Home in California, I got used to receiving incredulous looks whenever I mentioned my upcoming trip to Iceland. “Why, pray tell, would anyone willingly enter what sounds like a country fashioned entirely out of ice?” I could read it in their eyes, even as they smiled politely and said, “that sounds like fun.” I was soon to discover that the name Iceland, however, does not do the island nation justice; while it certainly has its fair share of frozen H2O, that’s only a fraction of the story.
For one thing, there’s a great deal of water on the opposite end of the temperature spectrum. Iceland is rife with geothermal pools, including the Blue Lagoon, a lava formation brimming with opalescent water leftover from running the nearby geothermal power plant. No need to worry about the plant disrupting your chi, though—it has no presence at the relaxing spa. It does, however, speak to another of the country’s integral characteristics. Geothermal power, a renewable energy source, is booming in Iceland thanks to the country’s unique geology. The gods of volcanism bestowed a double whammy of fiery awesomeness on the ironically named country, which is—like Hawaii—a hotspot. But this island nation is also situated on the Mid-Atlantic Ridge, a seafloor chain of volcanic mountains that make up part of the world’s longest mountain range (yes, it’s underwater!).
These unusual geological circumstances make both geothermal power and Iceland’s now-famous volcanism possible. Surely you remember Eyjafjallajökull? Well, maybe not by name, but it’s the volcano that in 2010 made it spectacularly clear what it thought of European air travel (verdict: not a fan). Fortunately, it proved to be somewhat friendlier to pedestrians. On an 11-hour hike that ranged 25 kilometers and featured a minimum of two near-death experiences per person, we trekked from the picturesque waterfall of Skógar on the south coast between the craters of Eyjafjallajökull and its volcanic neighbor Mýrdalsjökull. We passed through myriad stunning panoramas, including a Shire-like scene peppered with roaming sheep and woven with waterfalls; an ashy, barren moonscape; and the recently erupted flank of Eyjafjallajökull itself, which was littered with jagged brick red rocks and was still steaming ominously. Finally reaching the end, exhausted, I assumed the land could offer up nothing more wondrous than the sites I’d just dragged myself through, but as our Humvee (yes, it was rather an epic day) bounced us back to the road, our burly Icelandic driver—decked all in black and sporting aviators—slowed and pointed out a great rift in a nearby cliff.
“The Black Gate.”
Up until that point, I’d considered New Zealand to be the closest possible thing to Middle Earth here on Actual Earth, but our driver revealed that Tolkien had been inspired by that very feature to pen the entrance to Mordor. I was looking at Mordor with my own two eyes. I half-expected a blazing, bodiless, ring-coveting eye to be staring back.
Somehow, the wonders didn’t end there. In the remaining days, I donned crampons for a glacier hike on a tributary of the massive ice cap Vatnajökull, watched seals plunge beneath icebergs at the glacial lagoon Jökulsárlón (of James Bond and Batman Begins fame), and marveled as Geysir—the hydrothermal jet that gave all others the name—exploded skyward. Iceland frequently rendered me speechless, but I have no doubt that you could have read the amazement in my eyes. To write it off as an inhospitable icebox, my friends, is to make a serious mistake.