Volcanoes. Waterfalls, Birds....May 22 Part 2

After Gulfoss, we drove south toward the sea.  We stopped at a crater lake, Kerid, with a visible red caldera.  The current thonking is that it was a cone volcano whose cone collapsed. The colors were beautiful.

 We eventually followed Route 1, the road which circumnavigates the island, and followed it for a long way.   We saw Helka getting closer and closer.  It looks like a text book drawing of a volcano.  It is one of Iceland's most active volcanoes with 20 recorded eruptions since 874. The lava it lays is tephra.  Ten per cent of Iceland's tephra is from Hekla.  Hekla means "short headed cloak" from the almost-permanent cloud at its top.  It has produced one of the world's largest lava flows, of which we saw plenty of evidence. It had a significant eruption in1937-8 which lasted for over a year.its most recent eruption was 2000 and scientists think it may be getting ready to erupt. Unusually, this volcano only gives a warning of 30-80 minutes!  Yikes!

Then, we drove on toward the giant, looming Eyjfallajokull, which disrupted air traffic in May, 2010.  Actually, as volcanoes go, it is not one of Icelands largest, but it looked awfully large to us!  We first stopped at an amazing set of waterfalls coming off Eyjfallajokull called Seljalandfoss, one of Iceland's most photographed sights.  It falls over 200 meters and creates a rainbow.  You can walk behind it, but we didn't as we did not want to get that wet.  Then, we went on to the base of Eyjfallajokull, which is pronounced:  "ay uh fyat luh yoe kuutl uh". Easy?  It has three peaks and is always completely covered by snow.  At one time, the southern wall was at the coast, but now there is a flat plain between it and the sea where there are many farms, snuggled up to its base.

Animals.  Iceland is known for its ponies and we saw more horses today than I have ever seen.  The herds are everywhere.  The were brought by the Vikings and very important to Iceland's development.  No other breeds have ever been allowed, so they are pure-bred Viking horses.  They also have a gait of a fast walk not found in any other horaes anywhere.  Likewise, the Icelandic sheep have been isolated for over 1000 years and are also unique and lure bred and famous for their wool. Both these animals made survival in this harsh land possible.
 
We got back past 7.  For those following this blog, this will be a similar Mark story about gasoline.  We were in the midst of a lava field en route home when the gas light went on...no gas stations in sight and, when we got to one at the end of the field, it was closed.  A long 11 kilometers later, luckily, we found one.

We went for a lovely dinner at Organic Fish and Chips.  Really yummy basil cod.  Mark had fried cauliflower and broccoli and I had a Greek salad.  Good, but a bit expensive.

Now, for the birds.  We saw many birds today and stopped repeatedly to watch in our binoculars and attempt to photograph.  We are sure we saw many whimbrels.  We saw whooper swans definitely new to us.  We saw beautiful oystercatchers.  We saw nesting gulls at Seljalandfoss which may have been glaucoma, but we will need help to identify.  We are pretty sure we saw a European golden plover.  We have others on the camera that we have to consult about.  But, it was our best day of birding on this trip.