Ásbyrgi

Ásbyrgi is a horseshoe of sheer rock in the far north of Iceland: a canyon about 3.5 km long and more than 1 km wide, closed at its southern end by cliffs that rise as high as 100 metres around a floor of birch and willow woodland. Down the middle of the open half runs Eyjan, "the island", a rock ridge some 25 metres high that splits the canyon into two arms for more than half its length and gives a view over the whole curve from its top.

Its shape looks so deliberate that Norse tradition explained it as a hoofprint. According to the legend, Odin's eight-legged horse Sleipnir touched down here with one foot, and the canyon has been known as Sleipnir's footprint ever since. Geology tells a more violent story. After the last ice age, the glacial river Jökulsá á Fjöllum was swollen by catastrophic glacial floods, and the torrents carved the canyon in two main episodes, around 8,000 to 10,000 years ago and again about 3,000 years ago. The river then shifted its course and now flows about 2 km to the east, leaving Ásbyrgi dry, with only a small pond, Botnstjörn, at the foot of the innermost cliffs.

That sheltered pocket has made the canyon one of the greener corners of north Iceland. Native birch and willow grow on the floor, joined between 1947 and 1977 by plantings of spruce, larch and pine, and Botnstjörn attracts a variety of waterfowl. Ásbyrgi forms part of Vatnajökull National Park, in its northern section around the gorge of Jökulsá á Fjöllum, the same river that drops over Dettifoss further upstream.

Getting there

Ásbyrgi lies about 38 km east of the town of Húsavík and roughly 81 km in a straight line from Akureyri, the largest town in north Iceland. The canyon sits on the road loop known as the Diamond Circle. The nearest airport on a map is Grímsey Airport (GRY), about 90 km away on an island off the coast; the main airport for the region is Akureyri Airport (AEY), from which the road runs east via Húsavík.