ICELAND | Skeiðará Bridge – Diamond Beach – Jökulsárlón – Skaftafellsjökull – Dverghamrar – Kirkjugólf – Fjaðrárgljúlfur – Skaftáreldahraun

Iceland in November and December? Really? I saw an Icelandair promotion on Instagram which I couldn’t resist. The catch? It had to be late November to the start of December 2022. But I could – easily – enthuse Oriol to come along for a road trip in the South and West of Iceland.

Day 3 was cold and icy.

Skeiðarárbrú or Skeiðará Bridge Monument

The Skeiðarárbrú or Skeiðará Bridge was destroyed in 1996 by water masses and blocks of ice during the last major glacial outburst flood in 1996, triggered by an eruption of the Grímsvötn volcano, but was immediately restored.

Once the longest span in Iceland, the Skeiðará Bridge comprised a portion of the Icelandic ring road. The bridge carried drivers across the Skeiðarársandur, a wide plain of black volcanic sand marbled with creeks of run-off from the Skeiðarárjökull glacier.

A monument commemorates this event.

Diamond Beach at Breiðamerkursandur

Diamond Beach is a strip of black sand belonging to the greater Breiðamerkursandur glacial plain, located by Jökulsárlón glacier lagoon.

At the Diamond Beach, the icebergs which fill the glacier lagoon wash up on shore, creating a stark contrast with the volcanic black sand. They look like huge diamonds. This gives a very photogenic result.

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Jökulsárlón

Jökulsárlón literally “glacial river lagoon”, is a large glacial lake in southern part of Vatnajökull National Park. It’s situated at the head of the Breiðamerkurjökull glacier. The tongue of the Breiðamerkurjökull glacier is a major attraction for tourists. So we joined.

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Jökulsárlón has been a setting for four Hollywood movies: ‘A View to a Kill‘, ‘Die Another Day‘, ‘Lara Croft: Tomb Raider‘, and ‘Batman Begins‘.

Skaftafellsjökull

Skaftafellsjökull is a glacier tongue of Iceland’s largest glacier, Vatnajökull in the south of the island. The Skaftafellsjökull is located in the (former) Skaftafell National Park. The glacier is located east of the large Skaftafellsheiði plateau and wedged west of Mount Hafrafell. The meltwater is drained to the sea via the river Skaftafellsá and then the Skeiðará. This Skeiðará flows with very many arms through the enormous flushing sand plain, the Skeiðarársandur. Just east of the Skaftafellsjökull, on the other side of the Hafrafell, lies the small Svínafellsjökull.

Dverghamrar

Dverghamrar or Dwarf Rocks, just east of Foss, is a columnar basalt formation. On top of the columns, there is cube-jointed basalt.

The landscape is thought to have been molded at the end of the Ice Age. The sea level was higher at that time, and it is believed that the waves caused the peculiar look of the rocks.

Columnar basalt is formed when lava flow gets cooled, and contraction forces build up. Cracks then form horizontally, and the extensive fracture network that develops results in the six-sided formation of the columns.

The ‘church floor’ of Kirkjugólf

Kirkjugólf or ‘the church floor,’ is an 80 square meter expanse of columnar basalt stone slabs that slowly eroded when the sea covered the area. The hexagonal ‘tiles’ look like man-made flooring, but there has never been a church or any other building on the site. The protected natural monument is located just a few hundred meters east of the village of Kirkjubæjarklaustur.

Fjaðrárgljúlfur

Fjaðrárgljúfur, “feather river canyon”, is a canyon in south east Iceland. The Fjaðrá river flows through it. The canyon has steep walls and winding water. It is located near the Ring Road, not far from the village of Kirkjubæjarklaustur.

Skaftáreldahraun lava field

In 1783, a huge lava flow streamed from Lakagígar in what became known as the Skaftá Fires. This is believed to have been one of the greatest lava flows in a single eruption in the history of the world. The molten lava filled the gorges through which the Skaftá and Hverfisfljót rivers flowed, and swept down in two branches into inhabited areas, to spread over the lowlands where it laid waste many farms.

In Skaftáreldahraun you find a good place to stop the car and take a look over the lava field shortly (4 km) before you arrive in Kirkjubæjarklaustur.