If I were painting a picture of a volcanic crater with a lake in the bottom, if I hadn’t visited Iceland and seen Kerið then it would never occur to me to paint the sides of the crater red, and the pool bright blue, especially if it was a dreary, grey, misty day. I think I would have thought the water would be murky and dark and dangerous looking, oily and menacing; I think i would have imagined the volcanic sides to be black and grey, like burnt bones.
Kerið is in the Grímsnes area of Iceland, down in the south; its actually a caldera not a crater, which is what happens when a volcano collapses in on itself, when the magma chamber is empty. This caldera is about 180 foot deep, about 560 foot wide, and about 890 foot across – pretty impressive!
I visited Kerið nearly two years ago, and hope that maybe I’ll be able to visit on my next trip to Iceland. I have photos of it, but I would just like to see again that brilliant blue water, those fiery cliffs and the brilliant lichens almost glowing even on the most horrid day!
Lois Elsden 