Day Seven:
Today was a good day filled with lots of laughs and lots of snow. We started the day at the cutest bakery. Everything looked delicious, but I wasn’t hungry and I don’t think there was anything I could eat anyways. I loved the ambiance though. I’ve noticed that restaurants in Iceland will always give real dishes and cutlery, I haven’t seen one plastic fork or paper plate.
As we were driving to our first stop, we got to see 3 perfect stream Terrence’s that of course we had to stop to take a picture of. Still, on the way to stop one, Dr. Barineau pointed out creep on a slope just outside of the second-largest city in Iceland. The trees had “pistol butts” where the tree was growing and then the ground beneath it slowly started moving to create a curved shape in the trunk of the tree.
At our first outcrop of the day, we saw really well-welded tuff and got to see the contact where the source was either going through phases of pyroclastics and flows or we were seeing two different sources coming together. The outcrop showed topography that suggested erosion which told us that we were most likely in an environment that was wet.
Continuing our drive we saw some really cool ice icicles that were following basalt columns that made for some really good pictures. And we got to see a really good example of a monocline fold, where strata got draped over subsiding rock. Dr. Barineau helped us work through a very interesting area where there were large hummocky features in the middle of an extremely flat outwash plain. We were looking at a massive ancient landslide! Which indicated that we were in an area prone to mass wasting.
We hiked up some super slippery steps to see the top of a scoria cone that was in line with three other scoria volcanos of varying sizes. It was amazing getting to the top and seeing all three of them sitting like bumps on a log. I owe Jacob a huge thank you, he did catch me when I almost slipped a very long way down! At this stop, Jacob and I got to build the cutest mini snowman while Dr. Barineau was parking the car. He was adorable I must say!
At the scoria cones, Dr. Barineau saw a sign advertising a waterfall and we decided that we had the time to take the short detour. I’m glad that we did because the waterfall had turquoise water, colored by glacial flour! The three of us had a lot of laughs at this spot. There was a set of stairs that was completely covered with compacted ice, and Dr. Barineau suggested that Jacob should zip his jacket up and slide down. Of course, Jacob tried, but he didn’t get very far. And the only person who ended up in the snow was me, while I was holding all of Jacob’s things. Luckily my stuff was stored safely in my waterproof pockets, poor Jacob’s phone it was fine but it did get wet! At another part along the waterfall trail on the way back to the car, I literally landed on my tail like a movie. It was funny, but man did it hurt!
When we finally got to our hotel to check-in it was 7:00pm and we were hungry! So we decided to go to Grillhúsið. It was like walking into a bootleg Logan’s Roadhouse! It was definitely an American restaurant. What was interesting about it was a) how much Brittney Spears they played and b) how explicit the songs they played were. It was a little hilariously shocking.
The hotel we stayed in felt very much like a tourist trap. It was a decent hotel, but nowhere near the top of my list. When I turned the shower on, they left the handheld pointed straight up at the wall across the bathroom, and it took me a good solid couple of seconds to figure out the problem and how to move the handheld. The bathroom was soaking wet! I could see a waterfall from my room, it was small but cute. The man who runs the hotel didn’t take care of snow shoveling very well, and we had to step in really deep snow with our heavy bags to get to our room. I’m sure we all looked funny hopping through the deep snow the way we did!
Overall, while I of course miss home, I’ll be sad when I get on the plane to leave tomorrow.
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