mýrdalsjökull

This is Mýrdalsjökull, a glacier in the south of the island.

Looking back from the top, you can see how much the glacier has retreated since 2004, when it was possible to step onto it from the parking lot where the buses are parked.

In 1994, it covered the visible area of this photograph, extending out to a small building near the ringroad.





An ice cave, created by wind, water and sediment. The black you see in these photos is ash from the eruption of nearby Eyjafjallajökull in 2010. Long rows of ash line the rivers near here. Dredging the rivers and cleaning up the farmland has been a project according to our guides, who hope that Hekla--also nearby, swelling and overdue--waits to erupt in the late fall or winter, after the summer harvests and before the lambs, calves and ponies are born in the spring.