Today was another spectacular day, so Finnur offered to take us in his 4WD on an excursion to the Sprengisandur region in interior Iceland. We started on paved roads, then to a gravel road that wound through a canyon, up the mountain in switchbacks, and across a desert. This was my first experience of the interior highlands about which I have heard so much. The vast center of Iceland is largely uninhabited, due to the harsh landscape and conditions there. As we left the last farms behind, it was easy to see why no one lives there. Our destination was a geothermal spring in which we had hoped to take a hot soak, but when we got there they had emptied the pool to clean the algae out of the bottom. So we did not get the soak, but had an amazing trip, with Hofsj
ökull and Vatnaj
ökull glaciers icing the horizon, green canyons, and arid deserts. Our intrepid driver took us fording across streams, very exciting!
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| across the desert |
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| Fording the glacial stream |
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| Glacial river and Hofsjökul on the horizon |
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| our destination |
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| valley landscape |
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