Mist enclosed the campsite this morning, my tent wet as I packed it up. Not the earliest on the trail today, at least one party was ahead of me when I started out at 7:00 am. Reaching Emstrur huts at 11:30 am, by which time the mist had lifted, I decided to continue on to Þórsmörk (note that the funny letter þ is sounded as "th").
Some of the rivers today were shallow enough to splash through, others so powerful that bridges had been erected, but three required removing my boots and wading through. The water, which rose to my knees, was so cold it felt like being burnt, the current was strong making it difficult to place my poles in front of me. Such crossings took time as I first had to make sure my camera and other valuables were all in dry bags in case I fell in. Then I had to take off my boots, socks and zip off my trouser legs to convert them into shorts (if there were no onlookers who might be offended by the sight of my underpants I just removed my trousers as it was quicker). My boots were tied onto my rucksack and I put on my water crossing shoes, a light pair of running shoes designed to shed water through their sides. On the other side of the river I repeated the whole performance in reverse with the addition of drying my legs with a towel. A fairly slow process.
Much of the first part of the day was across black stony plains with lumps of frothy basalt, the bubbles permanently set in stone. Later, things became greener, at first a plain dotted with purple thyme and some red grasses, then as I approached Þórsmörk, small birch trees, with an undergrowth of blue geraniums and buttercups. A welcome contrast after the bleak treeless plains and black ash mountains I had been walking through which reminded me of slag heaps, piles of waste from coal mines or blast furnaces. Perhaps that is unfair as there were some impressive gorges or chasms today, lined with black lava, the water crashing through, dirty with sediment. Elsewhere there were cliffs showing the vertical columns formed when lava cools and contracts.
Þórsmörk is an area containing three clusters of huts. I made a diversion of a few kilometres to one of them, Húsadalur, to enjoy a cup of coffee, soup and some salad, as I had been missing fresh vegetables. Having planned to walk to Skógar tomorrow I crossed a gravel clogged, braided river, in part on a wobbly bridge on wheels to reach the campsite at Básar. My tent is in a lovely spot, among the little birch trees on an area of proper grass, not something I have seen much of in the last few days.
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| Mobile bridge, I suppose it is stored in the winter and wheeled out to wherever the main channel is in the summer. |
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