Day 1 - Grindavik and volcanoes

 Once we'd picked up the camper and loaded all our stuff in it, we headed for Grindavik.  It's a small town south of Reykjavik on the coast, near the Blue Lagoon, that we stayed at last time we were here in October 2023.  Since then, and actually soon after we left, there was an eruption on the peninsular near Grindavik. That was the start of a chain of lava eruptions that is on-going, with a new fissure opening just a few days ago.  It has already died down, but we could smell the sulphur in the air as we drove down to Grindavik.  

At the time of the eruptions, they quickly built a huge earth dike with the hope that it would divert lava from reaching the geo-thermal power plant, Blue Lagoon and the town of Grindavik.  The dike was mostly successful, but if memory serves me correctly, one of the eruptions was "inside" the dike and closer to the town itself.   The lava just flowed right on through the main road, destroyed the parking area of the Blue Lagoon but thankfully not the baths itself, and stopped just on the edge of Grindavik town.  

A few houses were consumed by lava, and huge cracks opened up in the ground all through the town.  One man was killed after falling into a fissure and they were not able to recover his body.  While they have filled in a lot of the cracks, and we were able. To drive through most of it, it's pretty much a ghost town, with almost all the houses empty.  

A guy I follow on insta used to live there and has had to move.  It's not clear whether they will ever resettle there, it's just too uncertain.  There is a large fish processing plant in the town that is still operating, but each time there is another eruption on the peninsular, the uncertainty increases.  While to me this is a cool example of nature doing it's thing, lives have been ruined by it.

As we drove past the area where the lava powered on over the road, we saw a small carpark and people up on top of one of the lava dikes, so we stopped for a nosey.  We walked up to the top of the dike and could see stream and gas from the latest eruption down in the valley.

Here's some phone pix showing the size of the dike etc.

Lava gobbles up the old road

The dike

Eruption in the distance

Grindavik in the distance 

Staying in Grindavik is not an option this time around, so we headed further south to Selfoss, a small town where we can buy gas and provisions and start to prepare for our hike.  We have had to do a massive re-shuffle of luggage to fit it all in the van!!! 

Yikes

I decided I needed to use my tent tonight, see how cold it is and how many layers I will need to take for sleeping on the hike.  It will also allow me to be jet-lag restless without disturbing my van-mate.

Tonight's accommodation 

The weather is not too bad, no wind to speak of and while it feels damp because of low cloud, it's not actually raining. 

What are you lookin' at?
A camp raven hunting a small child

Taken at midnight on a loo run