Grogu's cave

The cave that looks like baby Yoda is going to steal the show today so here you go


So how'd I wind up here?


Well first off there was another glacial outlet just up the road from camp so I thought I might as well pay it a visit.  It wasn't as grand as yesterday's but it was much closer and I did get to see a (small) iceberg calve off.



I then continued west asking the ring road.  The town I stopped to charge at turned out to have since hexagonal granite that they'd called the church floor (in Iceland obliviously) so I had a quick look.  The granite fractures as it cools creating hexagonal it thereabout blocks.



I continued driving west, where the road crossed and enormous blocky lava flow which has been colonized by moss.  This results in a strange bulbous green landscape.



This stuff went on for miles.  Eventually the terrain changes to seemingly endless plains of black volcanic sand and gravel, edged by mountains covered in greenery.

This led to my next stop, the baby Yoda cave!  It was cute but you're not going to spend all afternoon there.  The cave is embedded in a small mountain, which originated as a subglacial eruption.  The volcano, being pinned on by ice, grows up with step sides until it reaches the top of the glacier.  It can then flow sideways, so you wind up with a nearly flat mountain with very steep sides.

I figured I'd follow the trail up the mountain, it was a very steep climb but the views were amazing.  You could see the black sand stretching for miles, distant mountains and glaciers.  The black sands near here feature in the star wars film Rouge One, so even more Star Wars links.




That was enough for today, I'm camping at Vik. I'll go see the black sand beach up close tomorrow.  Vik is the town near the headland in the distance that you might be able to make out in the picture above.


Comments

Post a Comment

Popular posts from this blog

Thor's day traveling

Image
Waved everyone off at Thornhill, bus ride and airport faff went smoothly.  The flights generally seem on time today after the disruption earlier in the week. The flight was delayed but otherwise went smoothly. I caught a few glimpses of Iceland from above through the clouds as we came in. It was slow through customs then I collected the car which was a little more eventful than I'd hoped.  There was a moderate walk from the Hertz desk to the car and the car has a crack in the rear bumper. I couldn't check the damage report they emailed me as it kept giving errors.  Anyway it's all fine but not relaxing.  Also I wasn't sure how to lock the car. I think it automatically locks when you walk away and unlocks when you return but it's rather unnerving add you have no way to check it was locked! I left and went to a Bonus near Issi fish and chips.  Got some random food, something for breakfast and a cobbled together meal. Then the fish and chips oh my they were yummy. ...
Read more

Snow, Seyðisfjörður and Stöðvarfjörður

Image
In the morning I had a bit of a spring clean. I washed some clothes since dirty fat outnumbered clean.  They are arrayed around the car and hopefully the aircon will dry them out eventually.  I removed the rear carpet, it is velcroed down, and knocked out all the crumbs that had been accumulating. I finally attempted to find the leak in my air mattress but no luck.  I figure it's very small and should it get better it'll be easier to find. I cooked mountains of eggy bread for breakfast. I decided to head over to Seyðisfjörður which is a port town in a fjord, the same pet which the only ferry to Iceland stops at.  I was wondering about getting this ferry here but it seemed a bit too impractical as it leaves from Denmark and takes several days to get there. The road there it's a very high mountain pass.  The weather has turned colder now and as I went higher I was excited to see sleet then snow but the excitement quickly turned to fear!  Would the snow get wo...
Read more

Diamond beach

Image
Today I set off for diamond beach. This is a black sand beach, black because it's created from black volcanic rocks, onto which small icebergs wash up from the nearby glacier.  It was quite magical I took many pictures as did everyone else!  I walked along the beach for a fair way and saw some seals.  The ice peters out the further you go from the river outlet carrying the icebergs. I headed back to my car and made a picnic.  I've used the "frunk" (front storage under the bonnet) as my pantry. It isn't connected to the cabin and this time of year is stays pretty cool.  There's also a false lid to the boot where I can store things like the burner and washing up stuff. After lunch I followed the path along the side of the river outlet.  This quickly leads to a sizeable glacial lake which contained many icebergs, mostly small but since pretty sizable.  They created many beautiful random ice sculptures. I thought I'd see how closed I could get too the glac...
Read more