2 days exploring Myvatn on foot

Ended up spending three nights at the lakeside campground in Myvatn; it's a fascinating place bustling with volcanic and goethermal activity. I easily could've spent an entire week or more and still not had time to hike to everything to see around here. Myvatn is also one of the biggest bird sanctuaries in the world and I think I read that there are somewhere around 2000 different species of birds living around the lake.

The first day Craig, Karolyn and I set off to hike up to a volcanic "psuedo-crater" [they are called psuedo-craters, because they look like craters but that term implies creation by impact (meteorites) rather than by volcanic activity. There are many of varying sizes in this area.) Along the way we turned up an amazing little natural hotspring cave along the trail.

At this point it was raining pretty steadily and looked like dark clouds would be bringing more for the foreseeable future. So instead of hiking up to the pseudo-crater in the wet, we took the other fork in the trail to the Myvatn Nature Baths, a "luxury" hotspring resort said to rival the world famous Blue Lagoon rear Reykjavik. It cost a pretty penny to get in (2800 Krona... ~$21) but seemed worth the splurge. It was. Of course by the time we hiked to the springs, the rain had stopped but the idea of a lazy afternoon soaking in hot mineral water sure sounded splendid.

Myvatn Nature Baths

At the cafe there, I got to try Bjarnarflagsbraud ("Geyser Bread") a local specialty that is baked underground for 24hrs using the natural geothermal heat nearby. It's an interesting bread and quite tasty actually- it's extremely dense but soft and sticky and very savory.... like the heaviest gingerbread ever, minus the ginger and sugar.

A few hours in the hot pools did the body good (and the skin too, according to advertisements) so we started back to camp and checked out some crazy features along the way.

geothermal power plant & cooling pond

Day 2: On Sunday I set off solo to do some more exploring. First I rode around the west shore of the lake to hike the summit of Vindbelgarfall volcano for a nice view of the surrounding area and many pseudo-craters around the lake.
 

After a mountaintop lunch, I pedaled back around to the east shore and hike to the rim of Hverfjal volcanic rim. It's hard to tell from the photo but the rim ridge runs in a complete circle that you can easily walk all the way around.

Hverfjal

We'd also made friends with a couple of British ex-pats now hailing from Canada who are traveling counter-clockwise around the island via public bus. They've been spending a few days at the Myvatn campground as well and we've had many lingering breakfast & dinner conversations in the communal kitchen area; this last night here was no different.

good company: Karolyn, Graham and Jane