Tuesday, September 30, 2008

Berjamór

Alright, now that we're not out of the city on every weekend, it's time to catch up and post some pictures! There are plenty of pictures from the summer, so there will be more blog posts to come..

Anyway, this post is about a Berjamór. That's a berry picking trip. Though Iceland may be mostly treeless and not very hospitable to agriculture in general, large swaths of it are covered in berries by the end of the summer. The most common is the humble crowberry. It's not too tasty on its own, but mixed with skyr (the Icelandic better-than-yogurt dairy item) and a bit of sugar, it's great in the morning.

But you can also find blueberries. This particular trip was all about blueberry picking since we had a decent stock of crowberries already. We went to Þingvellir national park, found a spot, and started picking! :)

Later, we went to a nearby hot river for a dip. Technically it's water pumped up from the depths of the earth to produce power in the Nesjavellir power plant. Part of that water goes to Reykjavík, and part flows next to the station... So you get inside that flow and swim in the very warm water! Highly recommended. Be careful though, the current is quite fast...


Lake Þingvallavatn


Ropy lava at the edge of the lake


In fact there were lots of mossy areas... You could walk on them and feel a bounce


The blueberry plants were turning red


Blueberries!


And crowberries


Green


No berry is too elusive


Jo picking


We saw some mushrooms too


Posing with the catch


The hot river