TÜRKISBLAUES WASSER TRÄGT SCHWARZE SEDIMENTE MIT // TURQUOISE WATER CARRIES BLACK SEDIMENTS WITH IT My display is flashing, during the night the mobile phone received a weather warning from the police via SMS. Although I have had no contact with the police so far… How did they get my number? I’m not in China! Warning of severe winter weather. And while I’m still wondering which artificial intelligence is caring for me, snow falls from the sky as if cut into thick slices. It becomes difficult to keep the car on the ring road. Huge snowploughs come out of the dark towards me at a brisk pace, pushing the masses of snow off the road in a high arc. There is only one thing to do: return to Reykjavík! With the snowstorm behind me – the rear window wiper stirs ineffectively in the white – the kilometres to the capital seem to take a dangerous eternity. The traffic lights on the outskirts of the city show orange flashing lights. The ring road – out of town – is closed due to icy roads and snowfall, all routes through the interior – my mobile phone also announces this – cannot be cleared. Those who drive anyway risk high fines and rescue costs, those who get snowed in in their cars have to freeze. Two days later. We set off again. The snow has stopped falling. The white landscape just lies there quietly until the horizon. I make good progress again, strong wind has blown the snow off the road. The heavy cruiser with spikes runs like on rails, easily climbing the uphill stretch. The plan to circumnavigate Iceland counter-clockwise takes a week with stops in between. This is what most individual tourists do, enjoying one series of scenic attractions after another. Cruise ship passengers who get little time for a shore excursion are tempted by the »Golden Circle« with a selection of highlights that can be covered in just one day: Waterfall, Glacier Lagoon, geysers. Landmannalaugar lies in the uninhabited inland. The inland highlands, dotted with countless craters, are protected by the National Park. The heavy off-road vehicle works its way like a turtle over gravel roads. The drive is a constant up and down, abruptly rounding steep bends; where does the lane, which no vehicle is allowed to leave, run behind the next hill? The Icelandic sky stretches far and wide over the seemingly endless glacier and a medium or normal-sized lake until it meets the sea, a volcano or a mountain. Suddenly a river appears in front of the windscreen as we drive down into the valley. The sun has already sunk behind the ridge of a once exploded, slowly eroding volcano. The panorama, which had been indescribably colourful just a short time before, quickly shrinks into a black moonscape. Rejecting, dark and wild. SMS FROM THE POLICE read more 40
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