THE FJORDS
Next day rain, fog, and mist prevailed, so there was much whist-playing
and smoking below, and much blowing of whistle above. Towards evening
we were off the coast of Iceland; the land was not visible, for we
were enveloped in fog, but there was no doubt about it, for we could
_hear_ that land was not far distant. It may seem strange, but it was
a fact, we were really feeling our way along the coast by the aid of
the steam-whistle. The land thereabouts rises abruptly from the sea,
and the echoes from the sheer faces of rock enabled the officers of the
vessel to judge their distance. We went dangerously near to another
vessel in the fog, but soon afterwards it cleared off a bit, and there,
just abeam on the starboard side, was the other vessel, sufficiently
close to be a dangerous neighbour in thick weather. At midnight we
were going full speed ahead, but when I awoke at seven in the morning
it was to find that our experiences of fog were not at an end, that
we were again in a very dense one, and that we were lying-to. After
breakfast it lifted sufficiently to allow of a course being shaped for
Northfjord, our first port of call in Iceland. Much of the scenery
of this fjord was obscured by the thick atmosphere, but occasional
glimpses through rifts proved that we were missing many fine scenes
that are on view when the conditions are favourable. The first sight
of Iceland was obtained at Dalatangi Point, four or five miles to the
north of the entrance to Northfjord. In the fog we had gone too far
north. Other glimpses on the way were of a corrie near Dalatangi, and
the face of the mountains near Mjofifjord. Our stay at Northfjord was
of but short duration, and there was no time to go ashore, so the only
view we had of the town was obtained from the vessel's deck.
We had a number of Faroese passengers on board, bound for various ports
in Iceland; they were good types of the race, and I obtained permission
to photograph some of them.
Seythisfjord was not far distant, and in a few hours we were steaming
up the fjord towards the town at its head. The scenery and geological
structure of these fjords were similar to what we had passed through
two days before in the Faroes. Towards the head of the fjord there
are many waterfalls on the mountain-sides; in fact, it is a district
of waterfalls, for there are some fine ones up the valley, where a
fair-sized river and its various tributaries rush down from all sides
in a series of great leaps and bounds over ledges of rocks fifty,
sixty, a hundred feet high, finally joining and tumbling over the
lowest ledge in a grand cascade (which I photographed) to the river
below--the "valley of waterfalls" would be a descriptive name to bestow
upon it.
It was at Seythisfjord that we first set foot upon the soil of
Iceland. We were conveyed to the shore by the steam-launch and boats
from a man-of-war, the Danish guardship, that was lying in the harbour.
We were so honoured because the captain of our vessel was an officer
in the Danish Navy, and it was intended as an attention to him. It
seems that some of the vessels belonging to the Company are captained
by officers of the Navy, who are appointed to the command by the
Danish authorities as a sort of reward for services, for during their
term--three years, I think--they draw their pay as officers of the Navy
in addition to what is due to them from the Company.
On shore our party split up as usual, Miss Hastie and Hill going off in
search of plants, while the "Nautical Adviser," Thomas, and I wandered
along the sea-shore and into the town. We were pestered by an Icelander
having a very crude idea of the English language who had been imbibing
the "lemonade" of the country, and if he had not "three sheets in the
wind," at least there was one little sheet flapping about, the end of
which was flicking at us at inconvenient moments. We tried to shake
him off, but it was of no avail. He had a notion that we wanted a
guide to conduct us into the interior of Iceland, and he claimed to be
very competent and to know everything of the country. We did not doubt
his competency, or if so we did not inform him, but tried to make him
understand that we had made our arrangements for guidance, and that the
men we had engaged were teetotallers. For a long while he dogged our
footsteps, and it was not until we had got clear of the town and were
making tracks up the valley towards the waterfalls that we lost him.
On the way we joined Miss Hastie and Hill, who seemed quite satisfied
with the result of their grubbing amongst what--to those of us at least
who had not been educated botanically--looked like very common weeds.
Together we slowly, very slowly, made our way up the valley, for there
were many stoppages while plants were being dug out and transferred to
small tin boxes that looked like tobacco tins--indeed, I think they
were originally intended to hold the "weed" of the smoker and not
"Weeds--various." So much time was occupied by these stoppages, that at
last it became a question whether we should be able to reach the lowest
and, as we believed, the finest of the waterfalls, for we were expected
to be on board at a certain time, in readiness for departure; the
question was much debated, and there seemed to be a general desire to
discuss the matter rather than to make the attempt to reach the fall. I
determined to try, and was informed that I should miss the steamer.
I could see the misty spray rising from the fall not a mile distant,
so I set out across swamps and peat bogs, caring but little for such
trifles, for I had resolved to see that fall. Well, I _did_ reach the
fall, and after photographing it, crossed the river just below it, and
returned on the other side of the valley. It was a rather difficult
journey, for I had a severe cross-country course to cover, with a
number of fairly long jumps over the mountain streams on the way, but,
nevertheless, I reached the _Ceres_ half an hour before the other
members of the party. Then, strange to say, none of them seemed to
believe that I had reached the waterfall at all; but the photograph of
it is the best evidence that I can offer in support of my contention
that I did.
[Illustration: THE WATERFALL, SEYTHISFJORD.]
The soil at Seythisfjord looked very good, and would doubtless yield
good crops were the summer a bit longer and the ripening power of the
sun rather stronger. There is much peat and boggy land on the slopes
below the steep escarpments on each side of the fjord, and in the
river-flats up the valley; many ponies are grazed here, and as some of
the boggy land is being drained by deep dykes, the number is likely to
increase; the peat that is removed in cutting the dykes is built up at
their sides to form dividing fences.
The valley at the head of Seythisfjord is a fine specimen of the result
of sub-aerial erosion, for its form is due to the denuding action of
frost and snow, wind and rain, storm and sunshine. There is a vast
corrie at the head, which is shelved in a series of steps right down to
the flat through which the river meanders. It is at these shelves or
ledges of the harder strata that the waterfalls and cascades already
mentioned are to be found--there, where the river and its branches rush
over the edge of one terrace and plunge down to the next.
This being our first experience of the Icelanders, our attention was
attracted by the peculiar headdress worn by the women, which is common
to all classes--a small black knitted cap, about four or five inches in
diameter, from which a silver tube hangs suspended at the side of the
head; through the tube is strung a number of cords or silken threads
that hang down as a tassel.
We ought to have sailed late in the evening, but a thick fog settled
over the land and prevented a start. Wonderful echoes can be produced
at Seythisfjord; the steam-whistle was sounded several times, and
the sound echoed and re-echoed again and again, the reverberation
continuing for many seconds before it died away in the distance among
the mountain tops. Fog and misty rain continued through the night and
well into the small hours of the morning; but at about five o'clock it
lifted sufficiently to allow the _Ceres_ to put to sea. Progress was
slow, and the frequent blasts of the steam-whistle that disturbed our
morning slumbers indicated the state of the atmosphere; however, we
entered Vopnafjord soon after mid-day, and shortly afterwards came to
an anchorage opposite the town.
Vopnafjord is one of the homes of the eider duck, and it was on the
rocky islets opposite to the town that we first saw those birds in
their natural surroundings. We borrowed one of the ship's boats and
rowed over to the rocks. It was difficult to get near, for the ducks
were very shy--more so than usual just then, because many had young;
but as they were too young to fly, we did get fairly near by rowing
round their rocks. The nesting season was over, and many of the birds
had gone away. The production of eider down is an industry that is
increasing; the birds are rigorously protected, and a fine of ten
kronur (eleven shillings) is the penalty incurred by any one killing an
eider duck.
In the afternoon we went ashore in a hired boat that leaked very badly;
but we reached the shore without anything very exciting happening.
The return journey, however, was attended with considerable risk,
for in the meantime the wind had risen, and there was a nasty choppy
sea beating against us when we attempted to make the _Ceres_. Water
entered the boat through the leaky spots, and more was shipped; we were
near being swamped, but we made the gangway, and got on board without
anything worse than a wetting. At the various ports of call there was
often considerable difficulty in obtaining a boat, and the passenger
wishing to get ashore had to take whatever craft was available, for
they were very scarce. Often they were dirty and very leaky. Sometimes
a passage was refused, and on one occasion a cargo-boat starting for
the shore declined a fare of two kronur, although going direct to the
wharf not far distant--the Icelander is an independent personage, and
unless it suits his convenience he sometimes refuses a job.
While at Vopnafjord we met with a man, an Icelander, who could speak
a little English; we soon discovered that he was proud of having
acquired a few British swear words. Thomas and I were taking shots at
a number of fish-cleaners at work on the beach, when this man came
along; we had previously been in conversation with him, so he remarked
airily as he passed that the result of our snap would be "a hell of
a picture." We laughed, but he went on a few paces and then stopped
beside a fellow-passenger, a man of strict views and ideas, who was
photographing the same subject. The Icelander, encouraged, I suppose,
because we had laughed, went one better on what he had said to us, and
gave his opinion that _this_ result would be "a blank, blanketty blank
picture"!--he seemed surprised at the freezingly cold way in which his
remark was received.
We left Vopnafjord in the afternoon and in four hours made Langanes,
a narrow, flat-topped peninsula several miles long, a perfectly
horizontal lava flow, with faces that rise vertically from the sea;
the section is exactly the same, whether through the end or side of
the peninsula. The whiteness of the points of rock and of the face
generally, evidenced the fact that many sea-fowl resort there, and that
the rock-face is covered with a deposit of guano.
At midnight we were inside the Arctic circle, and had the weather
been favourable, we should have seen the sun just above the horizon.
But His Majesty was not on view, for though the fog had lifted in the
morning and had enabled us to make Vopnafjord, the weather had been
dull all day, with the sun quite obscured, and the same conditions
prevailed through the night. It was a pity, because it would probably
be our only chance of seeing the midnight sun, for next day we should
be in Akureyri, a town lying at the head of a long fjord, and nearly a
degree south of the Arctic circle, where the view would, we thought, be
obscured by intervening hills and mountains.
Husavik in Skjalfandi was our next port of call, and we arrived there
early enough in the morning for us to go ashore before breakfast.
Thomas and I were interested in a reported "raised beach"--land
originally formed on the margin of the sea, and subsequently raised
by tectonic (subterranean) disturbances to a height above sea-level.
Miss Hastie was also desirous of seeing the raised beach, and trudged
along with us over the hills to the bay where we expected to find
it; but on arrival we could see no raised beach: there was some
volcanic conglomerate, the rounded and smoothed stones of which had
perhaps caused it to be mistaken for a raised beach--unless, indeed,
we ourselves were on the wrong track and had mistaken the spot;
nevertheless, there was nothing else in view that looked like what we
were in search of, so we returned to Husavik over the hills again.
Not long ago these hills were completely covered with fine yellow
ferruginous loam--a comparatively recent deposit; but it is now being
rapidly eroded, and the older moraine beneath laid bare.
At Husavik there is a great accumulation of moraine matter that has
been brought down from the valley at the back. It is a terminal
moraine that comes right down to the sea, which washes at the foot of
its almost vertical face, fifty to sixty feet high. The town stands on
the edge of the moraine, and the only approach from the pier is by a
long flight of wooden steps; goods are conveyed in trucks that run up a
steep inclined tramway, and these are raised and lowered by cables and
the use of a windlass and friction brakes. Behind the town great fields
of peat are being excavated and stacked ready for use as fuel.
On the voyage from Husavik to Akureyri, one of our fellow-passengers
was the Icelandic minister of the church at Akureyri, a man who had
a very fine tenor voice, the best in Iceland according to repute; at
our request he sang to an accompaniment played on a small harp by a
travelling companion. One thing he sang was the Icelandic National
Hymn, entitled the "Hymn of Praise," composed by S. Sveinbjornsson to
celebrate Iceland's thousand years of freedom. The thousand years were
completed in 1874 (874 to 1874), and the fact was celebrated in that
year with festivities and general rejoicing, the King of Denmark taking
part in them.
On our arrival at Eyjafjord in the afternoon, the weather was clearing
up, and as we steamed up the fjord fine views opened out, and we saw
many excellent cloud-effects. After about three hours' steaming up the
fjord we reached Akureyri, the town next in importance to Reykjavik,
the capital, and came to an anchorage there at about eight o'clock in
the evening.