Day Sixteen

Today we moved on from Hofn to Reytharfyorthur (that's more or less phonetic spelling... see below for the actual location name) rather quickly in the morning because the roads were better than expected.  We were settled into our new hostel by around 13h00 and headed off towards the Aluminium Smelter shortly thereafter. That tour almost didn't include everything it should have because they'd lost power as we were driving up, but in the end, we were allowed to go in to see the pots (the enclosures where they make the aluminium from the aluminium oxide and a catalyst. I think I may have partied a bit hard last night because I've had a splitting headache all day which I believe has contributed to my considerable crankiness. (Sorry guys) And I almost fell asleep (and off a table) while listening to our guide answer some of our questions at the end of the tour!

I wasn't allowed to take my camera with me, and the only shots I got of today were me fooling around with my warming filter, so I've nothing new to post, but I decided to include an amazing (or two) glacier shot! enjoy!

Day Fifteen

Today started off with lectures at the local research centre again - starting with Climate change to a quick Connection between Climate change and Tourism followed by Harold's presentation about his masters thesis, and PhD process of his study (ongoing) of Tourism and the effects of it.

This afternoon we headed out to an old Armed Forces base initially set up by the British and later taken over by the Americans. Then we proceeded to walk across a black sand beach, picking up stones along the way. Our guide took us across a plain to a Viking Village (actually a movie set which apparently has not yet been used) which we meandered around for a while before moving on back towards the vans. The instructors headed to get the vans (with the one left near our outlet) as we walked off to meet the horses. Both Ava and I had apples to feed them. Our last visit was to a view point on the far side of Horn (a mountain) accessed through a tunnel (Gabi, Stacie and I held our breath).  The weather was somewhat misty so the view wasn't as spectacular as it could have been, but we could still see the three glaciers Thor showed us modeled over the next 200 years.  Its really depressing to see how much they've changed since their peak size (in this little ice age - started in 1200) in 1890.

Days Thirteen and Fourteen

So, I fell off the bandwagon yesterday. We arrived in Höfn yesterday evening after a day of hike-drive-hike-drive-midterm. And then we proceded to party (mildly) because THE bar in town was already closed.

Sunday (13):  Before setting out in the morning, I hiked up to the top of the nearby 40m waterfall (Skógafoss) with Sharon to have a look around. A little farther up stream from the main sight was a second smaller, more niagra like waterfall. A shortish drive brought us to the parking lot of the Skaftafellsjökull - a glacier on the southern part of the country. We hiked up past the moraines, and onto the glacier.  It is both amazing and increadibly sad to see how much the glacier has receded over the past 100 years. I am aware, and I believe it is important to mention that we are coming out a mini-ice age, but its rather unreal to see how much ice has melted. The glacier has receded a few hundred meters (estimated based on how far we hiked) in the last 50-odd years. We drove on for a ways, stopped at another glacier to see it's lagoon (on the near side of where Beyond the Wall was filmed for the Game of Thrones!!!) then on to one final lagoon - where amphibious boats take tourists out. <-- does that sound sustainable to you? Kinda seems like it's unnecessarily contributing to climate change...But then again, I flew here on Earth Day.

We arrived in Höfn with a little time to study in the hostel before writing the midterm after which we grabbed some bjór and headed to the beach.

Today (14): Up bright and early, as usual, this time to head a research centre here for a few hours of lecture followed by a grocery trip.  We then had little time to get ready to set out on another hike to a glacier, this time Hoffellsjokull.  Our guide (nicknamed Thor because his real name is a mouthful) sounded sad as he talked about the receding glacier. Every month for the last five years he has been taking a photograph from the same spot. When he started, he was just barely at the ice, now the ice is hundreds of metres away. I think was stuck me was not so much the recession in metres, but the depletion in volume of the glacier. I can even begin to estimate a km^3 value, but it is most definitely massive.  We hiked up a hill west of the glacier face to get a better view, and it was magnificent!

On our way back into town, we unanimously decided to make a pit stop at a dairy farm which makes its own ice cream! The chocolate vanilla cone I had was delicious! Before dinner a Ava, Luke, Lesley, Riley, Steve and I headed for the pool to try out the waterslides and the hot pools. Then Luke and I made ribs (not on the BBQ, sadly, there was no propane, and the grill looked uber disgusting). One game of thrones episode later, here I am!

Ok picutres! I've taken so many gorgeous ones of glaciers, I'm going to try for some variety....Enjoy!

Day Twelve

Today was amazing! We checked out of the hostel at 9am and left to meet with our instructors and pack the vans.  About an hour of driving through the rain with a quick Bonus/bathroom stop brought us to the base of our first hike of the day. There was some confusion about who would be going up the mountain, but eventually everyone got on board, and we set out.  I think we were away from the cars for nearly 4 hours as we hiked up to the geothermal springs, past the bathing area (literally just a hole in the river) to some more bubbling mud a ways on, then circled back to the river for a dip! Almost everyone got into the water (after some fun open air changing) which was suppper hot! One of  pools was (supposedly) 44C! We left the hot pools as I at my sandwich around 12h45.  The hike back to the car was permeated with running! As we ran, Luke looked like Gimly (from the Lord of The Rings) while Emily, Sharon, Riley and I ran along with him. The scenery was phenomenal; the sun even started peaking out between the clouds! - Did I mention it was raining this whole time? Our speed and a bunch of layers (yay wool and down!) kept me warm, if not totally dry. I honesty loved running along the trails, and found my self motivated because of trying to keep up with the athletes (and 6'6 Riley). It was really cool to see how the grasses had remained green in the vicinity of the hot/war running water, but was an unwatered/wintered yellow everywhere else! The landscape was one that no photo could do justice.

We next headed off to visit a waterfall that we could hike around behind the falling water. If I hadn't already been pretty damp, this would have done the trick! A combination of wind and falling water means spray for everyone! Poor Daisy got drenched when a gust of wind picked up the falls and blew them towards her. I got some pretty neat shots from behind the falls, and some falling rock made those of us doing the loop run through a section up to the viewpoint before finishing the circuit and heading back to the vans.

Our last stop was a giftshop and small movie theatre at the base of Eyjafjallajokull - best known for shutting down air traffic all over Europe in April 2010.  The movie was quite interesting; it recounted the experience of a farming family at the base of the glacier before and throughout the eruption. They had farmed there for generations, and were prepared to leave at any moment due to suspicious seismic activity prior to the main eruption. The latter blotted out the sun, caused layers of ash to fall on the farm, and required sheltering the animals and evacuation of the families. Now though, the volcanic ash has fertilised the surrounding areas, and they are a self sufficient farm, providing grain for the livestock from their own fields.

We ended at the hostel in Skodar.

Here are some pictures from today.

Day Eleven

Today was awesome. We had two lectures this morning, on natural hazards and emergency preparedness, and one on Ecological Economics.  The latter was taught by a woman who joked during her presentation about a student's comment: "if you blink you fail."  That's no word of a lie - she spoke soooo fast! But she did have heaps to say about how economics and politics often take environmental or natural capital for granted, and how there are limits which we've far exceeded. This seemed to round back to yesterday's point that we can't always grow. Growth isn't infinitely sustainable, and something will eventually give. There are wastes and bi-products of the economic/political/social/consumption systems that we have in place that go out into the environment but never get accounted for in life-cycle analysis. I know that there are regulations for the oil sands and for mines in Alberta to return the landscape to the image it once was post-processing, but that only talks about the landscape where the resources were removed. What about where the resources go after that? The refineries in Texas have waste, and the final products emit carbon, end up in landfills or end up in other systems, but how much material or energy actually gets recycled? I would also like to point out a comment that was made by someone else: Reduce Reuse Recycle. Which comes last? Why are we focusing on recycle when it is the third R? Reduce consumption, Reduce the materials used (as an engineer, I can say that the first R is being done to an extent - so many things are being over designed now to reduce the amount of material used to make a product. Why? because material costs money!), but I think the former, reducing consumption, is one that needs to emphasized. Do we really need as much space, clothes, electronics, cars, and other stuff as we have become accustomed to?  

After the collapse of the factory in Banledesh, Chatelaine ran a story which included the headline [Pay more, Buy less] (http://www.chatelaine.com/living/bangladesh-the-wake-up-call-we-needed/)  Which I think is and interesting concept because it covers the idea that local made products, or products made where the workers are safe and being paid fairly, are more expensive, yet more equitable. We shouldn't be adverse to spending more money to ensure the safety of the people who make our things. Though I do prefer the former option of having products made locally because it keeps the money in our economy, and reduces  the energy needed for transportation, Mountain Equipment Coop did a study where they tested to see if customers would hold true to their word and actually spend more money to buy a Canadian made product; however, what people say and actually do diverges when it comes to spending money. "The demand for lower prices by retailers and consumers makes production in low-cost countries attractive."(http://www.mec.ca/AST/ContentPrimary/Sustainability/EthicalSourcing/SourcingAndGlobalIssues/SourceInCanada.jsp) Meaning production in Canada is not really a priority for consumers, price is.

The second part, "Buy less" addresses the excessive consumerism. The article talks about all the clothes that we've bought for cheap and left to rot at the bottoms of drawers or in the back of closets. Why do we buy so much stuff we don't use? Or use once then send it to contribute to overfilling landfills? Marketing, advertising, and capitalism can all be scapegoats.  I don't really have an answer to this question. All I can say is that I will monitoring my own spending much closer now.

Reuse is starting to become a fashionable thing with the "up-cycling movement" which I think is neat, and again contributes to the idea of a changing labour force as mentioned in Day 10.  People are becoming innovative by adding value to 'junk' and making it desirable.

On another note:

I've also come to feel as though we aren't destroying our environment, rather altering it in such a way that Mother Earth will just remove us from the equation. We won't destroy her, we'll just make her uninhabitable for us.

The second half of the day started after stocking up at Bonus, grabbing a swim suit and heading out towards the Blue Lagoon. First we stopped at a geothermal power plant for a tour. Then a facility which takes waste carbon and electricity from the plant, to make exportable substances. Then off for a swim and some bjor(s) in the Blue Lagoon. The Blue Lagoon is actually a bi-product of the plant - we went swimming in waste water!!!

Oh, and did I mention? HAPPY BIRTHDAY RILEY!
Here are a few pictures!

Day Ten

Today was an introduction to our final group project for the course. Topics haven't been picked yet, but we've selected our interests, and we'll be grouped accordingly. After these discussions, we shopped for foodstuffs for the next few days, then headed back to the hostel before leaving for the bus station (Hlemme (?)) to go to visit the author of Dreamland ( Andri Snær Magnason) in his home turf at a re-purposed Coal Energy Factory (now Toppdin). The location was magnificent, the kind of place I could wander for hours taking pictures and never get bored.  We only had a short time to wander after his speech/question period, not nearly as long as I would have liked! Here are some pictures from the factory!

The pictures weren't really the most important part of this visit though, Andri was really interesting to listen to. He's written a few books (starting with poetry and children's books) and had interesting views on how the labour force should be structured and what form that labour should be. Iceland has become a hotspot for aluminium smelter plants due to its super cheap energy (ie. the energy company breaks even) which take up over 70% of the energy produced here.  The energy is primarily hydro-electric which means these companies can claim to be using green energy, but they are still eating up Iceland's beautiful landscape. Andri describes a shift in thinking towards a new type of labour force, and warns against the tribulations of living in the past. (Which makes me think of the shift described by a guy the Strombo had on his tv show - he describes how because so much has become mechanized and automated, the required labour force is shrinking; therefore, the more important jobs in the future will be those that add value through creativity and innovation.)  Andri believes that the energy and aluminium/heavy industries are like wildlife: if you feed them, and encourage them, they will get hungrier and hungrier and complacent in the realm we've built for them; they will endlessly come back for more. Instead, Andri advocates the need to understand that just because nothing is changing, new smelters aren't being built, there is no economic growth, the country is not stagnant but rather in a time of consistent prosperity. I agree with this to an extent: economies cannot grow indefinitely, this is unsustainable, so this perceived stagnation may just be a balancing point in the scale at this particular point in time; however, if everyone else is growing, does that really mean that one is not really stagnant, but rather shrinking with respect to other economies? I think this would be a hard pill for any government to swallow (or to try to feed to its people).

Some of this is mine, most of it is his. I like that this is not the first time I've heard of the idea that we are moving towards a tertiary labour force. As a mechanical (engineer), I'm part of those that mechanize systems to make them more efficient and consequently provide fewer jobs.  When labour is cheap elsewhere, and money drives decisions, we need to look at how we can add value, at how we can be innovative and irreplaceable.  I think the days of being an assembly line worker are coming to an end - we can assemble anywhere or machines can that job.  How can the assembly like worker innovate and make themselves irreplaceable? I do not have an answer, but I know that one will be needed soon if we want to save the millions (or more?) of people that do these kind of jobs in North America.

Night all. 

Day Nine

Classes again this morning followed by a visit to the National Iceland Museum. The former included lectures on glaciers, climate change, ecology, and fisheries (this last lecturer was awesome, his enthusiasm and ideas - though sometimes very biased - were enthralling!).  At 14h00 we headed to the museum (thanks to Leah for paying our entrance! - apparently it used to be free on wednesdays, but is no longer) where I wandered mostly alone till just before 5.  I took some photos, but they were few and far between; I did find some cool stuff in the gift shop!

I also got my marks back for all my courses save Capstone; I did better in one and worse in the other of my classes than expected - I've officially passed! (not that there was any concern....)

I don't know what rules are for posting images like this, but I own no rights to the content, it's all accredited to the National Museum of Iceland! The white box is an old photo booth!