{"id":85171,"date":"2014-01-02T19:00:21","date_gmt":"2014-01-02T19:00:21","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.golf1.is\/?p=85171"},"modified":"2014-01-02T20:11:31","modified_gmt":"2014-01-02T20:11:31","slug":"the-weather-in-iceland-and-icelands-natural-phenomena-on-golfcourses","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.golf1.is\/en\/the-weather-in-iceland-and-icelands-natural-phenomena-on-golfcourses\/","title":{"rendered":"The weather in Iceland and Icelands natural phenomena on golfcourses"},"content":{"rendered":"

It is of interest to any Icelander to know how the rest of the world perceives Iceland. What on earth comes to mind in the minds of foreigners when they think of Iceland?\u00a0 Having lived abroad (a.o. in Germany, the US and France) and travelled quite a bit in the world, my foreign friends have always asked me whether it isn\u00b4t terribly cold in Iceland?…\u00a0 just going by the name of the country.\u00a0 Some had even acquired more knowledge stateing they knew that Iceland was \u201egreen\u201d and Greenland \u201eicy.\u201d\u00a0 True.<\/p>\n

\"Is<\/a>

Hmmm? Is Iceland green? Here: Iceland seen during wintertime from space<\/p><\/div>\n

Alas, Iceland is not green all year round.\u00a0 We, Icelanders can thank Heaven for the gulf stream that encircles our beloved country and keeps the climate here temperate. We don\u00b4t get terribly cold winters nor terribly hot summers.\u00a0 It\u00b4s known to snow heavily in wintertime especially in the northern and western part of the country and we do get temperatures below 0\u00b0C, but quite recently Icelanders are experiencing seasons, for example long autumns \/ (i.e. falls for my American friends) although the short spring here always seems to fade into summer.<\/p>\n

Apart from what conclusions can be drawn from the name of the country, what springs to mind when one thinks of Iceland?<\/p>\n

\"Iceland<\/a>

Iceland is rightly called the island of fire and ice. Here the from the erruption of Eyjafjallaj\u00f6kull in 2010.<\/p><\/div>\n

Most people know after the \u201eEyjafjallaj\u00f6kul-incident\u201d that Iceland has alot of volcanos (to be exact 30 active volcanic systems, of which 13 have erupted since the settlement of Iceland in 874 AD.).<\/p>\n

\"Masses<\/a>

Masses of ash from Eyjafjallaj\u00f6kull stopped airtraffic all over the world in 2010.<\/p><\/div>\n

Eyja – fjalla – j\u00f6kull (lit.: Island – Mountain – Glacier) which could be translated something in the direction of the Glacier of Islandmountains erupted in 2010 and spewed large amounts of volcanic ash in the sky, which stopped airtraffic in Europe for weeks. Eyjafjallaj\u00f6kull, like its name suggests (the j\u00f6kull in the end meaning glacier) has a relatively small volcano (Icelandic standard)\u00a0 underneath its icecap. People all over Europe and the world for that matter were trying to pronounce this strange name \u201eEyjafjallaj\u00f6kull\u201d and many funny versions appeared, much to the delight or also dismay of Icelanders.<\/p>\n

OK – so far we now that it\u00b4s not so cold in Iceland, but not too warm either. Iceland has volcanos and hence alot of lava fields and glaciers (about 11.1% of the country is covered by glaciers and ice-caps and it has the largest glacier in Europe: Vatnaj\u00f6kull (lit.: The Glacier of Waters).<\/p>\n

Apart from the contrasts volcanos (fire) and glaciers (ice) – Iceland is known as the land of fire and ice – it is known for another contrast its cold, beautiful waterfalls (if you count all sizes it\u00b4s impossible to guess the real number) and it\u00b4s extremely hot geysirs (around 800). Geysir in Haukadal is by far the most famous hot spring and \u201cThe Golden Waterfall\u201d\u00a0 (in Icelandic: Gullfoss) in close vicinity the most beautiful waterfall.<\/p>\n

\"On<\/a>

On the 7th fairway a par-3 hole of Me\u00f0aldals golf course in \u00deingeyri in the western part of Iceland you\u00b4ll find a waterfall right on the golf course (which is a 9 hole one). Photo: BB<\/p><\/div>\n

Now on a golf website why would anyone talk about the weather and natural phenomena such as volcanoes, glaciers, waterfalls and geysirs?<\/p>\n

Because, perhaps unlike any other country in the world golf in Iceland can be enjoyed in exciting settings near these 4 types of natural phenomena. In some cases they even play a key role.<\/p>\n

Volcano<\/strong>: Hvaleyrin, Oddur og Vestmanna-Islands, Hella, V\u00edk. From the Hella golf course you see the majestic vulcano Hekla. In the other golf courses mentioned you play in lava fields.<\/p>\n

\"From<\/a>

From the Geysir golfcourse in Iceland. You can see the geysir Strokkur spout in the background. The golf course which is a 9 hole one right by the world famous Geysir is unique for many reasons, \u00a0it\u00b4s challenging and a good exercise in pin point golf. You\u00b4ve got to stay on the fairways – you\u00b4re lost if you\u00b4re in the rough. Photo: Golf 1.<\/p><\/div>\n

Geysir<\/strong>: Geysisv\u00f6llur, GG, GHG.<\/p>\n

Glacier<\/strong>: G<\/strong>olf Club H<\/strong>\u00f6fn \u00ed H<\/strong>ornafir\u00f0i \u00a0(abbreviated: GHH) From GHH\u00b4s Silfurnesv\u00f6llur (literally: the Silver Peninsula Golf Course) there is a beautiful view on Vatnaj\u00f6kull, the largest glacier in Iceland and the one glacier covering the largest area in Europe (approximately 8% of Iceland)<\/p>\n

Waterfall<\/strong>: Fl\u00fa\u00f0ir – Me\u00f0aldalsv\u00f6llur – Ja\u00f0arinn\/Lundsv\u00f6llur\/H\u00fasav\u00edk\/\u00c1sbyrgi \u00a0– in some of the mentioned golfcourses you drive past some of Iceland\u00b4s most beautiful waterfals or are in the vicinity of them. Only on Me\u00f0aldalsv\u00f6llur in the western part of Iceland, there actually is a waterfall right on the golfcourse!<\/p>\n

Ragnhei\u00f0ur J\u00f3nsd\u00f3ttir, Editor in Chief Golf1.is<\/em><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

It is of interest to any Icelander to know how the rest of the world perceives Iceland. What on earth comes to mind in the minds of foreigners when they think of Iceland?\u00a0 Having lived abroad (a.o. in Germany, the US and France) and travelled quite a bit in the world, my foreign friends have always asked me whether it isn\u00b4t terribly cold in Iceland?…\u00a0 just going by the name of the country.\u00a0 Some had even acquired more knowledge stateing they knew that Iceland was \u201egreen\u201d and Greenland \u201eicy.\u201d\u00a0 True. Alas, Iceland is not green all year round.\u00a0 We, Icelanders can thank Heaven for the gulf stream that encircles our Read more<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":3,"featured_media":85173,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"_exactmetrics_skip_tracking":false,"_exactmetrics_sitenote_active":false,"_exactmetrics_sitenote_note":"","_exactmetrics_sitenote_category":0,"footnotes":"","_links_to":"","_links_to_target":""},"categories":[7],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-85171","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-news","cat-7-id"],"acf":[],"views":2094,"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.golf1.is\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/85171","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.golf1.is\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.golf1.is\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.golf1.is\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/3"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.golf1.is\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=85171"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.golf1.is\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/85171\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.golf1.is\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/85173"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.golf1.is\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=85171"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.golf1.is\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=85171"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.golf1.is\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=85171"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}