One of the many waterfalls

Dragon's Lair?

Our safe haven

Working in a haze

We are still fighting everything the Icelandic climate has to throw at us. Unfortunately the latest is very thick fog, making visibility far too low to safely navigate the "trails" much less spot contacts. We are starting to get to the point where I can piece the big picture together, though without more samples and the chemistry to back it up, its all just educated guessing. So we are taking what the weather gives us and trying not to get too discouraged; I am failing miserably at the latter. We have been given a little time off lately, so we have made a few plans to do some of the touristy things. We also decided to take the long route home; this will allow us to see more of what Iceland has to offer, not just rainy valleys. Those trips are still a little ways off for now, but they give us motivation to work hard to earn them in the mean time. Apparently there is a large Icelandic festival starting which may be very interesting to be a part of. Some of the hikes lately have provided scenery that looks like it belongs in a Lord of the Rings or Harry Potter movie, I thought for sure Brianna was going to have to fight a dragon today; I'm sure she would have been fine as I waited patiently at a safe distance (the car). Even through the clouds on tops of the ridges the views are pretty spectacular, a little sun wouldn't hurt though.

Church in town

Fishing boat in the fjord (glacier carved inlet to the ocean)

A kaffi (cafe) in Akureyri

Hraunsvatn (vatn means lake/water)

It gets cold this high up, but beautiful flowers can still grow! (it gives us hope!)

Jason is super excited to finally reach the rhyolite!!

An outcrop of Rhyolite showing what we believe to be pauses in eruption

Temperatures are low, but spirits are high!!

The past two days have been our first few days without Sheila, Jason's advisor, but things are going very well. We have been accomplishing alot and we are actually feeling like real geologists!! We have been successful in locating and mapping our key outcrops, even though the weather is still not cooperating. It has been cold and rainy and we have even been lucky enough to get sleeted on too! Last night was our first night in a hotel and although the bed was very nice, we decided we felt more comfortable in our tents at the campground. We geologists are a strange and unique breed.

Our office has a nice view!

A minor logistical hurdle during our 5 hour hike.

Where are my rocks?

After a week of winter in July and hiking for 10s of km everyday, my advisor left us here alone. Our job is to find a type of volcanic rock called rhyolite, which should look entirely different than every other rock here. The problem is, the rhyolite either blends in with the surroundings better than we thought, or it isn't here at all. We have found a few promising outcrops, but getting to them safely requires lots of time, some rope, and maybe a helicoptor. We are thinking of hijacking some of the dozens of horses that are around here to save us some energy. They would have come in handy on wednesday when we hiked for 5 hours just to get the the base of a 1000 m cliff, the top of which contained one of the more important outcrops in the field area. As our luck would have it, it is crucial that we return to this area for a more detailed analysis. We are putting this hike off for a few days, but we will be spending quite a bit of time on a neighboring ridge that, when we looked a few days ago, seemed to hold a number of key outcrops for the research. We have made a good plan and a schedule, that I'm sure Brianna will keep us to on our quest for the elusive rhyolite!

Field Area
Campsite in Akureyri

Iceland at Last!

We arrived in Keflavik early Sunday morning, picked up our rental vehicle, and began our journey to Akureyri. None of us were able to sleep on the plane, so it was a long, tiring, but beautiful drive. Iceland is absolutely amazing!! By the time we reached Akureyri, it was late in the evening so we ate supper and went to our camp site. The campground is a fenced in area right in the middle of town, not much privacy, but at least there are showers. There are lots of Europeans, but I am pretty sure we are the only Americans here. People have been very friendly but we have been suprised at the lack of smiles. Over the next four days, we became familiar with the town and key areas where we would be working. Everything has been going well, but it is a little colder than we expected. Typically, the weather is in the mid 50's with a little wind/rain, but unfortunately for us, it has been 30-40 degrees with high winds, sleet, rain, etc. Not exactly what we had pictured, but we are told it should warm up (we are keeping our fingers crossed). Another adjustment has been the amount of daylight. It never actually gets dark!! For about 4 hours between midnight and 4am its like dusk. Adjustments are difficult but worth it for a chance to work in the beautiful landscapes of Iceland.

Why Iceland?

The life of a graduate student has predominately been classwork (as a student as well as a teacher), but now I finally get to do what I have wanted to do since I got into geology years ago. I will be doing field work in Iceland for 5 weeks. The field work is a part of my Master's thesis, in which I am trying to determine, as most geologists in Iceland do, the origin of many of the volcanic rocks. Iceland sits on a portion of the Earth's crust in which volcanism is favored for multiple reasons. First, the Earth's plates are being pulled apart here, this phenomenon makes for a prime location for volcanic activity on its own. In addition to the plate movement however, the mantle under Iceland is anomalously active causing even more volcanism than in a normal rift setting. These circumstances have drawn volcanologists and other geologists to the island for decades; now, with the help of my advisor, Sheila Seaman, and my great friend and field assistant, Brianna Force, I hope to add my small piece to the geologic puzzle that is Iceland. Work will consist of mapping and collecting of rock samples. A key goal that I have made for myself is to be able to identify individual lava flows within the complex; this will require very meticulous mapping.

The field area is in North-Central Iceland, just to the southwest of the city of Akureyri. It is an 8-9 million year old volcanic complex that spans a region roughly 35 km by 20 km and has been dissected by past glacial growth and movement.
-Jason