On March 19th, the volcano in Iceland erupted. We all were expecting one since we have been having many earthquakes shaking Reykjavik and neighboring areas for weeks prior. The shakes came from a little more than 30km away from Reykjavík, to be exact, Reykjanes peninsula, where the Blue Lagoon is settled. No one knew how big of a volcano it will be. That Friday night, we have all been informed by the media that it’s already happening! I was lucky to visit this magnificent site three times before the session, and all of the times new volcanoes opened, it just grew bigger and bigger. Lava was flowing all around the valley, creating huge lava rock barriers. Have you ever heard of cooled-moving lava rock? It sounds like breaking glass! Every time I visited the volcano, I could see the vast area around it filling with lava. We would comment - Oh, we were standing there last time, and now it's a new crater that just opened. How crazy is that! It felt that everybody forgot about the Covid and was happy about the latest thing to think of. It wasn’t something small; it was a real VOLCANO!- "backyard" volcano, as we locals say.
Only a week before the session, I received a letter from a couple in Germany. The recommendation came from our mutual friends. They have told me that they would be visiting Iceland and would like to have a wedding session here. They got married back in October, and that was their honeymoon trip. Of course, the first location that came to my mind was the hot “backyard” volcano. To get to the craters, you had to do quite a challenging hike that took around 1-1,5 hours one way. I was able to get a foldable changing booth and hope for the best weather and wind direction. On the last visit, I witnessed six craters spitting lava into the sky and admiring it from very close, sometimes way too close.
We have started our day at a beautiful lake Kleifarvatn; it was the first time Flo was seeing Kathi in the wedding dress ( she brought a different one to Iceland). So we decided to have a first look session and enjoy the beautiful Icelandic scenery.
When we got to the parking lot ( they had to make one in a field since the traffic increased dramatically, there were thousands of visitors coming to see the volcano), we met with our friends and started the hike in a warm April sun.
Expecting epic photographs when reaching the volcano site, unfortunately, we have realized that the wind was blowing all of the dangerous gases over the "epic” part I had a chance to visit before. We have decided to walk around it to get a sight of at least the lava flow and the crater. The bright mid sun was settling down, leaving us with cold northern wind and a distant warmth of the lava spitting from the crater that was barely doing any good to warm us up.
Thinking of them changing into a wedding dress and a suit left me to shiver. When we found the best and safest spot to settle, we unfolded the changing cabin, and they have started changing from hiking to wedding outfits.
A cold gust of wind was blowing into our faces leaving me with no time to think. I thought just let them become a small part of this enormous volcano and capture their experience. We had an unforgettable experience in a freezing Icelandic wind with beautifully messy hair and tears running our faces.
