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.