I cut together a rough video of all the short clips I collected while in Snæfellsnes. Sergey and I were sharing his camera, so I had free hands for once.
The first morning we set off around the peninsula, stopping off the main circuit on many unmarked gravel roads. We trailed a snow covered path a couple kilometres off to the coast (nearly getting the small front-wheel drive stuck), where we found the isolated bright orange Öndverðarnes lighthouse with nothing around but rugged Icelandic coastline, volcanic tundra, with brushes of moss and tufts of weed. There was spongy moss that stretched over the cliff face, so it was an interesting walk out to the edge. We managed a few neat photos atop a large hole in the rocks sitting next to the Svörtuloft bird cliffs, as we listened to the waves tunnel beneath us. We then drove from the North West point, down to the South West, driving through private property to another Lighthouse near Dritvík. The ground was strewn with sea urchins that had been picked through by coastal birds, and the coastline was covered in weathered debris that had been washed ashore, trapped on the black rocks. There was an old bottle, half full with frozen seawater, the rest Rum, that had been mangled by the ocean and left on the rocks, probably travelling far from a sunken pirate ship... Surely. We also spotted a flying-fox which seemed strange in such an isolated area. Heading now east along the southern coast we stopped off at Hellnar and Arnarstapi, part of the region riddled with myth and folklore. There was a great stone statue of the guardian spirit Bárðar Snæfellsáss, deity of Mt. Snæfell—The saga telling he wandered the region "in a grey cowl with a walrus-hide rope around him, and a cleft staff in his hand with a long and thick gaff," which he used when walking on glaciers, now keeping watch from above. We were lucky with the visibility, and could see the formation on top of the mountain with the statue in the foreground, which made for a neat photo. There was a small pathway around the cliff edge, referred to in English as the secret walkway, and after just a small time spent here you can understand Icelands fascination with Huldufólk (Icelandic hidden people), the Elves of Icelandic folklore. There are construction projects, even in downtown Reykjavik, that are altered due to the location of certain stones, believed to be homes of these Elves.
Leaving Anarstapi, we made our way again over the mountain pass— this time with much better conditions, and daylight to guide us. After the pass, we tracked east to Grundarfjörður, the most well known town in Snæfellsnes, where a number of films have been shot including most recently The Secret Life of Walter Mitty. We stopped at Mt. Kirkjufell, one of the most photographed mountains in Iceland, and were lucky enough to have a fantastic glow of the sun, hiding behind the clouds as a backdrop. We stopped off at the Vínbúð (Grog store), which only opens for an hour a day, making it with only a couple minutes to spare. We quickly found the cheapest Viking beer, and twenty 500ml cans set us back 57.000 ISK ($57 NZD). Now heading back to Rif, we heard an Icelandic cover of Get Down Tonight, which I snapped a quick video of.
Back at the fish factory, we started on the first beer, waiting tentatively for the clouds to clear, as the forecast for the Aurora Borealis was strong that evening. Just as we were about to begin powering through the beers a fellow traveller from Germany came running into the building yelling about the lights. We quickly packed up, jumped in the car and set out to our remote spot en route to the orange Öndverðarnes lighthouse, 15 kilometres west. Half way we were hit with a massive snow storm, but luckily we trusted our understanding of crazy Icelandic weather, and powered through, hoping it would clear. Driving close to 10 kmph on what was hopefully the gravel road (driving by feel), we stopped about halfway knowing the rest of the path would be impassible in these conditions, and soon enough the snow storm cleared and we could again see the Aurora painting the sky. We were a stone throw from a black sand beach, covered in rounded snow covered rocks. I opted mostly to leave my headlamp off, and let myself be guided by moonlight, but that had me a couple times knee-(and nearly waist-)deep in large pockets of snow that looked solid, as I walked up and around the embankment while the Russian and German set up their tripods and caught the show. I disappeared into the darkness a short while up to a rocky point of the cliffed coast, which gave me an awesome view all the way to Snæfellsjökull, and the moon level with its peak, sitting peacefully with my legs hanging roughly off the edge, looking out to sea, with the Aurora floating above the now-dwarfed lighthouse. Unbeknown to me, the Russian caught me in one of his photos—I thought from there I was invisible. With the light show over, we then made our way back to base, ready for another round of dinner.
The next day we had plans for a famed shark museum further north in Bjarnarhöfn, as well as stopping off in the large port city of Stykkishólmur, where again many scenes were shot in The Secret Life of Walter Mitty. A massive storm however had set in for the day, so our first stop was a petrol station 5 kilometres from Rif, where we were stranded for a couple of hours. We then spent an hour driving through 30+m/s wind, carrying horizontal snow and ice, with only a couple metres visibility, a few kilometres to the next petrol station where we were stuck for another few hours. It was now about 4pm. We spent the next few hours, as roads re-opened, making our way back to Reykjavik, (cancelling our hostel reservation for Borganes), arriving back around 9pm. Without a booking we found ourselves a couple beds in the Hostel, and finished off about 8 litres of beer between us, before hitting the town for Sergeys last night in Iceland. It was an insane weekend, and we were absolutely lucky that our dart on the map approach led us to Snæfellsnes, now understanding why it's known as miniature-Iceland.
The majority of these photos were taken by Sergey, with either his 10-20mm Sigma Lens, or my 18-35mm Sigma Lens. We've decided these two, plus perhaps a 50mm prime lens is all anyone would ever need, and what we captured over the three days below hopefully proves it.
sick!
ReplyDelete