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Geldingadalur eruption over dusk


Pictures are at the bottom...

31 March, 2021

It was time to go back to the eruption. But this time, in the evening, to see it across dusk.

Bjarni and Lee came with me this time, we'd all been separately on the same day last time, and all motivated to see the changes. And changes there have been! It's really filled in now, and is nowhere near as friendly. There's no low lava running smoothly over grass you can "play with" it's just got some big walls of lava in bottom of the valley, that regularly tumble down. Not nearly the sort of plaything it was last week!

But still super awesome to just watch it spout and spit!

We walked around the north side as far as we were allowed, (turned back due to gas concerns, though honestly, the gas was far worse in a little pocket people were loitering in below at the time) to see some different angles, and see how the two craters are so different. One, the southern one, is the remnant of the cinder cone from last week, and is still busy just pouring lava out, while the other, the northern, is now much bigger, and cheerily spitting and spurting fireworks.

We relaxed, ate, watched, and then, like everyone else, it was time to head home again. We had chosen to take route B, which we highly recommend. It's not really meaningfully longer, maybe 500m or so, has _substantially_ less traffic, and really just felt easier to us. It _does_ have harder route finding at night, as there's less traffic, but it's also got sticks, with reflectors. It's probably a bit windier as it's higher, but not by much.

Next time, I want to get properly around the north and east sides, ideally to watch it flow out into Meradalur.