Bouncy Askja bus

 Yesterday (I was knackered last night so it's tomorrow now) I took the Myvatn Tours bus to the Askja Caldera.

This is no normal bus! It is built for off road, and the road to Askja is one of Iceland's 'F' roads. These are gravel roads that you're legally only allowed on with a 4x4 and often include river crossings.

We went along normal roads for about half an hour before hitting the dirt tracks.  Then the bumps begin.

The landscape starts as your typical somewhat barren looking mountainous landscape but gradually the signs of life thin out until you're in a moonscape or maybe Mars. The tour guide informed us that Apollo astronauts spent time training here to learn some geology and more recently they tested a Mars rover out.

We had a few stop offs along the way.  The place isn't totally lifeless, where there's water there's life, indeed it's an abundant breeding ground for migrating birds and sheep have been know to wander this way for grazing.

We eventually made it to the caldera.  This is a massive crater, 10km across.  It was formed during the glacial period but there have been more recent eruptions which have left craters inside the caldera.  Normally the Viti crater.  People have apparently swum in this as it is geothermally heated but right now it's highly acid so that's a no-no.

Not that I'd want to swim as it was about 2 Celsius and the wind was blasting at 45 mph!

A large part of the caldera is sinking as magma escapes from underneath leaving a massive lake, known as Lake Askja.  Today the wind has created sizable breakers despite the lake not being that enormous.  You could also see the end whipping up swirls of water.

Afterwards we made a stop off at Askja base camp which is rather civilised given how remote it is.  They have rangers staying there in the summer and I think winter rescue crews as well.  They have power from a wind turbine and hydro.

Then it was just the long bumpy journey home, this time with minimal stops other than a toilet break.  The road varies between flat planes full of gravel which make a pretty good road surface if you just remove the boulders which the bus can sprint along to circuitous routes meandering through old lava flows.

On a more practical note, my airbed has a slow puncture and doesn't last the night any more. I was thinking of trying to patch it last night but I was too knackered. Thankfully it only needed blowing up once in the night and I slept well.