Fagradalsfjall Volcano, Iceland, September 2021
Watching an active volcano is a timeless experience, where the improbable triad of reverence, awe and fear strike your heart right at the same time, quickly expanding these sensations to the rest of the body, with the whole being fused into a tingling and shivering state of surrender…
We are supposed to escape from these places, as they create unfortunate destruction in so many locations, but conditions in Iceland were near perfect to witness with security the birth of new earth rising from the core of the planet.
I spent three weeks in Iceland in July completely obsessed with the possibility of watching the hypnotizing flow of lava, the sight of glowing earth blood running out of a crust wound, attempting to reach a new balance of pressure and harmony.
I partially succeeded in my attempt, being able to film and photograph a highly active caldera with my drone, as well as film some extremely intense lava rivers under harsh mid-day light, melting the bottom of my surviving drone. It was not perfect, but I could not ask for more, as I felt each moment as a blessing, despite the intense physical exhaustion, body aches, sleep deprivation, strong winds and all those “comfortable” things Iceland is so fond of.
I went home with my soul filled with memories, not only of the volcano, but also of so many other landscapes, especially the magical highlands and their eternal barren enchantment.
After a very tiring 18 hours flight return, normal life resumed abruptly, with patient care getting more intense than ever, with requests coming from everywhere, emotional victims of covid and of so many life issues. The frantic rhythm of everyday life has the strange capacity of quickly turning those sacred moments you have experienced a few days before into a surprisingly distant memory, as if that volcano happened in another life, another time, another dimension.
During the night, after each hard day of work, I found myself repeating the strange ritual I had learned in Iceland: checking the live feeds of the volcano, searching for new activity reports, reading the live chats filled with geology enthusiasts, watching the seismographs. Why was I still doing that? Why was the connection with this place so strong, to the point of me feeling the need to keep it alive beyond the trip itself?
I entered a new period of vacations in the first quarter of September, where I would finally have my first non-photographic vacations of the last 5 years. I promised myself I would stay those two weeks in a quiet place, reading books, meditating, enjoying the slow pace of calm life, but yet I could not avoid regularly checking the live feeds of the volcano everyday. On the first week of vacation the volcano had entered a fully dormant state, meaning a potential end of its activity, which triggered in me an ambivalent feeling of uneasiness and, at the same time, of comfort, as having no choice is often much better than having two difficult choices to make.
The first vacation days passed by, and the thought of returning to Iceland continuously crossed my mind, but with the volcano dormant it would make no sense at all to go through such a financial and physical burden. I decided to set a final deadline to decide if I would consider returning – Sunday 12th September -, right at the middle of the vacations, hoping there would be no need to decide anything, and just use my spare time to focus on finally preparing my past summer milky way images and my July Iceland photos.
Since all my entire life and relationship with Nature has been filled with experiences of transcendence, surprise but also of sacrifice, I should have seen it coming. This time it would be no exception and, after 9 days being dormant, I checked the live feeds on the 12th September, after waking up, and the volcano had re-awaken with full force!
The next 18 hours transformed into an unstoppable turmoil of 300km travelling during the night, unpacking the warm weather luggage and re-packing everything for Iceland, getting all the gear ready, purchasing almost-unavailable flight tickets, establishing rental car partnerships, getting the endless covid documentation, doing covid rapid tests, and so many other details, but we made it!
And so we spent one more unexpected week in Iceland, most of the time parked in the volcano nearby parking camps, dealing with the usual extremely unstable weather, doing the riskiest drone flights ever, experiencing an unforgettable spectacle of lava right on the first night, getting worried with toxic fumes and having extreme difficulty in finding the way back during the night.
These trips are usually 90% sweat and exhaustion, but the other 10% are made of something that words cannot explain, in this case an ineffable sense of communion with this vibrant place, filled with travelers from all over the world, as fascinated as us with the display of power of our planet. During these days we were privileged witnesses of defining moments of transformation of the soil we step and take for granted, witnesses of a phoenix being reborn right in front of us…