The manly trolls of Gulfoss…
… and the worms (um, gold collecting dragons, you know the type) of Gulfoss…
… the Golden Falls … 
… look across to the female trolls across the gorge, which are riding a worm…
.. and if the worm has the head of a ram, well, this is Iceland, after all.
And the flag … this flag:
… flies between them.
So now you know, too.
So much of Iceland is a volcanic wilderness.
1000 years ago, the farms of Kaldada and Sandar were overwhelmed with lava. Glacial water finds its way between the old earth and the new.
Hraunfosser near Bjarnafoss
And even bog cotton. It is life that is the wonder.
Forget white! Skeiðárjökull wears her ash well.
Before it melts…
… and goes to sea…
… and comes back.
The Iceland the Icelanders send you to on the bus is magical.
Seljalandsfoss
So is the one they live in, across the road.
One has water blowing in the wind. One has volcanic ash blowing in the wind. These are the big choices. Hmm. OK, also the Atlantic Ocean blowing in the wind.
Snaefelsnes
And, right, fog and rain blowing in the wind.
Seydisfjörður
Do they tell you about that? No, they do not. They tell you about the Blue Lagoon:
Not your style? Well, there’s this story, too.
Did you notice the consistent use of white? It’s a message. Let me show you again. One …
…two…
…three.
Icelanders know about whiteness.
How blue it is.
How watery.
And how it covers everything with illusion. OK, well, a backdrop for illusions.
And that in Iceland ghosts are everywhere.
And they are white.
Well, white and red. And white.
Right, and snow blows in the wind, too.
So, off you go!
… I come for the cities.
Welcome to Vik, sprawling metropolis of 291 people on the floor of the sea. For Gunnar, this was a last remnant of Atlantis.
Welcome to the Vik suburbs! Well, urban sprawl, eh, but, still, the Atlantic drop straight off and smells only of iodine and salt, so that’s ok, then.
And the waves of the Sea of Atlantis splash up over the bones of the world.
I like it that it does that. I just wanted you to know that tonight. Whatever ladder you use…
… to climb out of the surf…
… and make land.
All farming is hard.
Abandoned Farm, Borgarfjörður Eystri
Everywhere. Here’s a farm in Wales.
Hayfield, Y Fron, Wales
And a farm in Canada.
New Orchard, Vernon, Canada
And a farm in Iceland. This one is still working!
Sturluflöt, Iceland
I think the last is the most beautiful. Team? What do you think?
Hmmm. It’s hard to say if they agree or not. Closer?
Ah. The silent type.
Look at the Kelduá emerge from its valley. Here in the remote East, water turns to stone and back to water, and stone flows like water, then freezes, then breaks apart and flows like water again.
It is why a river in Iceland is an á: not a substance but a flow (aqua), not water but the energy that materializes as water and, as you can see, as stone. And jumbles them all up together. And breaks them apart. When you stand there and see beauty, it is that energy that you sense. The freezing energy, that is the business of frost. Keep your distance from that stuff! It’s lethal.
The old Norse runes are well known.
They were repeated many times and developed shared symbolic meaning, aside from their use as an alphabet suitable for carving in stone.
Nonetheless, there are other runes. At Ásbyrgi, for example, long strings of runes, alphabets essentially, written in a bodily script, are written in long lines across the faces of the cliffs.
The more you stare at them, the more they make sense, although each is written one time only, in constant modifications of basic patterns, no two the same.
The pleasure gained from spending a day reading them is no different from that in a gallery on the European continent, in the face of Rembrandt, Vermeer or Van Dyk, or in a vault in Mainz with Gutenberg’s Bible, or in front of Shakespeare’s First Folio in the British Library.
These are masterworks never repeated, but no less masterworks, and no less languages and texts, for being so.
You can’t read them in the pubs of Reykjavik. You are going to have to go north, so far off of Highway 1 that when you learn to read these runes you won’t tell anyone what they say.
Well, 80 km/h on a good day.
Snæfellsnes
Way too fast! Maybe you should walk?
In a land of many stones at the top of the world, where it can, shh don’t tell anyone from the Icelandic Tourism Office, get cold…
… rocks contract from the flatness to stay warm.
Going flat is a sure way to lose all your heat, and it’s a long way to the merino wool shops at the mall in Reykjavik, and how are you going to walk there when you’re a rock? Nope, rounding up it is. Plants, being more evolved, follow suit, because they’re smart.
Now you know too. Shh. Don’t tell anyone from the clothing shops of Reykjavik or they might open a branch up north. Here’s an ad for one geared for humans, that endearing lot. They started up north, then moved south where the humans are. A flag for everyone, to make everyone feel at home.
Here’s a version from half-ways to the north. This ewe has donated half her fleece to a stone, by the looks of it.
But what would a stone make of this?
This?
And what would a stone make of this?
This?
No, when you’re a rock, it’s better to clump up with your friends.
No, not like this:
Brrr!
A Farm in Iceland 
