Glacier and Iceberg day

Yesterday was a great day. We started off by taking a snowmobile ride on the Vatnajokull glacier that covers most of eastern Iceland. This started with a jeep ride up to the glacier along a dirt road barely wide enough for the jeep with hairpin turns, dramatic drops on either side and not a guardrail in sight. The plan had been to take a jeep ride of the glacier but Ken and James decided that was for gray-haired woosies so we ended up on the snowmobile drive. It was snowing with some ice pellets so the ride was a bit hard on the face but we were wearing full snowmobile suits and helmets so it was okay. It was in cloud so we missed out on some dramatic views but it was still really great. Sara and I discovered that the advantage of being on the back rather than being the driver was a higher level of warmth, but we after discovered that the disadvantage was that the snowsuits were not entirely waterproof particularly in the derrière area.

After that we went and had the new tire put on in Hofn and had lunch at a bakery in the local supermarket and headed out. Next stop was the glacier lagoon at Jokulsarlon and you can see lots of photos posted below. The lake was great and the boat ride amazing but better still was the black lava beach across the road, where icebergs were being taken out to sea by a fierce current. And lots were washed up on the black beach which looked very dramatic. That's where the photo of Ken and James on the iceberg comes from. We spent a long time there, which also included sampling a beer only available locally which is made from glacial water.
From there, on to Vik where we checked into a very austere looking place called the Volcano Hotel which turned out to be really terrific. We went into town for dinner and then to the black lava beaches at Vik which were really interesting - nothing south of there for a long long time. There were some interesting basalt columns right at the beach - all this at 10:30 at night and, of course, still light.

This morning we started off at Skogarfoss, a waterfall with a double rainbow and with Eyjafjallajokull (the volcano that erupted a couple of years ago shutting down airports across Europe) that is still actually smoking (or ashing or whatever). Now off to the Golden Circle - big waterfall, geyser and the rift valley where the two tectonic plates are separating.

Tires all holding.