July 29 and 30, 1999
Today is a rest day in Kirkjubæjarklaustur (my jaw and writing hand are so tired I can hardly move). I stayed last night in the "close to town" campground. The couple next to me snored endlessly all night. I used the dayroom cooking facilities to make my usual oatmeal and coffee as it was cool and misty outside. Met a british woman who was doing research measuring gravel at Skaftafell and a French couple from Grenoble. Then I went to the excellent visitor center and got some directions for a couple of day hikes. I particularly enjoyed the 3 hourhiking route out in the pseudocraters. There were many plover and curlew as well as the old road through the area.
Kirkjubæjarklaustur? Shall I break that down into English for you?
Kirkju = church bæjar = farm klaustur = cloister
The cloister disappeared with the reformation, but the farm and church are still there. Iceland does an excellent job with public art. The monk figures here are about 2 meters tall.
A 1 km long single lane wood decked bridge, with turnouts.The Skeiðarasandur is a large sand flat at the bottom of the Skeiðararjökull, one of many glaciers that flow off Vatnajökull. This is a huge area that gets regular jokullaups (flash floods) when the Grimsvötn volcano under Vatnajökull dumps it's collection of meltwater. Typically the flood occurs on a 10 year cycle, but high volcanic activity produced a spectacular flood in 1996 that washed one of these long bridges away and did major damage to the rest of the road.
meltwater it comes blasting out
from under this glacier,
Skeiðarajökull. The flood then
spreads out over a broad plain
of braided streams and gravel.
The day was a bit grey, but still the
area was amazing.
