We left our lovely accommodations near Egilsstaður (AY-gills-sta-thur) wishing we could take our cabin with us. It was the biggest room we’ve had so far, and we had our own bathroom, too! And a porch. And warm enough weather to enjoy it.
But we were there only for one night, and we’ll be three nights here at Mývatn (MEE-vaht’n). As expected, our room here is “budget standard”…actually, it’s a bit larger than most. Which means we can both open our suitcases at the same time, and we have a sink. and two chairs.
After much discussion, we decided to make a side-trip to Seyðisfjörður, a busy fishing village which is also the destination for ferries coming from Europe to Iceland. The road there ran up over a snowy pass, Fjarðarheiði (FYAR-thar-hi-thee), where people were unloading skis and snowmobiles on this bright sunny Whit-Monday holiday. There was a monster snow-blower by the side of the road, and the snow was pretty deep up on top. Pretty view down into Seyðisfjörður, though.
The town was pretty much closed for the holiday, so we passed on through and headed out to the end of the fjord and the bird-cliffs at Skálanes (SCOWL-ah-ness). Much of the drive was on a two-rut road and kind of muddy. The scenery was breathtaking, but we were defeated in our goal by a fast-running stream that looked somewhat deeper than our Ford Kuga’s clearance and the bottom had plenty of “little” boulders. Which were plenty big enough to get our car stuck on, our feet soaked in icy water, perhaps damage something in the undercarriage, our insurance cancelled, trip messed up. So we walked around a bit, and then looked more carefully at the cliff edges we were driving along as we headed back. They weren’t all that high, but we did find some nesting Fulmars, and a mixed group of Eiders, Long-tailed Ducks, and Red Knots.
Then we drove back over the snowy mountain pass, through Egilsstaðir, and headed for Mývatn. And got more snowy mountain pass, except it was more like driving across a snowy plateau for two hours. Snow. And geese. And swans. LOTS of geese and swans. Any time there was a patch of bare ground or open water, there were geese or swans. In the snow. On the ice.
After two hours or so of snow, there was a lava desert, and a HUGE river with a really nice (one-lane) bridge.
And then we started seeing steam rising from various points, as we entered the Mývatn district. There’s a major geothermal plant near here, and the ground just kind of oozes steam in some areas. Coming down off the plateau we could see Lake Mývatn, which is one of the major destinations on our trip. The name means “Midge Lake”, which doesn’t sound so appealing, but it’s a great site for both geological formations and birding. It’s a large, shallow lake formed after a volcanic event 2300 years ago, and birds love it.
The lake environment probably isn’t what you’re thinking when you see the word “lake”. There are volcanic features everywhere. Last night after dinner, we drove around the lake. This morning, we went for a walk around the pseudo-craters on a nice sunny day.
Myvatn has some rather unusual volcanic features that are the result of lava flowing into a shallow lake. When this happens, water trapped under the more than 1000C hot lava turns to steam, which then finds various paths up through the lava. One common result is seen in the first two pictures below. Lots and lots of really weirdly shaped “chimneys” where high pressure steam carried bits of lava upward with it. Other times the result was to produce quite normal-looking, but pseudo-volcanic craters, such as those shown in the following five photos. None of these craters, so nicely formed from volcanic ash, have roots extending down to a magma chamber, whence lava could have erupted. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mývatn .
During past ice ages, Iceland was covered with a large sheet of ice, much like modern Greenland. This did not stop the volcanoes from being volcanoes, but it did result is some unusual-appearing, flat-topped volcanoes, such as Bláfjall (previous reference), seen in last picture of this group.
Yes, that’s ice on the lake. They’re having a very late spring this year.
Lake Mývatn is the only European nesting ground for the Barrow’s Goldeneye, and another 12 species nest here, with many others just passing through. Photos of European Wigeon, Harlequin Ducks, Barrow’s Goldeneye, Common Loons (sleeping), Horned Grebe, and Red-breasted Merganser:
We also walked along the river Laxá (LAHX-ow), which is where we found the Harlequin Ducks. Puttered along up the west side of the lake and stopped at the Bird Museum (every kind of Icelandic bird stuffed and on display, except the Great Auk…interesting in a kind of creepy way), which is on a peninsula out in the lake. We were hoping for more great birding, but when we came out of the museum, it was snowing. We ate lunch. It was still snowing. We decided to come back to the room and catch up on the blog and a few other things. Like naps. Now, of course, it’s sunny out….and almost time for supper.
Supper was yummy! Big bowls of Icelandic meat soup, a beer for Sheila and a cappucino for Lars, and skyr with berries for dessert. Still not as much as the horribly expensive dinner we were sort of trapped into on our second night on the road, and much tastier.
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