{"id":38850,"date":"2026-05-25T00:00:00","date_gmt":"2026-05-25T07:00:00","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/community.nrs.com\/duct-tape\/?p=38850"},"modified":"2026-05-12T13:04:08","modified_gmt":"2026-05-12T20:04:08","slug":"jokulsa-a-fjollum-part-ii-eyrarros-where-we-should-be","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/community.nrs.com\/duct-tape\/2026\/05\/25\/jokulsa-a-fjollum-part-ii-eyrarros-where-we-should-be\/","title":{"rendered":"J\u00f6kuls\u00e1 \u00e1 Fj\u00f6llum Part II: Eyrarr\u00f3s & Where We Should Be"},"content":{"rendered":"

We come through another canyon, and the dark grey volcanic rock walls begin to open up. The landscape becomes a vast grey\/black gravel desert, with craters, lava boulders, mountains in the distance and almost no vegetation. The rumble and mist ahead are sure signs that it is time to find an eddy so we can get out and scout. We wander across an open expanse in the direction of the thundering sound; the river has broken into many channels, each dropping through jagged and narrow slots of rock.<\/span><\/p>\n

Anxious laughter spreads through the group, and we describe the view as we have so many times already: \u2018this could be the moon\u2019. But it\u2019s not just a metaphor. When Ragga, our wonderful shuttle driver, dropped us off at the river\u2019s source earlier this week, she told us astronauts have trained for moon landings in the area.<\/span><\/p>\n

Apollo astronauts once trained in the Askja caldera, just south of where we are, and more than 50 years later, the Artemis II crew returned to the volcanic deserts of Vatnaj\u00f6kull National Park to do the same. It was as much a fun fact from Ragga as it was a warning: her attempt to describe a place so stark and stripped of life warranted comparison to another world.<\/span><\/p>\n

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(C) Steven Walker<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

It is mid-portage that I catch the guys putting their boats down to crouch low over a tiny spec of colour forcing its way through the black sand. The small flower they\u2019ve gathered around is the eyrarr\u00f3s\u2014the \u2018Arctic River Beauty\u2019, a willowherb with thin stems and soft pink petals that blooms in summer months before the winds and weather tear them away. The eyrarr\u00f3s was a strong candidate for Iceland\u2019s national flower.<\/span><\/p>\n

Here, on the banks of the J\u00f6kuls\u00e1 \u00e1 Fj\u00f6llum, the existence of something so delicate feels almost impossible. It grows only where glacial rivers deposit thin fans of silt, on the fragile and dynamic edge between water and desert. And on this river, that edge is almost always changing. As it gets blown around in the wind, it is holding on in a place never meant to support such a soft form of life, or, heck, <\/span>any<\/span><\/i> form of life for that matter.<\/span><\/p>\n

We stand up and dust the black sand from our knees, suddenly aware of how strange we must look out here. Three paddlers in brightly coloured GORE-TEX suits, contrasting against the washed-out greys of ash, rock and sand. We are just as jarringly out of place as the eyrarr\u00f3s. And as the eyrarr\u00f3s holds strong to its sliver of sand\/silt, fragile but stubborn, it\u2019s clear we are trying our very best to do the same.<\/span><\/p>\n