Study Tour - Reykyanes Peninsula

In the morning we left Keilir, the former USAF military base, and went to visit a geothermal power plant called Svartsengi.
Map - click to zoom.












Svartsengi power plant is located on the Reykjanes peninsula. It currently produces 76.5 MW of electricity, and about 475 liters/second of 90 °C hot water. Surplus mineral rich water from the plant fills up a nearby lake and popular tourist bathing resort Bláa Lónið (Blue Lagoon), which we visited in the evening.






































After the visit we went for a trip around peninsula. This photos are taken on the far south-west end, near Reykjanes.













Take a wild guess what is this white stuff on the rock ;)











































Next stop was a High School in Keflavik, in which father of Arnbjörn works as a headmaster. As I'm computer engineer, I took a closer look on the computers they had there. And well, for a High School it's not bad ;)
Server room.


























All students can use laptop computers.

















On the classes of technology, one group of students had to construct a fuel cell remote controlled car. I wish we had this kind of exercises in schools in Poland...













We also visited Arnbjörn's mother studio - she's a painter :)
























In the evening we went to Blue Lagoon - one of the most known tourist attractions in this area. Blue Lagoon was actually an environmental disaster. It was made of the waste water from nearby geothermal power plant, which was supposed to soak down into the ground, but instead, it stayed on the top. As people were coming more and more to this "artificial lake", some business men thought of creating a spa resort here with swimming pool and clinic. They now even produce their own line of cosmetics and some pharmaceutics.


















































In the night (of course it wasn't dark) we went to Reykjavik with a group of guys to have some fun :).

Study Tour - from Höfn to Reykjavik

We left Höfn in the morning and head west along road 1 which is kind of ring road for Iceland because it circles whole island.
The map - click to zoom :)












The first stop was Jökulsárlón - best known and the largest of glacial lakes in Iceland. The lake is filled with icebergs, which are calving off the Breiðamerkurjökull glacier.













We spotted a seal swimming in the lake.







































Next stop was Skaftafell National Park. We had an about 1.5 hour walk with a guide there.













Glacier in the back :)










They actually filmed "Batman Begins" in that location :D
















Vik, one of the towns we stopped by on the way. They had Vínbúð opened only for an hour during the day, but we got there on time luckily :D










Skógafoss - an impressive waterfall, I just love them here in Iceland :D




























































Notice the face-like rock looking in the direction of a waterfall :)













Seagulls have their nest in the rocks surrounding the waterall.













Another waterfall on the way - Seljanalusfoss. You were actually able to walk beind it - amazing expirince :D


































































After that we went to a ghost center in Stokkseyri. Wasn't really scary though, but beer was included in the price ;). We left our bus in Reykjavik, took 3 cars and went to Keflavik, Keilr - old USAF base for a sleep. We were to stay there another 6 days.

Study Tour - Kárahnjúkar dam, way to Höfn

Fourth day began from a visit to a biggest power plant in Iceland - Kárahnjúkar dam - hydro power plant which supports Alcoa aluminum smelter with electricity.
Map of the trip (click to zoom).












On the way we spotted a group of reindeers. Reindeers are not originally from Iceland - they were "imported" from Greenland to enrich the island with new species.













Kárahnjúkar dam - the reservoir was still frozen.













The dam. On the place they had to build 3 dams, divided by one big hill. An island was also created in the middle of the reservoir, which before was a mountain :)





































Me, Tomek, David Dvorak - our Fuel Cells coordinator and Kasia.
























They also build additional small dams to support water supply to a power plant.












This is the way back - you can see Lagarfljót lake in the background. It's surrounded by the biggest forest in Iceland, which they don;t have many anyways ;)













Visitors center.












Power house - it's inside the mountain, we got there driving inside with the bus. It's in some distance from the dam. All the water for the turbines is supplied through a tunnel drilled in hard rocks which has a length of about 40 km!













Access tunnel.
























After the visit we went all the way to the south to Höfn for a dinner and sleep after a long day. Views on the way were amazing, but unfortunately it was raining almost all the time, so I couldn't make good photos.