Our new word for today is “jokull”, which is Icelandic for glacier – our Icelandic vocabulary has doubled overnight. And we saw dozens of jokulls today.
The Vatnajokell Glacier is the largest in Europe and 8% of Iceland sits under several hundred metres of it. It is responsible for most of the volcanic activity as its sheer weight keeps the magma underneath under pressure until it explodes out through the icesheet – regularly. Tongues from this icesheet “tumble” down through their valleys to the plains between the mountains and the sea. Boy is it picturesque!
We donned crampons and grabbed an ice axe for a guided glacier walk on Svinafellsjokull. It’s black on top because of the ash from a nearby volcano which erupted in 2012
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