Reykjahlid we stopped to see Grjotogja, the hotspring inside a cave that they used to film Jon and Ygrittes love scene in Game of Thrones. It used to be a popular bathing spot, but volcanic activity in the 70s spiked the water temperature and although its been cooling off in recent years its still too hot to be safe. The cave isn't nearly as spacious as it looks on TV (not surprising), but we managed to get a nice vantage point for some photos at the end of the pool and then crawled through a small gap in the rock to get out on top of the cave and scramble down to our car. 

​After setting up our tent at the campground we took a trip to Myvatn Nature Baths, often referred to as the "Blue Lagoon of the North." The Blue Lagoon is a world famous man-made hot pool outside of Reykjavik, but at $85 a person and often overcrowded we decided it was a "must see" that we wouldn't mind missing. We were told that Myvatn was half the price and twice as nice, and we weren't disappointed. Several large man-made rock pools with a gravel bottom are filled with water from the National power company's bore hole in Bjarnarflag. The water contains all kinds of beneficial minerals that give it a cloudy bright blue color, and it comes out of the ground at 130 degrees celcius so it has to be cooled down a lot before its pumped into the pools. There was a nice view over the valley of the mountains in the distance, and we stayed until after dark so we could enjoy the sunset and the stars.

They weren't formed by eruptions like most craters, instead they were caused by explosions of steam from under the surface as lava flowed over the wetlands and lake. The steam vents caused rock and lava to build up around them forming small circular and semi-circular craters along the lake shore.

There were massive clouds of steam and sulfur rising from the ground and streaming out of the mountainside in the distance. The crust is very thin in spots and the soil temperatures could reach 100 degrees Celcius, so we stuck to the marked paths as we walked through the hellish landscape.

Our next stop was Viti crater, about 300 meters across, filled with deep blue water and surrounded by a geothermal area with steaming mountains in the distance. We hiked up to the rim, then all the way around the crater for views of the multi-color mountains ranging from deep black to green to tan and white. On the side of the road on the way back to the ring road was a continuously running hot shower, right out in the open. We have no idea what it was meant for, but we used it to wash the sticky mud from our shoes.

Since we didn't want to spend another night at the crowded campground in Reykjahlid we planned to drive all the way to Egilsstadir, but we took a chance on an 8k detour to Modrudalur when we saw a camping sign, and ended up finding our favorite campground in Iceland so far. We followed the signs and pulled into a field full of goats (local landscaping crew I guess...), and then down past a small turf building into a level field with campsites divided by turf walls. It was the first time on our whole trip the sky was clear enough to see the stars, and we cooked dinner in the quaint little turf house, joined by the resident cat. Modrudalur is the highest inhabited place in Iceland at 1,539 ft in elevation and it made for a cold night and a heavy layer of frost on the tent in the morning. We had planned on getting out to look for the northern lights, but neither of us could bear the thought of leaving our cozy sleeping bag in the middle of the night!

After our time on the Snaefellsjokull Peninsula we headed north to explore a little bit of the Westfjords, one of the more remote parts of Iceland. Our first stop was to visit the Museum of Sorcery and Witchcraft in Holmavik, where we learned all about the history and culture of pagan activity in Iceland.

​The Westfjords was one of the biggest holdouts for witchcraft after the country was "christian-ized," and most of the people who were burned alive for witchcraft were from the area. It turns out, in Iceland the people accused of witchcraft were mostly men and only one woman was ever burned at the stake. We learned a lot about the various lore and superstitions and for such a small museum it was really well done. All of the exhibits were in Icelandic, but we were given a translation book in English so we could understand everything. The craziest thing we learned about were the Necropants...apparently a spell for making money involves getting a friend to agree to let you skin them from the waist down after they die so you can step, bare bottomed, into your very own pair of skin-pants. If you keep a coin in the scrotum along with a magic rune symbol, then as long as you never remove the original coin the scrotum will always be filled with money. Good for those who are short on cash, and presumably don't mind jingling with every step.

After our journey through the Icelandic Occult we drove out along route 60 that hugs the coastline of the Southern part of the fjords in search of a hot pool right on the edge of the ocean. It was a long and winding dirt road that made me grateful to be in a car rather than on bicycles as we periodically climbed over one mountain and descended down the other side to the next fjord at steep grades of 10-15%. The entire drive offered magnificent views of the ocean and the occasional quaint little farmhouse set next to its own private waterfall. 

We found Hellulaug hotspring in the early afternoon, and it was completely worth the long drive. Hot water was piped down from a spring on top of the cliff into a 12x9 foot pool about waist deep. It was made by blocking up the entrance to a natural crevice in the rock with a wall of stacked stones, and it was so close to the ocean that I could imagine getting sprayed by waves if the tide was high and the seas were rough. The clear blue water was slightly aerated and if we sat still for a moment or two we ended up covered in tiny little bubbles. Since we had no other plans for the day we stayed for several hours as various other groups came and went. As the day wore one we decided not to continue out into the fjordlands, and retraced our route and cut north to the little town of Hvammstangi to a campground we particularly enjoyed while on our cycle tour. On our way back a juvenile white tailed eagle raced us along the road for a couple hundred meters, giving us a chance to marvel at his nearly 6 foot wingspan.

​We spent two nights in Hvammstangi so I could take advantage of the internet there to do a Skype interview for a position at Schweitzer for this winter (spoiler alert, I got the job!!). It was nice to take a full day to relax, organize all of our photos and footage and catch up on sleep. We've been on the move constantly since we arrived in Iceland and this was the first time we spent more than one night in the same place. In the evening we went down to the grocery store for some veggies and were surprised by a huge whale dragged up onto the boat ramp down by the dock. It was a Minke whale that had stranded itself in the next inlet and died as they were trying to get it back out to deep water. 

We are continuing our travels to the North and East, come back soon to hear about our adventures in North Iceland!