Trip to Iceland
Mike and Judy Henderson
July 3 to July 14, 2016
I'm going to leave this map of the cruise at the beginning of each web page so that you can relate what we describe to the location in Iceland.
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7/10/2016 We departed Akureyri and headed to Isafjordur. The weather was much better than earlier, and although the ship did some "rocking and rolling" it was not as bad as the trip to Akureyri. This was early morning as we headed into Isafjordur.
As we left on our morning tour we went through the Bolungarvikurgong tunnel, a 5.2km tunnel that had been cut through the mountain. Previously, people had to use the coast road, which was difficult and dangerous in the winter. Our first stop was at a church in Bolungarvik, known as Holskirkja, "the church on the hill".
A young lady in traditional Icelandic dress sang some traditional songs for us.
Next we went to the Museum at Osvor, a replica of a fishing village at Bolungarvik. It was very interesting to see the difficult, primitive living conditions of the early fishermen. They fished in the winter, when it was dark, because they were farmers in the summer.
The hut where the fishermen lived is on the left, with the fish processing hut to the right rear. The fishermen's hut had two levels. The first level was for storage of fishing gear and the second level (essentially, the attic) was where they slept.
Here's another view of the fishing "village" taken from the web.
A typical fishing boat and a person dressed as the fishermen would have been dressed. The rope around the waist and between the legs was to assist in rescue in case a man went overboard. Its not a very big boat when you think that they were going out in the dark in winter weather.
Next we went to the Westfjords Heritage Museum where we were offered a taste of the putrefied shark, called hakarl, and dried fish. I tried the fish but passed on the shark. It was described as having a strong taste of ammonia.
Here are the samples of the shark. Click here to learn more about it.
And the dried fish. The dried fish was very chewy, but the flavor was not bad.
The museum was also a museum of accordions. Why accordions in this part of the world? Apparently accordions were popular in Iceland. According to Wikipedia they have 190 accordions in the museum.
This is just a small sample of the accordions that were in the museum.
Then we went to the location of a tall waterfall - the waterfall of Tungudalur. On the way, we passed a golf course. Surprisingly, there are a lot of golf courses in Iceland, some of which are located in lava beds. The fairways are smooth but if you hit out of bounds, the ball will bounce in unexpected ways. Walking across lava is extremely difficult and will quickly destroy shoes, so accurate shots are important. This course was on smooth terrain, however.
But back to the waterfall - the tour leader dipped out some water from the stream and we all had a drink. It was pure, with no mineral taste. There's a campground further along the stream at the bottom of the falls.
In the afternoon, we took a boat ride to the island of Vigur in the fjord. It was a 40 minute ride and the boat bounced quite a bit. This is one of the boats.
Vigur is a nesting site for Artic terns. Terns defend their nests by diving at people (or animals) that come to the nesting grounds.
On the island, they gave us sticks to hold above our heads to keep the terns from diving and hitting our heads.
Here's Judy with a stick, ready to go on the walk through the nesting grounds. I asked if this would disturb the terns and their nesting but was told that they have never detected any change to the survival of the baby chicks. We were allowed to walk on a mowed pathway through the grass, so we didn't actually come too near the nests. Still, the adult birds were vigilant.
Here I am trying to take pictures of the terns as they dive at us.
A few tern pictures:
And here's a baby chick in the grass. It might be an Eider duck, which were also on the island - notice the webbed feet. He looked quite healthy - just waiting for mama. There was a special heated box in which baby ducks were placed if they had been abandoned, and they received great care. Eider down is a big income-producer for the island, and they were careful to protect the Eiders. We were not allowed to enter the building where the adults were nesting and producing the valuable down, but they described the collecting and cleaning process.
We also saw some puffins. Notice that one of them is holding several little fish in his beak.
Here's a black guillemot. These were plentiful on the island, also.
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7/11/2016 We departed Isafjordur and sailed to Heimaey Island in the south of Iceland. Heimaey is the site of the Eldfel volcano which erupted in 1973, destroying about 400 homes and nearly closing off the harbor. I encourage you to read the Wikipedia article I linked to. It's an interesting story about man's efforts to control nature to save a town and livelihoods.
On the way to Heimaey Island we passed a small island - I think it is Eldey Island - that is the nesting site for the northern gannet. Heimaey Island is part of the Westman Islands (or Vestermannaejar, as it's known in Icelandic).
Northern gannets are all over the island.
We also sailed around Surtsey, a new island formed in 1963 by an underwater volcanic eruption. No pictures - its a plain-looking island with the beginnings of vegetation but not much bird life yet. It has been declared a protected environment so that scientists can study the development of plant and animal life under controlled conditions.
Then we sailed into the harbor on Heimaey Island. Here's a view into the harbor - a fairly narrow entrance but still passable. The eruption of 1973 created a lava flow that nearly closed the harbor entrance, but it was saved by heroic efforts in a seemingly impossible situation.
We took a boat ride around the island.
Janice and I on the boat. It was fairly cold on the water - there was a brisk wind blowing.
Too many scenery shots so I won't bore you with them all. One lava flow area is famous because it looks like the head of an elephant. The formation is called columnar basalt.
On our return to the harbor, the captain backed us into a small cove. We saw a speed boat and a rubber dingy already in the cove.
To our surprise, they began to play "Amazing Grace" on a trumpet and sax.
The cove acted like a "bowl" and really projected the sound to us. What a special experience!
Back on land we took a local tour. Our first stop was to see a replica of a Viking house that islanders would have used centuries ago. It consists of two buildings built into the hillside and connected by a passageway. The structure on the right is where people would live, and the structure on the left was for animals.
It's not actually an exact replica. The guide said that it was built higher for the comfort of visitors and a small amount of modern material was used in the construction. Here's a view of the interior, where perhaps 20 people would live in the winter.
Then we went to the Eldheimer museum which documents the 1973 volcanic eruption of Eldfell. The museum is built on top of some of the area covered by lava and ash, and has many exhibits from the eruption, including a "hands on" exhibit that shows the progression of the lava across the island.
Outside the museum are the remains of a house that was covered by lava (and has been partially dug out).
Here's the outside of the museum.
I found this picture of the exhibit I mentioned earlier on the web. As you turn the outside rail, the image shows the progress of the lava. Very cool exhibit.
We departed Heimaey and sailed for Reykjavik. Here Gino and I are at dinner. We were amazed at how much we had in common.
