Cool

With this weeks Photo Friday theme being "cool", and with the weather turning warmer as we head into the dog days of summer, I thought I'd put in a couple of more Iceland photos.

I took these pictures on a trip outside of Reykjavik. I had signed up for a trip to see one of the glaciers. But as we headed inland, a fierce blizzard and white out conditions forced us to turn around. Instead we got a tour of the countryside, with the driver telling us stories of the places we passed.

We stopped at spot where the the tour guide wanted to show us a cave he knew. Apparently, some famous thieves had holed up a few hundred years ago to escape their pursuers. We got out of the van and started to follow a trail marked by large rocks. But the wind was blowing so hard you could bare stay on your feet. Then, one person got blown right off the trail, and we ended up heading back to the van.

Like much of Iceland, especially as you move away from the coast, the landscape was stark and forbidding. As far as you could see, no trees, no bushes, and certainly nothing man-made except for the van at our backs. Nothing but black, jagged volcanic rock and blowing snow. With nothing to judge by it became hardly possible to judge distances. I remember looking out at the landscape, and not being entirley sure whether I was looking at mountains far in the distance, or some nearby crags. A very humbling, and stunningly beautiful, area. These two pictures, scans of some slides I took, hardly do it justice.

Comments

hehe...I submitted a couple of Iceland pictures for Photo Friday too. Of course, they're nothing compared to yours! Great photos!

[spenceronehalf]

Dang, those are some fresh images. The glare! :)