With over 80 hikers staying the night at Emstrur hut, we decided that even with staying up late watching the aurora that it would be smart to get moving early to avoid the crowds. Shannon and I dined on an early morning breakfast with a few early riser hikers in the sunny hiker tent where we were joined by Maria-Antonia from last night. She was rail thin and operating on an aspiring actress’s budget hitchhiking around Iceland so we gave her some granola bars and our two best instant mashed potato meals that we had brought as extras but weren’t going to eat. She had 4 more nights to go and we were on our last night this evening so we were in the market to do some good deeds and give some trail magic to our Mallorcan friend. Maria-Antonia was so thankful and sweet and it was hard to say goodbye, despite knowing her for less than 24 hours. We practiced a little bit of Spanish on her when she sleepily couldn’t remember the English words for things and I think she was grateful for that. I can remember being in France for a month in high school as a mini-study abroad session and how when I was tired how difficult it was to speak my non-native French…I definitely sympathized with her struggle. After a quick breakfast, we wished Maria-Antonia good luck and headed out.
Shannon and I needed get a decent head start as we were going to be hiking 15 miles today from Emstrur, bypass the glorious lakeside Alftavatn hut to the high-altitude (and maybe high snow?) Hrafntinnusker hut. Now 15 miles may not seem long to some people but for some reason going northbound on the Laugevegur and the Fimmvorduhals trails it was quite challenging with the elevation changes and terrain after spending a lazy week driving around Iceland and eating good food and pampering ourselves. Go figure. In all honesty, we had been getting soft and now the highlands were making us strong again with this hiking adventure.
It was nice to be going against the crowds as we were able to hike with a much smaller group of folks headed north instead of the hoards of hikers taking the more popular southern route. Being able to enjoy the landscape without throngs of tour groups and people made the extra elevation gains worth it going northbound instead of southbound. The trail out of Emstrur was slightly hilly and then opened up into a beautiful couple mile long stretch of flat packed black sand through a desolate grassless plain. We covered good ground and with the sun starting to beat down on the dark desert, the heat reflected back up at us warming us up on such a brisk morning. Soon the fast flat stretch came to an abrupt halt at one of several water crossings we were to encounter this morning. Hikers were lined up on either side of the rushing water sizing up the best way to cross and swapping hiking boots for water shoes or bare feet. We followed a burly bearded Irish guy with a smile that lit up the river with exhilaration as he gingerly splashed through the torrents, the water cascading over his calves.
The water was freezing, absolutely mind-numbingly cold from the glacier meltwater up in the mountains, but with my knock-off crocs in “Lock-and-load” mode, I was strapped in and going forward and ain’t nobody was gonna stop me. The currents coming off the glacier melts were especially strong where the snaking side rivers and braids came together and I managed to stay upright by digging in my hiking poles and squatting firmly sideways. I had my pack belt undone just in case I started to go over. Luckily after making it through the tough part, you could mostly cross on some ephemeral sandbar islands with little trouble.
On the opposite side of the river, the landscape greened up a little bit as we entered the famous Katla Geopark which is essentially Iceland’s version of Yellowstone’s famous geysers with no warning signs or ropes to keep people from falling into boiling water pits or geysers of sulfuric acid. We were excited as this seemed like it would be very different from landscapes from Thor’s forest, the glaciers, the volcanic craters and cascading waterfalls we’d already enjoyed so far.
Shortly we came across Hvannigil hut, a beautiful little hut tucked away in idyllic grasslands full of sunshine and wildflowers that the grazing sheep had missed. Their restrooms were amazing but we didn’t linger long, only for a quick bathroom break and some sausage snacks (my favorite)!
The landscape started to get hillier and grassier and then boom! We were at a beautiful backcountry lake with mountains studded around its tranquil shores. I wished that we had one more day on the trail so we could relax at the Alftavatn hut and take advantage of the only restaurant and bar technically on the Laugavegur trail (the Volcano huts restaurant had been a little bit of a detour off trail the other day) but we had some serious ground to cover to make our flight on time. Shannon and I were had some serious hiker hunger with the cold weather and we threw our bags down next to picnic tables on the sunny back porch of the Alftavatn hunt. We spent the next hour eating and chatting with an amazing veteran from the UK who seemed to be more obsessed with hiking than we were. He was properly British – reserved, perfectly groomed (went to go shave halfway through our lunch) and also had a coy sense of humor. We laughed the whole time we chatted with him and easily could have wasted away the entire afternoon with him over some pints at the backcountry bar if we didn’t have flights to catch in a few days. His tent was soaked from the frost that melted this morning so he was drying that in the sunshine so it wouldn’t refreeze at the next hut tonight. Amongst all of the trails he’s hiked, he highly recommended we next try out the GR20 on the island of Corsica which is supposed to be beautiful yet extremely dangerous.
Reluctantly we said goodbye to our new found friend who told us that we were doing it right going on all these adventures. “Don’t stop adventuring – life is too short. You’re doing it right.” He smiled and headed south while we turned and headed north, deeper into the highlands and the Katla Geopark. The colorful Icelandic landscape transitioned from grasslands into colorful rhyolite hills (multicolored volcanic rock hills that look like they were painted) and up and over the mountain pass we climbed north from the Alftavatn hut. The hill out of the Lake Alftavatn valley was incredibly steep and flashes of light were mirrored on some sort of shiny stone that glinted in the afternoon sun. I stopped to take a breather on the way up and picked up a couple of the sparkling rocks, turning over the sharp bits in my hand trying to figure out what they were when it clicked…
I was holding dragonglass. To those of you who don’t follow Game of Thrones, this rock is also known as obsidian, a black volcanic glass with edges that fracture so sharply they were highly prized materials used by our ancestors for knives, arrowheads, spears and many other tools and weapons. Holy awesomeness.
I shouted out to Shannon at the discovery and we took a few minutes to scour the hillside which we soon found was absolutely covered with razor edged obsidian chunks. We decided we would only pick up the chunks that were sharp and looked like arrowheads or spear points because those could be used to kill White Walkers…or also display in our apartment. I was having the best time looking for obsidian arrowheads but was also dragging behind quite a bit so Shannon had a talking with me about how much trail we had left and what time the sun set so reluctantly I picked up the pace and we trudged higher up into the mountains.
The warmth and protection afforded by the valley was soon just a memory as the exposed ridges we trudged on were surrounded by ice and snow. Around a corner we paused, slightly confused, as the snow started to look funny on the hillside. It was almost like the snow on the slopes was…moving. The wind changed and the scent of rotten eggs crossed our nostrils, confirming our suspicions that this snow was actually the ground on fire from a steamy sulfur spring. The earth’s crust must be very thin here as soon we were observing bubbling hot springs, steam vents sprouting from the talus slopes and unearthly gold, white and a heinous orange colored ground. This must be the stretch of trail that I had read about where you were instructed to not stray from the Laugavegur path as the ground was so hot that your boots could melt and your skin would cook instantly if you fell. I remember watching videos on YouTube of hikers boiling their Mountain House meals by just resting their pots on the ground in Iceland.
Shannon is quite playful and doesn’t always like to follow the rules so we had been practicing every day of hiking for this section of trail. He sometimes takes unnecessary risks (not saying that I don’t also do this) but it was almost like he didn’t quite believe me when I told him that there were sections on the Laugavegur Trail where couldn’t linger because the ground would be too hot. He would run around the trail pretending to jump on the hot ground in days past but I think when we finally got to this section of trail it became very real for him. The constant stench of sulfur, rainbow of color on the ground and steam clouds shooting out of what looked like a normal mountainside were a little unsettling and Shannon settled down. There were some points were it was a little nerve wracking crossing some of the creeks because you could see bubbling springs pouring out of the ground but you couldn’t tell if they were cold, warm or scalding skin-meltingly hot. We quickly crossed these creeks and I wished that I had brought one of those radar thermometers that my friend in Idaho has for finding hidden hot springs in the mountains.
At some points we were hiking through boot-deep slippery snow where the geologic activity must have been very minimal. A few minutes later we were back walking on ground so hot I swear I could feel the heat coming through the bottoms of my boots which was alarming. The last thing I wanted was my boots melting out in the backcountry of Iceland with another 10-15 miles to go. We came across two different groups of hikers both from Toronto and the last hikers told us that the hike coming from the north was amazing and every few hours it felt like you were walking through a new climate. At least this wouldn’t be a boring next couple of days out on the Laugavegur!
We carefully picked our way across a couple of withering snow bridges where huge crevasses had opened up exactly in the same place where the trail had crossed maybe a few weeks earlier this summer. Despite the thick packed snow and ice, just over the next hill was a steaming vent where thick sulfur clouds choked us momentarily. Maybe a kilometer (half a mile) from the Hrafntinnusker Hut we came across a huge rock cairn with a plaque written in Icelandic. It was here in 2014 an Icelander named Svavar Tomasson passed away in the winter in a snowmobile accident. Shannon and I had been nervous about the amount of snow we’d come across up here on the highest point of the Laugavegur Trail that was notorious for bad weather. We had been asking the southbound hikers we came across about the snow situation up to the Hrafntinnusker Hut as our friend Maria-Antonia had told us last night that when she crossed it had been very dangerous and almost knee-dep snow in places. As the day passed, the snow report seemed to improve as the sun melted the worst of the snow which was promising as we neared the treacherous pass.
As we gained altitude and the mountains became whiter and whiter, I recalled reading about a young Israeli hiker who in 2004 was killed in a late June blizzard on the Laugavegur Trail less than a kilometer from the hut we were headed to. Ido Keinan was an eager 25 years old when he arrived at the Landmannalaugar Hut at the northern terminus of the Laugavegur hike. The weather had deteriorated from light snow to a heavy white-out conditions that were much too dangerous for the wardens to let hikers go so for two days the Laugavegur Trail was closed. Hikers were starting to get impatient and as the weather calmed down, the wardens permitted a handful of hikers who had the appropriate cold weather gear to hike to the next hut. When Ido arrived, the wardens did not permit him to go on in the unstable conditions as he was underprepared in his cotton clothing and light shoes. As the hiking saying goes, “Cotton kills.”
Unfortunately, Ido was overly eager in what The Reykjavik Grapevine called “…his juvenile enthusiasm” and naively believing that he could take on the mountain pass in the deteriorating winter conditions, he snuck out of the Landmannalaugar campground without the wardens seeing him. Deeply unprepared for the conditions
and maybe not realizing how dangerous the cold and snow was 3300 miles (5300km) north of his home in Israel, Ido soon got turned around on the mountains. On a clear day, the 7.5 mile (12km) trek from Landmannalaugar to Hrafntinnusker takes the average hiker 4-5 hours with the significant elevation changes. The day that Ido hiked, a thick fog settled in on the mountains as the wind increased and blowing wet snow buried the winding trail in a blanket of white. Visibility decreased and unknowingly Ido started wandering off trail in the white-out. As the storm worsened, Ido’s naive dream of exploring the world without care soon turned into a nightmare as he became completely lost in soaked, freezing clothes. Ultimately he realized he was in trouble and made two phone calls – one to the Icelandic emergency services and another to his sister in London where the cell service soon cut out as he described being cold and lost out in the Icelandic mountains. When Ido’s sister lost the call, she called the Icelandic police and spoke to another brother who alerted the rest of Ido’s family about the danger. Ido’s family rallied and contacted the Icelandic ministry, Israel embassy for Iceland, the Icelandic police and more as they pleaded for them to send a search-and-rescue mission out to find Ido. The Icelandic police told them that the conditions were too dangerous to send a helicopter out in but that 70 people from the nearby town of Hella were already out in the mountains searching for the hiker on foot.
Meanwhile, the Laugavegur hut masters had been counting every single hiker who left the Landmannalaugar hut trekking to the Hrafntinnusker hut and soon all the hikers were accounted for, despite being cold, wet and their gear thoroughly soaked from the storms. Around 5:30pm, the hut master at Hrafntinnusker hut was in the middle of helping warm up the hikers who had arrived when she received a call from the hut down in the valley of Landmannalaugar asking if young man from Israel had arrived as he was reported missing. She was surprised because she thought everyone who was supposed to have arrived was in for the night and told Landmannalaugar that unfortunately no one fitting that description was in the hut. Everyone was quickly interviewed to see if they had seen Ido on their way up to Hrafntinnusker and one couple had mentioned they had seen him up at the mountain Brennisteinsalda a few kilometers about Landmannalaugar earlier that day. That information was relayed back down to the rescue team and they sent about a dozen fast runners up the mountain, some of whom were almost lost themselves in the wet and windy storm. The runners effectively searched the lower hills but didn’t find anything so they headed up further into the mountains towards Hrafntinnusker where the weather was even worse.
Meanwhile the hut master at Hrafntinnusker went out and searched in the storm but with the conditions so poor, she didn’t turn up anything and was forced to wait it out for the rescue reinforcements. Around midnight the rescue team knocked at the door and the hut master invited them in to get warm but they declined and headed back out into the storm. About an hour later, the rescue team called to see if they could come back to the Hrafntinnusker hut to get warm and the hut master prepared hot drinks for their return. When they knocked on her door, she invited them in and asked if they had found Ido.
“Yes,” the rescuers answered.
“Is he dead?” the hut master asked.
“Yes,” they replied flatly.
Ido’s family was notified that a body was found but that they needed to provide a description of his clothing and his backpack. A year later, Ido’s family flew out to Iceland to build a rock cairn where they laid a bronze plaque in Ido’s memory on the Laugavegur Trail near where he perished in the snowstorm. His memorial near Hrafntinnusker hut reminds hikers to be wary of the concealed dangers of the Icelandic highlands.
Shannon and I had met several Israeli hikers on the Tour du Mont Blanc in the French Alps, some of whom were severely underprepared for the cold. One of the women we had met had not even brought a long sleeve shirt or waterproof jacket with her for the 10 day trek amongst the snow-covered peaks, glaciers, freezing rain and snow. I think the internet offers better information these days for those in warmer and drier climates to plan for these hikes but I too had also been underprepared for the sub-Arctic climate in Iceland. I had made the mistake of bringing ultralight gloves with me on this trip as I was coming from spending the summer hiking in the oppressive humidity and heat of Kentucky. It was only after back to back day hikes in pouring rain, 50 mph wind and snow that left my fingers numb and wet that I quickly realized I needed to purchase new waterproof fleece-lined gloves while in Iceland. I thought about my mistakes and how I was lucky to make them before I ended up in the backcountry for 5 days. It was humbling to look around these desolate lava fields, steaming ground that would melt your boots and glaciers that concealed leg-breaking crevasses and collapsed snow bridges. We thought of Ido as we slid down steep snow-covered scree slopes and finally arrived at the base of the Hrafntinnusker hut.
As we neared the hut, the ground was littered with more and more obsidian pieces, some larger than my head. You had to carefully navigate the slippery rocky path as if you fell here, the razor sharp edges of the obsidian chunks could easily cut slice through skin and muscle. Dozens of windbreaks had been built out of volcanic rocks and obsidian stones by prior campers and volunteers which indicated to us that it was going to be a windy night. We selected a windbreak that was almost as tall as our tent yet far enough from some of the other hikers to give them a little bit of privacy. As we laid our backpacks down I caught a distorted reflection of myself in the shiny multifaceted obsidian and smiled at the oily blackness that we had made it through one of the longest days on our trek. We quickly set up tent, weighing the shelter down with our gear and the least sharp lava rocks we could find on the tent stakes so our tent wouldn’t blow away while we were eating dinner.
Up to the picnic tables of the hut we hiked to eat our dinner on the hill in this dragonglass wasteland where a stiff glacier breeze blew down as the warm currents rose and the cool air settled into the valley below. Next to the hut a constant roaring poured out of the ground as roped off sulfuric vents thundered out of the mountainside. I made some mashed potatoes for the third night in a row and grumpily Shannon sat down next to me as we dug in. Somehow the trail gods were looking out for us today and the chef from one of the multi-day hiking trips where you pay big money came out and asked if we would like some salmon and veggie pasta that was leftover from his group. He was carrying an enormous pot that was half-full with the pasta and we eagerly scooped some into our bowls to supplement the instant mashed taters. Thanking the chef profusely he then asked us if we thought that the hikers camped out below would want some of the pasta. We said that if they were anything like us then they definitely would appreciate the offer. Soon enough the chef came back up with an empty pot and zero waste. We were glad to be of service!
The chill of the Icelandic highlands came long before the sun set and Shannon and I jumped in our warm sleeping bags in our private little backcountry windbreak apartment. While Shannon slept, I had set an alarm for midnight and woke briefly when the stars came out. The high altitude and subarctic winds brought telltale signs that winter was right around the corner, the long days of pleasant hiking in Iceland were coming to an end. Even layering up all of my clothes including my down coat and rain jacket, the night was still bitterly cold, the kind of chill that tore right through your skin and settled deep into your bones. Poking my head out of my tent, I sleepily decided that it would be most opportune to take photos from the warmth of my sleeping bag. For about forty minutes I messed around with some long exposure astrophotography in the clear yet absolutely freezing night before my fingers were so numb that I needed to get back in the warmth of the tent. It wasn’t until the next morning when I checked out the photos that I realized I had accidentally caught some faint teal Northern Lights in my shots of the Milky Way! Totally amazing for a last night on the trail.