7-7-2015: Church, Fire and Brimstone

We head up to the church that was built to resemble the columns by the ocean. In the church, you can go up into the tower and capture beautiful views of the city. All concrete the church dominates the area. It is not old but impressive but plain as befits Lutherans - humble folks. An organ plays and the sound is awesome. Outside the church is a very impressive statue of Leif Erikson donated by the US of A on the 200 year anniversary of the City.

 

 

Beauitiful views of Reykjavik!

 

But this day is volcano day. It seems some Iceland Geologist was walking around in a lava field - because that is what geologists do for a living. So he happens upon a hole and being very scientific he decides to toss in a rock to see how deep the hole is. No sound. "What" says he, "No sound?" Back he comes the next day with friends he can trust, a light and a long rope. Down he goes on the rope for one, two, three hundred feet (I think that is right?) before he hits bottom. "Weird" he thinks. Every volcano he or anyone knows either blows off the top or fills the top with magna that cools and blocks the hole. Yet, here is it and the explanation is still not known. They think it is a volcano that shot out a few spits of magna and then quit.

That was 4,000 years ago and the volcano god seems content to rest so we will visit the volcano like the nut that used a rope. You do not just drive up and take an elevator to this beauty. Nope. We catch a van to meet the van that takes a drive to the ski base.

We are then treated to a fast paced walk on a gravel path through a lava field for 45 minutes and it is cold.

We arrive at base camp and man, I am happy to see the camp. Rest is in order and we wait our turn to enter the volcano but it takes special equipment so on goes the helmet, on goes a well, thing that hooks round our hips with a loop in front to hook us onto safety lines.

 

We are called and up we walk to a plank over a chasm so deep light does not quite reach there. We hook on a safety line to walk over the Captain Hook replica plank thing trying not to think that should things go wrong, hanging from a crappy hook on a line over a dark hole in the earth that was once full of hot lava shooting into the sky is our plan B.

Oh, well, the walk is short and we are safe in a little tin box suspended on a little steel wire hooked onto a little motor with a little pulley holding us, the operator and two large guys from Canada. Down we go and it was a bit like a vertical cave but the color was, well, amazing. The minerals make the color and there is copper, sulfur, iron and other minerals. We land and get a chance to walk around. It is strange being inside a volcano. After all, this is the land Jules Verne wrote about in his "Journey to the Center of the Earth".

 

It is time to go and back in base camp we are awarded with a hot bowl of soup before we head back at light speed (these people are in great shape! and we are at the higher end of the age scale for visitors to this adventure). It is so fun to do these trips - we take the walk with folks from India, China, Germany and Canada and they are all great. Last night in Iceland and we hate to leave our second hotel that is so nice and quite and dark!

Iceland is a land that is magical indeed.