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August 10, 2005
The eve of departure
Boston is in the past. The truck is packed, the address changed with the USPS, my credit card and the CIA. Okay, so I didn’t contact the CIA, but I bet they know all the same.
If you see a big yellow truck driving south, wave hello. You’ll know it’s us because of the unique padlock on the back of the truck: a fitting gesture of closure and security, a nod to those in the know as we leave a black ribbon of interstate in our wake.
Posted by nick at 05:38 AM | Comments (4) | TrackBack
August 06, 2005
Iceland by any other name would smell as sweet...
Internet time has not been as commonplace as I had expected on this European tour. I find myself on the last full day in Germany sitting in front of a screen trying to catch up to all but the first days of the last three weeks.
Johanna and I left Reykjavic in a whirlwind, barely catching the once-a-day bus that would get us to our destination with enough time to do this 55km hike that is said to be one of the most diverse stretches of land in Iceland: Landmannalaugar to Porsmork (there are some weird phoentic letter things on that last place name — suffice to say it is pronounced, I think, as “THORS-murk”).
We thought Landmannalaugar was a small village in the mountains, but it turned out to be either the name of the region or just of the summer-season tourist hut and natural hot-spring that keeps folks naked enough to feed the hordes of small black flies. We didn’t dawdle at the compound (several cabins with cots, a camping ground, a parking lot and the hot pool) and instead struck out on the hike so we could eat our lunch of german flat bread, cheese and tuna fly-free.
Landmannalaugar is on the edge of a kind of glacial run-off delta. It was in a pretty flat valley that looked like it would be much more full of water when snow is melting. We hiked out of this valley and onto a plateau of lava-rocks that were old and wet enough to have a thick layer of moss growing on them. It was a cool sight, as though a thick green batter had been dribbled along the tops of this lava flow. But as soon as we had enjoyed this scenery it was gone, we had reached the edge of the lava flow and it was replaced by softly rolling sandy hills (glacier-carved? there were many times this trip where we both wished we had payed more attention to our geology teachers) with sulphur-spitting steam vents. There were several large vents, like a hole maybe 10 meters across that you could not get that close to for the smell and the heat of the steam. But the whole area was littered with small vents. When we finally found a spot at the top of a little hill with enough wind to keep those damn bugs from flying into my hair and getting stuck in the little jewcurls, the ridgerest that we put down heated like the seat of a luxury SUV, without noticing we had placed it on several mini steam vents. It was cozy. And for the rest of the day, it was more of this pattern: 100 to 200 meters of craggy black lava flow, sandy rolling hills with small hot-water streambeds building some texture, vents identified over the next hill by wisps of steam. We kept on imagining a hobbit at the base of each of these plumes, working his whisper-lite to give him some hot water for a proper cup of tea.
After crossing a lava field dotted with beautiful mirror-quality chunks of obsidian, we climbed up a snow-covered hill where a memorial to a 24-year-old man who had died in a late-June blizzard in 2004 sobered our approach to the first of several strategically placed huts (this one 12km from Lmnlgr.). We pitched our tent, made a tasty dinner (Johanna, I think on a tip from Taus, had brought along some kale and potatoes — it was a welcome addition to add some durable greens to our cooking mix. We ate and fell asleep early.
Despite this whole ‘always light’ thing, we didn’t take much advantage of the extra daylight until the last day of hiking, when we pulled into base camp at 10PM or so. But I’m getting ahead of myself here…
The next day started with a long and frustrating hike across these soft gravelly hills which, every 50 meters or so would dive into a 10 meter high stream-bed that had been carved out by snow runoff. our elevation did not change significantly in our first hour or two of hiking, but we went up and down countless times. Big time frustrating. We were soon rewarded with a nice uphill climb and one of the best views of the trip. We could see that we were headed towards a greener valley, away from the blacks and greys, the oranges and sulphuric reds of the lava fields and soft hills and into a lush valley bordered by two huge glaciers. Seeing steam vents and lava fields next to glaciers made us wonder who would win if lava flow met a glacier…what would happen? A good argument for an anything-anything-anything match (akin to a roshambo match, just without the rock, paper or scissors), if nothing else.
We had reached the highest point of the trip (about 1200 meters, I think) and could almost see our destination, now a mere 40km away. On our slow descent into the green valley (few trees, mostly just grass and sheep keeping it short), we forded a frigid glacial river (knee-deep, rushing), tried to go swimming in a gorgeous mountain lake (knee-deep, placid), chatted up a German couple whom we leap-frogged with on the trail a bit as we each stopped for snack breaks and a few other small river fordings. The second night was spent in a campsite that was divided into loose sites by old stone farmhouse ruins.
Our last day of hiking was a the longest, about 25km total. We started out across more rocky valley terrain (lava rocks and small lava sand/pebbles? again, no technical terms here) and wound our way between some mountains that jutted up out of the valley. In some places it was like southwestern desert landscapes, small flowering plants and larger-sized rocks dotting the black-sand expanses between the mountains evenly, as if planted or laid there on purpose. Apparantly on foggy days this area is dangerous because it is really easy to lose your way without any clear landmarks around. The weather was gorgeous throughout the whole trip, though. We lucked out on that front. In the afternoon, we walked along and over (thank you, footbridge) some deep canyons with fast-moving glacial run-off, a nice reminder that the glaciers in front of us and to the left (south and east, respectively) were getting closer. Finally, we crossed a riverbed that was probably 100 meters wide but only had shin-deep water rivulets coursing through it now. On the other side was a birch and poplar forest, thick with tall grasses and small versions of these beautiful trees (stunted growth from the cold climes?). We stopped and had dinner next to a small brook and found our way to the Porsmork camping ground and bus pick-up at 7AM the next morning.
Basically, there was never a dull moment on this entire hike. The landscape changed every few kilometers (if not more often) to something completely new and different than before. There were beautiful wilderness extremes (craggy mountaintops, boiling hot water coming out of the ground, ice caps sulking in the distance, desert flats) and more civilized wilderness (sheep bleating from soft grassy knolls, farmhouse ruins, the quaint huts and their facilities — each one had a person or a family, in one case, who lived there and looked after the hut and the campground). We lucked out with weather, didn’t take good advantage of being able to hike at 1AM without a flashlight, appreciated not having to worry about bears snatching our food away, and loved the fact that the bussed allow for nice long one-way trips (even if they are damn expensive).
Our last day in Reykjavic we enjoyed the public baths one more time, ate some real food (non-re-hydrated bean mixes) and watched a local youth soccer game at a field near the campground. Early the next morning, Sunday July 25th, we hopped on a plane for Munich.
Posted by nick at 05:15 AM | Comments (0) | TrackBack