First, some links:
http://www.flickr.com/photos/26708482@N08/ - Pictures of Graffiti in Reykjavik
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6zWk1eUYJeM - A movie of Dettifoss, the largest waterfall in Europe (in terms of water volume)
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=eVdS0YBHZcY - A movie of Goðafoss, a horseshoe shaped waterfall that plays a prominent role in Icelandic history. In the year 1000, the Icelandic parliament (the Alþingi) decided to accept Christianity as the official religion. On the way back from this meeting, the head of the governing body (the law-speaker), passed this waterfall and threw in his staff with the engravings of the Norse gods. Goðafoss means Waterfall of the Gods.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9-9h2_zh4lE - The Latrabjarg cliffs in the Westfjords.
We've been up to a lot since the Westfjords. The morning of the 6th we left Isafjordur and drove to Holmavik. On the way out of town we stopped a couple times for some hikes. The most impressive was the hike up Naustahvilft, or Troll's Seat. It was an extremely warm day, but up in the mountains (at about 250 meters) there was snow on the ground. Bizarre as it was, I hiked around with the jeans rolled up and shirtless, trekking through the snow and the sun.
There isn't much in Holmavik, but the one interesting sight is the Icelandic Museum of Witchcraft and Sorcery. Along with the rest of continental Europe and the U.S., Iceland went through a phase of witch hunts. Interestingly, almost all of the witch burnings (21 in all) occurred in the Westfjords, and were initiated by one family (which may not be that surprising since most Icelanders are related to each other). Unsurprisingly, that one family was a rich and powerful land-owning family, and most of the people burned were poor peasants. The typical story goes: something bad happens to someone in the powerful family - a daughter falls ill, crops fail, a house falls down - and they find in a local peasant a scapegoat. These peasants, having a hard life, try any and everything to make life easier, and so at some point have resorted to witchcraft (drawing symbols on stones, chanting incantations over their sheep, etc). Eventually they admit it, and then it's all over. One priest who fell ill had a father and son tried and burned, and then attempted to try the daughter as well. Thank goodness the witch-crazy was contained to one century (a long enough time as it is).
Our next big stop was lake Myvatn, in the north east. Along the way our only detours were to see Goðafoss (linked above) and a few turf-covered buildings. I'm fascinated by these buildings. They look as if they've sprouted up from the ground. Icelanders built such houses due to a paucity of other building materials, and because they insulated well and were pretty durable.
Near Myvatn lies Dettifoss, the largest water-volume waterfall in Europe. It's got nothing on Niagara, and honestly wasn't as impressive as some of the other, smaller, falls we've seen, but one thing did strike me. You know how if you watch a rotating ceiling fan, you only see the blur of the blades, but then all of a sudden your eyes focus on one particular blade for a second, and you follow it around its rotation? I experience the same things watching waterfalls. Most of the time I just see the gestalt - a huge amount of water pouring over a cliff into a basin below. But every so often (more often if I try to do it) I end up focusing on a particular section of water as it rolls over the edge and plummets down. I lose sight of it before it hits the water below, but for those seconds, I'm reminded that the waterfall is actually just a conglomeration of millions/billions/trillions of water molecules. I think of a waterfall as this one, stable thing, but when you really look at it you see how the water never falls in exactly the same way. Sometimes it crashes off the side of the rock wall surrounding it, sometimes it bumps into another stream of water also falling down, ricocheting off in a new direction. It's a constantly-in-flux body of water. So I looked at that for awhile.
We camped at Lake Myvatn for a night, intending to see the sights around the lake the following morning, but it rained all night and into the next morning (a drizzle that brought with it an impenetrable haze). Nathan and I were trying to decide what to do, and as we were carrying our tent and sleeping bags back to our car Rachel and Sabrina from the WWOOF farm popped out of their tent and shouted us down. I had half-planned with them to meet up when I was still on the farm, but it was a great surprise to see them., and they helped us figure out our plan for the day, which is to say they had plans for us. We cut our hiking plans short due to the rain, which was a doubly good idea because Lake Myvatn is infested with small flies - midges - which are unbearable when hiking (but do give rise to the tremendous bird-life around the lake).
The previous day another traveller had shown them the way to a secret place off the main road. Not telling us what it was they directed us there, by car and by foot. We traversed a lava field, and could see steam rising from the ground in the distance. When they proclaimed "we're here!" we were standing next to a crevice, with some planks of wood leading down 20 feet to the bottom. Climbing down, we discovered a geothermal pool - hot, but not too hot. We spent the next hour or so lounging in the water, and at one point Rachel dropped the bombshell on us: the wall on the right side was the European tectonic plate, the wall on the left, the North American tectonic plate. In the truest sense we were floating between continents.
Eventually we had to drag ourselves out of the water and back to the car. Nathan and I had plans to go whale watching the next day from a town further north, Husavik, and wanted to get there that night. The town itself was your typical Icelandic fishing village - a few hundred people, a pretty harbor, a mountainous backdrop (how absurd to become used to such sights!).
The following morning we boarded the boat at 10am, and three hours later rolled back into port having seen nothing more than flocks of birds and a single seal. Hugely, immensely disappointing. But as our guide told us - there are no guarantees in the wild.
Currently, Nathan and I are back in Reykjavik, but the details of where we went between Husavik and now will have to wait for another time.
