Our first morning in Iceland was like any other Icelandic winter morning: cold, and dark. The low was about 15 degrees below 0, Celsius. The four of us had piled into our Rav4 and were navigating the snow-covered highways in the pitch-black looking for a nondescript natural hot spring in the middle of the Iceland tundra. Needless to say, we were lost. GPS navigation in the Icelandic countryside was spotty at best, and any hope of finding a road sign was lost under several feet of snow. Our first Icelandic “adventure” was about to turn out to be a bust.
As the sun began to rise, and our hopes of finding our seemingly mythical oasis of hot water began to sink, a small plume of steam shimmered faintly in the distance. We were close! We drove back and forth along the small highway, always keeping an eye on the steam, trying to find a drive-able route to reach the hot spring until, finally, we drew the conclusion that our Rav4 had enough off-road prowess to forge through the snow. It was a risky call, but it was one that paid off. We were able to park within walking distance of the hot spring and then, for the first time on the trip, stepped out into the frozen winter-land that was Iceland.
I remember how beautiful the white snow was as it sparkled in the low morning light. I also remember being cold. VERY COLD. I remember the shrieks of my fellow travelers as we stripped down to our underwear and stepped foot onto the frigid permafrost; our skin screaming in pain at the chilling sensation. We ran, and I mean ran, into the hot spring as soon as we were free of our clothes and in an instant: sweet relief. The water from the spring was juxtaposed perfectly against our surroundings; it was hot, comforting, and so relaxing. The four of us sank ourselves in as deep as we could and rested our gazes upon the still pond in front of us, backed by the snow-covered peaks of Harfusfell Mountain. The low, clear sky above the mountain began to faintly glow pink, and that’s when I realized what the we were about to have front-row, hot-tub seats to: Our first Icelandic sunrise.
Well, maybe not “sunrise” exactly. The sun itself was actually rising behind us to the East (as it should), but during every sunrise, typically just before the sun crests the Eastern horizon, the Western horizon will burn a deep pink and purple. This is because the wavelengths of purple and pink light are longer than other wavelengths in the visible light spectrum, and therefore are able to bend (sort of) around the Earth and be seen reflecting in the opposing horizon just before the sun officially rises (and sets). Now, normally this reflection of pink and purple wavelengths lasts only a few minutes, or even seconds in some skies, but because of Iceland’s far Northern latitude, sunrises and sunsets last much longer, and therefore their associated colors in the sky last longer as well. With all of that said, it was the perfect set up for an Icelandic photography session…except for the cold.
While we may have been in our own little hot-tub during this beautiful sunrise, the outside air temperature was still well below zero, and we were, as luck would have it, still in just our bathing suits. But we did have our camera equipment with us, so we grabbed our cameras - tripod and all - and brought them into the water with us (being careful not to get our cameras in the water, of course). Then the real challenge came - actually taking the pictures.
To avoid any interruptions in the picture (like steam crowding the frame) I had decided to use neutral density filters to allow myself to take longer exposures that would “erase” intermittent objects - a simple, but costly solution to our ever changing surroundings. Each of the filters had to be hand-screwed on and off of the lens each time I wanted to recompose the photo, and to do that, I had to get out of the water and stand in the below zero, Iceland winter air in just my underwear. The experience was…miserable. I was shivering and shaking, making it all the more difficult to use my camera properly and, at one point, I even dropped one of my filters into the hot spring - what a nightmare. But, when all was said and done, the final picture was more than memorable.
The whole sunrise lasted about 30 minutes, and I stood in the cold for the better part of that time trying to make sure I was getting everything out of my first Icelandic photo-op that I could. The experience was something that I will never forget, and the image of Harfusfell Mountain beneath Iceland’s beautiful, light-scattering horizons will remain an one of my all-time favorites because of that.
But like I said before: this is just one of the many stories that came from our Icelandic adventure. And we still had 10 more days to go…