Three unique outdoor adventures and two unusual food adventures. Read on…
Inside the volcano
I took a journey toward the center of the earth by descending deep into a dormant volcano. The Thrihnukagigur volcano last erupted 4000 years ago and for some reason left behind a magma chamber that is completely hollowed out (they explained why but I couldn’t follow along; I barely know what magma is.)
We hiked 45 minutes in the great outdoors to reach the entrance of the volcano. There is only one way to enter the volcano and that’s through a very narrow crater at the top:
Using an elevator similar to a window washer’s elevator for high rise buildings, we descended 120m down to the floor of the volcano. It was a bit claustrophobic at times but overall ok. This cartoon puts into perspective how deep the crater (and we) go down:
Seven minutes later we reached the bottom. It was fascinating down there, with a very interesting array of colors on the rock walls, a tiny pinhole of sunlight from the crater opening far above our heads, and the enormous size of the volcanic chamber inside.
If you ever come to Iceland, do this.
Scuba diving
Scuba diving typically isn’t an activity that people — including myself — associate with Iceland. However, I discovered that not only is diving possible here, but it offers several things not found anywhere else in the world.
We went diving in the Silfra fissures, which is notable because 1) it’s in the Thingvellir National Park, which is where Game of Thrones is filmed, 2) it’s where the world’s oldest parliament was first created, and most interestingly 3) it’s where the continents of North America and Europe meet. Specifically it’s where the North American and Eurasian tectonic plates meet. (If I understand this correctly, continents are the parts of the plates that rise above the ocean; this graphic describes it better.)
As you might guess, the water temperature is close to freezing (about 3 degrees C). But this extreme cold allows for some of the clearest and most pristine waters on the planet.
Surviving such a cold water dive required a dry suit, which I had never worn before. I thought wetsuits were heavy, but that’s nothing compared to what we wore: a layer of thermal underwear (I was forced to buy some here), followed by a thick fleece undersuit (a fleece onesie), and finally the thick neoprene drysuit itself. Over all that we had extra weights (16kg!) and then the usual gear. It was nearly impossible to move. I became so hot walking around I couldn’t wait to jump in the water. But I did … and it was cold … so cold. The only semi-exposed body parts while wearing a dry suit are your wrists and your face, and I really thought they would develop frostbite.
In the end, though, it was all worth it because the views were phenomenal. There was easily >100m of visibility in that clear blue water. Although there was no marine life, there were plenty of interesting things to look at. Here I am touching both North America (right side of photo) and Europe (left).
A typical view throughout the dive.
The experience was well worth it and highly recommend it to any diver who finds themself in this part of the planet.
Hot springs
Iceland is full of volcanic activity, which means there are lots of active geothermal fields. We visited a popular one in the city of Hveragerdi, which involved a very arduous and very uphill 5km hike through endless steaming and stinky sulphur holes and green mountains as far as the eye can see.
Amazingly we did eventually make it there after two hours and were rewarded by a warm river that we relaxed in for a long time.
Hot dogs
It turns out Icelanders love hot dogs. They are cheap and you can find them everywhere. If you see a line of people in this city, chances are they’re lining up for a pylsur, or hot dog.
I hunted down Bæjarins beztu, a very simple hot dog stand that allegedly makes the best dogs in the country. There’s always a line in front of this stand waiting to get “one with everything” (a dog with ketchup, mustard, a special sauce, and fried onions.)
It’s been a long time since I’ve had a hot dog, so while I don’t have much to compare to, it really was tasty. Made of beef, pork, and lamb, it actually tasted like real meat and best of all it had a great snap when you bit into it. Bill Clinton even ate here multiple times whenever he visited.
(This is now the second place I’ve visited that Bill liked. Hopefully my heart doesn’t follow in his footsteps too.)
Fresh meat
I did something I’m not proud of tonight. I ate Iceland’s two most well-known wildlife animals: whale and puffin. Each is somewhat of a delicacy here and I figured when in Rome … why not?
The puffin was smoked and thus not tasty at all; I dislike all things smoked. Whale meat was interesting. It was (very) red meat but had a texture and taste more like fish. It didn’t taste bad but I felt guilty eating a fellow mammal. As a friend to the fishes, I felt so guilty that I returned home and went to WWF’s website and partially alleviated my guilty by adopting a whale. (Afterwards the website asked what prompted me to donate, and presented me with a list of options like TV ad, word of mouth, etc. I looked for a “I ate one of your animals and felt bad” option but fortunately didn’t see one.)
Join me and adopt an endangered species too!
