We’ve had nearly a week here of temperatures below freezing, and several more days to that to come. So it’s appropriate to think of a place called Iceland. Skaftafell National Park sits between the ocean to the south and the giant Vatnajökull glacier to the north. In the park, you can hike up the mountain for a view of a giant tongue of that glacier breaking through the mountain and working its way to the sea.
Skaftafellsjökull
Jökull is Icelandic for “glacier,” so I suspect you can figure what Skaftafellsjökull means. Here’s the view south from the same vantage looking as the glacier moves toward the ocean. I trust you can spot my son Dan.
Skaftafellsjökull
If you look at the highest point of the top of the mountain on the other side of the glacier, you can imagine piecing the two images together to get a sense of the full view. And here’s a switch from the wide angle lens to the telephoto to get a closer view of that peak.
The three mile loop trail continues away from the glacier view to several waterfalls that come down the mountain. Oh, and the Icelandic word for waterfall is foss. So here’s one of the more dramatic—Svartifoss. You can see it carving through the columnar basalt created as the lava cooled.
And I just checked the weather report. Yep, colder here today in Northern Illinois than Iceland.
Svartifoss