Blue Lagoon and Mt. Esja

the steam on the right is a geysir in the lagoon

covered in silica

Lecture on Thursday we had a little exercise by creating our own country and brainstorming on ways to make it sustainable and how extensive it would be for a community to rely on renewable energy. It was interesting and helped to put real numbers into the equations. That afternoon we took a trip to Carbon Recycling International, which is a small methane plant next to a geothermal power plant (it isn’t really international and is the only one so far). I found the process confusing but basically geothermal plants release carbon dioxide so CRI takes the CO2 and through a chemical process transforms it into methanol and water. The water is pumped back into the ground and the methanol can be used as an additive with gasoline to be more renewable. It is very experimental and is still quite small, but it sounds like if it works out, it is a good thing to have at all geothermal plants. After that, we headed to the infamous Blue Lagoon! We have been hearing about the Blue Lagoon from everyone since we arrived in Iceland and have been anticipating it for the past three weeks, so my expectations were pretty high. It is a geothermal spa and probably the biggest tourist attraction in Iceland. It is just one big geothermal pool that is this milky blue color due to the natural minerals. There is an abundance of silica which is a white clay that is supposedly really good to rub on your skin. Agust informed us on the ride over that the Blue Lagoon actually uses the discharged water from the Svartsengi power plant. I doubt most tourists know that! Surprisingly, it exceeded my high expectations and it was amazing. I’ve never seen water that color before and it was so huge with not too many tourists. We spent about an hour in the water. Depending on where you swam it went from warm to extremely hot. Of course we had to rub the silica on our faces, although the only results I noticed was my hair becoming extremely dry and frizzy after. Needless to say, it was a great day!

Friday morning was a wrap up on the topic of renewable energy and Agust let us out early. Jeremy and I decided today was the day to hike Mt. Esja, one of the mountains surrounding Reykjavik. It was quite the bus journey to get there; we attempted to hike it our first week in Iceland, but got stranded half way there between bus routes. After three different buses, we made it to the base and headed up! Hiking is so different here because there are no trees and it is on lava rocks and dust. There were six marked points along the way, each with a sign written in Icelandic (of course). It took us about an hour to troop up to point 5 which had a big rock along with a guest book to sign.

where's the trail?

There were two groups of people taking a long rest but, aside from pondering the image of a stick figure falling, we didn’t think twice about continuing up to the top. From point 5 to 6 there was hardly a trail and pretty much straight up piles of small rocks and dusty soil. Jeremy went first and was scrambling and sliding down the mountain and it wasn’t until we noticed a man trekking down about 10 meters to our left that we realized we weren’t even on the trail…oops. I took over the lead and found the trail again and finally spotted the 6^th sign. It still wasn’t the top though. Looking up was a scrambling cliff and we figured we made it this far, why not go for it.

view from the top

The trail was not marked at all so I gave it my best shot and climbed up, finding chain ropes to hang out while we climbed along the treacherous summit. We eventually made it to the top and it was well worth it! We stared down at the tiny city that was Reykjavik, managing to spot the Pearl, near where our hostel is. Esja isn’t so much of a mountain as it is a plateau shelf-like ridge. The other side was a rock field that looked like it went on forever. You could see cairns marking the way into the horizon. We knew the last bus from the parking lot left at 6:08 and it was about 5:30, but the view was so great we didn’t bother rushing. After taking it all in, we climbed down. Halfway down the trail we actually saw the bus drive right by the driveway, so we weren’t to sure how we would get home. Luckily, my parents trained me well and we asked a woman who had just come down for a ride into the city and she agreed. We came back to the hostel to find a group of loud, drunk British guys staying in our hostel for the weekend for a stag party. Should be an interesting weekend…