This is an "educational tour" on the Kverkjojull glacier. Glaciers move and change continuosly, even more in this global warming age, so it will not probably be possible to follow the GPX track on the next years. By the way, we strongly advice you not to go on a glacier if you are not correctly equipped or to go with a guide as we did, even if this meant a 70 euros per person fee (more or less).

The excursion started infront of the glacier, where melting ice streams flow. First part of the ascent is on dirty ice, but we are going to find many interesting elements.

Crevasses: the guide explained us that their formation depends on folds of the ice under the surface, as if you bend a piece of modeling clay: on the extending side of the clay you'll see some little cracks. Blue color inside crevasses is due to ice purity. When air starts to go inside the ice, the blue begins to vanish and the ice will turn white.

Melting streams: of course, ice melts for the sun and for the increasing temperature. These streams dig the glacier surface bringing with them all the volcanic ash that was inside the ice.

Black ash accumulations: they seem big sand clusters, but indeed there is ice under the thick ash layer. The ash was left there by a former surface melting stream, insulating the ice from melting. This also means than once the glacier thickness was at least till the top of the black cone: melting process speed is impressive.

Even if the path seem simple, the guide tells us to watch out for dangers like crevasses, in special way to some cracks partially hidden by the snow.

We walked for 3,5 km on the ice, the tour lasted more than 3 hours. Not cheap but it was educational and funny as well.

• Download track in KML format!
• Download track in GPX format!