Iceland

July 10, 2016  Iceland

Up early, transfer to the airport, fly to Oslo and change planes for Reykjavik.  With the two-hour time change, we arrived at noon, but one of our group had a bag not make it which delayed our leaving the airport.  We traveled across a volcanic moonscape:

 We arrived at the famous Blue Lagoon, a hot outdoor pool of incredible proportions.  We had lunch at the restaurant there, and then changed and went in.  It’s amazing—it ranges from warm to hot depending on where you are.  There’s a bar for drinks, and people in the pool with trays of white goo made from evaporated water which is supposedly good for your skin:

The air temperature was in the high 50s and the clouds dropped a cold drizzle on and off, but the water was wonderful.  Depending on your level of belief or disbelief, it cures whatever ails you.

Iceland is fascinating geologically.  It lies right on a junction of two tectonic plates, and is pulling apart at the very fast rate of 2 cm. per year.  As the island splits in half, magma rises up in the faults and fills them in, so much of the interior of the country is fresh volcanic rock.  The rock is covered with a tan moss, and fissures are everywhere:

 After getting cured of all our ailments in the hot mineral water we traveled to a geothermal power plant.  99% + of the homes in Reykjavik are heated with hot water from this plant, which lies about 15 miles inland.  In addition, the thermal energy is used to generate electricity.  Bore holes are drilled from 3 to 6 km. deep, and superheated water/steam under pressure rises at a temperature approaching 300 degrees C.  The water is caustic and so isn’t used directly for power, but rather is put through giant heat exchangers, where water from the water table, just a couple of hundred meters deep, is heated:

 The heated good water is split—some is sent to Reykjavik for use in home heating and home hot water:

 And some is used to power the giant turbines which are hooked to enormous generators.  There are six turbine/generator pairs, each of which generates 45 megawatts of electricity.  Here’s one:

The water from the water table is discarded into the sea, but the water from the deep bore holes which brought the heat and steam into the heat exchangers is pumped back deep into the ground.  It was a fascinating tour!  We drove up above the power plant for a panoramic view of this area, which is quite forbidding:

 The moss was so thick to walk on that it was spongy!  There were clusters of very pretty tiny pink flowers:

 Tomorrow volcanos, glaciers and black sand beaches.