At The End of the Earth: Iceland

At the end of the earth, Iceland is one of the most beautiful and haunting places on Earth.

Ancient Lava Field Covered with Moss on the Southern Coast
The climate of Iceland's coast is subpolar oceanic. The warm North Atlantic Current ensures generally higher annual temperatures than in most places of similar latitude in the world. Constant coastal mist produce four inch thick blankets on aa lava fields. Every precarious footstep seems an insult to this rich botanical carpet.
Braided River, Skeidararsandur
Late in the evening of September 30, 1996, seismometers detected the beginning of an eruption under the glacier. One of the volcanoes had previously collapsed and formed a caldera named Grimsvotn, in which a subglacial lake had been accumulated. Late on the first of October, the day after the eruption started, the surface of the ice over the caldera had risen ten to fifteen meters. The next day, the eruption broke through the surface of the ice, emitting an ash cloud ten kilometers high. The volcano quieted on the thirteenth, but the ice continued to melt and overflow the Grimsvotn lake. More than three cubic kilometers of ice melted, but little was emitted through normal runoff points. Since an ice dam and the caldera itself held the melt back, the jokulhlaup would not occur until November, or at least one month later.
Braided River, Skeidararsandur
At 7:20am on the fifth of November 1996, the meltwater burst vertically from two kilometers above the tongue of the glacier. By four that afternoon, the jokulhlaup was fully realized. A mixture of sediment, meltwater, and ice moved at ten kilometers per hour from the full twenty-kilometer width of the glacier's terminus across Skeidararsandur, forming standing waves three and four meters high. The total flow peaked at over fifty thousand cubic meters per second in the five outwash channels, making it briefly the second largest river of the world. The flood obliterated a 376-meter-long bridge, the majority of a second bridge nine hundred meters in length, twelve kilometers of roadway, twenty-three power-line towers, and causing fourteen million United States dollars in damage while adding seven square kilometers to the area of Iceland. Thankfully, there were no fatalities or injuries, and the flood did not reach any nearby settlements.
Marine Snail Harvest, Stykkisholmer
The common whelk (Buccinum undatum) is an inhabitant of coastal areas of the northern Atlantic Ocean, as well on the eastern coast as on the western coast. The whelk mainly lives in cold water with a salt content of around 2 to 3 percent. The whelk lives on different soils, but it is most frequently found on soft ground, for example muddy and sandy ocean floor habitats, in depths between 5 and 200 meters (15 to 600 feet). Whelks of different ages are used to live in different depths; the older whelks seem to prefer deeper sea areas, whereas the younger ones live near the shore.

Woman Hanging Laundry, Egilsstadir
Icelanders are the national group or ethnic group of Iceland descended primarily from Norsemen of Scandinavia and Celts from Ireland and Scotland. Historical and DNA records indicate that around 60 to 80 percent of the settlers were of Nordic origin and the rest were of Celtic stock from the British Isles. They are very friendly!