May 18, 2016: Driving to Bifröst

We had breakfast at the hostel in Skoga and started our drive to Bifröst University. This is the university that I lived at for 7 months in 2012 when I was a Fulbright scholar in Iceland. It is approximately 160 miles away from Skoga.

Before we left, a few students decided to climb to the top of Skogafoss.

When we are driving in the van, the students play music from one of their phones/ipods. 

Notice Caitlin's beautiful Lopi sweater.

We stopped briefly at the prior hostel and picked up a couple of items that had been left there.

Back on the road, we stopped in Hveragerđi and went to the Geothermal Park. 

Originally, this park had numerous hot springs in it and was famous for cooking bread and eggs in the boiling water. After the 2008 earthquake, all of the hot springs emptied out of water but refilled some weeks later. After the winter of 2012-2013, the water table started to lower and the hot springs changed into fumaroles (hot springs where you can only see the steam but not the water). The signs around the park were from when there was water in the hot springs.

 

With the steam, Hveragerđi has lots of greenhouses. The greenhouse associated with the Geothermal Park grows bananas, tomatoes and grapes.

We had planned on soaking our feet in the mud pots but none of the students thought it sounded fun nor educational so we skipped the experience (it was also windy and trying to rain).

We had lunch at a bakery in Hveragerđi. Everyone seemed to love the soups and desserts.

On our way to the Natural History Museum of Kópavogur, we stopped in a 66® North store that was supposed to be the outlet. It was still shockingly expensive no one purchased anything.

The Natural History Museum of Kópavogur, or Náttúrufræðistofa Kópavogs, opened in May 2002. It is divided into two categories, geological and zoological. The geological part focuses on the formation of Iceland, the major rock types and minerals. The zoological part focuses (with few exceptions) on Icelandic mammals, birds, fish and invertebrates.

Skeleton of orca

 The most exciting exhibit was the marimo or lake-balls.  These balls are made up of filamentous green algae (Aegagropila linnaei). This growth form of the algae is known from only two lakes in the world today; Lake Myvatn in Iceland (where it is called kúluskítur), and Lake Akan in Japan (where it is called marimo). 

Carly knew all about the lake-balls.

The structure of the lake-balls is unique. There is no core (e.g. pebble) in the center. The algal filaments grow in all directions from the center of the ball, continuously branching and thereby laying the foundation for the spherical form. Surprisingly, the ball is green all through, although light only reaches very short distance (few mm) into the ball. The chlorophyll inside the ball seems to be in some kind of hibernation in the dark, but if it becomes exposed to light e.g. if a ball breaks up, it is activated again. This phenomenon may be unique to the lake-balls among photosynthetic organisms.

In 2013, the marimo in Lake Myvatn started to die and it is not known what the cause was nor how to help the algae recover.

After the museum, we started our drive to Bifröst. We took the 6 km long tunnel under Hvalfjöđur. This tunnel cuts off 56 kilometers distance if you went around the fjord. Hvalfjöđur is the whale fjord where historically, Iceland would butcher the whales that were caught off the coast. In World War II, it was used as a huge naval base by the US and UK. This was a very strategic location for ships to refuel when sailing between the US and Europe.

We went shopping for food at Borgarnes before completing our drive to Bifröst University. When we got here, we received keys to two 6-bedroom apartments. Each room has its own bathroom with a shower. There are four rooms upstairs and two bedrooms downstairs. The first level also includes a foyer, kitchen, utility room (with freezer), TV and a huge couch. Everyone thought this was a great design and wished we had something like this in Gunnison.

Kitchen and stairs.

Eating breakfast

The upstairs skylight.

One thing everyone was looking forward to was free laundry at Bifröst. It is in the basement of another building but everyone was able to get it done this evening.

We ate dinner of a veggie filled red sauce on pasta or rice. After dinner, everyone went to the gym here on campus that also has a small hot tub and a large hot pot. While soaking, the students met a dad and his two sons. The dad (no one could remember his name) is here finishing up his master’s degree. The younger of the boys, has the same teacher that my daughter had four years ago.