August 9, 1999
The warden at Asbyrgi recommended that I take the bus into Dettifoss. I wasn't looking forward to another bus trip, but he said that the road was exceptionally bad and that there was no scenery from the road. He was correct on both counts. I was charged 2100 kr for the ride up to Dettifoss and back as far as Vestardalur, from where I would hike the remaining 13 km. The road was bad, it was washboard almost the whole distance and you could see none of the river canyon without taking the 3-4 km dead end turnoffs. I only saw two cyclists, and they did not look the least bit happy. Dettifoss turned out to be a lot of water falling into a canyon, and as often happens, impossible to photograph in a single shot. the spray was incredible, giving the effect of a full rain for a 1/2 km downstream. Dettifoss is the largest volume waterfall in Europe. From Dettifoss the bus rattled back towards Asbyrgi, stopping twice for scenery before finally dropping me at Vestardalur. God, it was nice to be out of that damned bus.
Dettifoss
It throws it's own rainbow
Vestardalur
was very cool. It was dozens of basalt plugs that had been the cores
of volcanic cones. The hike followed the top of the canyon and was
nice and quiet. I saw no one else the whole
