In memory of my friend, Vilborg Harðardóttir, journalist, who reported To the mass media
from the Vestmanna Islands about the forceful volcanic eruption which changed the landscape.
She helped me describe this event in a truthful way.
The following myth was known:
“When the bishop of Iceland would have three sons who were all clergymen,
a new volcano on The Vestman islands would come into view,
exactly the like of the one which was there already.”

Iceland is an island in the North Atlantic Ocean.
It is the farthest one, west of the other Scandinavian countries.

In fact, it is quite close to Greenland, but has a very different climate, flora and fauna.
On the map it looks like a duck. It is a republic.
Iceland is one of the most beautiful countries in the world with its blue, blue mountains,
geysers, volcanoes, glaciers, The Blue Lagoon, colorful landscapes and great differences between south and north, east and west.
Some places there are hothouses, where even bananas can be grown, due to the underground hot water springs.
Most towns, villages and many farms have natural hot swimming pools and saunas.
Almost 300 thousand people live in Iceland, so there´s plenty of space for everyone.
The climate is rather mild, yet frightful storms may at times harass the country.
The Gulf Stream that comes from Mexico Bay protects Iceland from the enormous cold of the North Pole.
The Polar Circle runs through the northernmost island.
Many tourists come to Iceland to see the Northern Lights in winter, hot springs and volcanoes and the midsummer sun dancing on the horizon.
The following is a story about a family who experienced a volcanic eruption in the south of Iceland.
They lived on the Vestman Islands which are famous from old times when pirates came and brought some of the people as slaves to North Africa,
but that´s another story.
The family in this story:
Guðrún Guðmundsdóttir, the mother,
Sigurður Jónsson the father,
their children Anna Sigurðardóttir, 8 years old
and Páll Sigurðsson, 6 years old.
Children in Iceland get their father´s first name as their surname and do not change it if they get married.
A woman keeps her maiden name when she marries.
This family had to flee from their beloved island during a great volcanic eruption in 1973.
In the south of Iceland, just off the coast, there is the green and very beautiful island “Heimaey,” – “Home Island”,-
and on the eastern side of it is the volcano “Helgafell,” which means Holy Mountain.
It is shaped like a pyramid. People in Iceland do not have to build pyramids. Earth does.
It is so peaceful out there and the sunrises so beautiful, that people used to check from their windows,
if there was a halo around the Holy Mountain.
Horses grazed there and the rising sun danced around the mountain top when the sky was clear.
In the beginning of the seventies, nobody was afraid of the Holy Mountain,
as it is a very old one and Iceland is filled with old cooled down volcanoes.
This one had not erupted since people started living on the island. Therefore, everyone felt secure.
The most dangerous volcanoes in Iceland are on the mainland, people thought.
And that´s where most of the earthquakes take place.
Anna and Páll lived with their parents Guðrún and Sigurður, on this island, in fact quite close to the Holy Mountain.
They could see it at about a mile´s distance from their bedroom windows.
Their house was a typical two storey wooden house, red and white with a balcony to the west side,
wherefrom they could see the sun go down. They could also see a good part of the south coast of Iceland.
On clear days they could see the huge volcano Hekla lying on the mainland like a sleeping ox on the horizon.
Once they had seen it erupt and it was the greatest fireworks ever, seen from their home.
Everybody felt secure on their Heimaey (Home Island) with the Atlantic Ocean all around.
They trusted the ocean would keep their island cool.
Once a year, in the early fall, there is a festival on The Vestman Islands.
Musicians, singers, dancers, reporters, photographers, people from the capital of Reykjavik, young and old, s
ailors and teachers, backpackers, all those who want to enjoy late summer on the green and beautiful Vestman Islands
come there for a long weekend when singing and dancing goes on in the light nights and days. It used to be the safest place on earth.
Then came the evening in January 1973 when most of the 5300 people living on the island were about to go to bed.
The evening had been unusually mild. In winter it is quite dark most of the time in this area, so people usually go early to bed in this dark month,
but not this night, because the atmosphere was so calm. It was as if Earth held its breath.
The harbor was filled with fishing boats because the weather forecast was bad. It is often unbelievably calm before a storm.
The snug harbor was like a cradle where white, blue, red and green fishing boats moved gently with the water.
Their first trawler was on its way from a shipyard in Japan.
Guðrún and Sigurður were having some fresh air on their balcony, before going to bed, talking about a tour to Spain,
in order to get some sun in the middle of the dark wintertime.
“I´m a bit afraid of flying that far,” Guðrún said. “It takes hours.”
Sigurður said that travelling by air was safer than driving on the roads in Iceland, where many people drive too fast and there are frequent accidents.
Anna was out with her little dog Snati, before saying good night to him in the scullery.
She was thinking about the tour to Spain. She thought she´d like to learn Spanish, but the queer thing was, that their library didn´t have any Spanish readers.
Her father had told her that the Vestman islanders live from fishing and they provide Iceland with a lot of the best fish from the great Atlantic Ocean.
So, why study Spanish?
Anna was offended.
“That´s what all people think about here – fish and fish and more fish,” she had argued.
Her father had laughed and said that, if they didn´t catch a lot of fish and turn it into delicious food for export,
they would probably not be able to own a tv, a car, or go to Spain.
“The young generation,” Sigurður said to his wife and drank the last of his tea, “wants all kinds of modern facilities,
but they couldn´t care less how lots of luxury is financed.”
“It´s time enough for them to discover that. Let them be young and carefree as long as possible,” Guðrún said.

The harbor is sheltered by the enormous cliff, – Heimaklettur- the Homecliff, where lots of sea birds have their nests.
It´s a great sport on the island to climb the cliff and take eggs from the birds. There are the seagulls, the puffins, the terns.
Sometimes eagles and falcons come in search for food and then the noise from the cliff becomes deafening.
Prancing is a great sport for children on the island. They start by swinging themselves holding on to ropes from not too high a cliff to the next one.
Anna and Páll had been playing chess that night and he had won all the time, so she was a bit sulky.
She felt she should always win because she was the eldest one. Now he was so good at playing chess, that it was increasingly hard for her to checkmate him.
While she was walking with Snati in the neighborhood, she thought about lots of things. Snati ran around, but always came back to her.
Suddenly the ground she was walking on shook and a horrible roar filled the air.
Anna became so scared, that she ran towards their house.
”Come Snati!” she called out.
The terrible roar and some fire glimpses on the horizon made her sprint so fast that she reached her home in a few minutes.
Her parents were at the door calling for her to come home.
”Where´s Snati?” Sigurður shouted.
Now the house shook and the parents ran out to see what was going on.
At the end of the airfield, they saw that a long split had opened in the ground.
A long, deep crater was filled with fire and spit huge fire tongues into the air. This was so close to Holy Mountain,
that it looked like an illuminated pyramid in Egypt, which they had seen pictures of.
“My god,” Guðrún and Sigurður both said many times as if paralyzed.
Some horses were grazing right there, where the earth had split open and they could not come to the village,
as the fire was between them and the habitation.
“A horse fell into the crater,” Páll yelled.
”Snati, come home,” Anna shouted, but Snati was nowhere to be seen.
People came running to see what was going on in this part of the village, some of them half naked,
all of them in a state of shock. – What was happening to their island? -
Huge clouds of smoke had formed above the area and the earth shook.
Fire lanes were already on the move and seemed to be heading for the village.
“Let´s pack some of our clothes and things. We have to flee,” Guðrún said and hurried into the house.
”Where´s Snati?” Anna yelled. She started going around ourside and calling Snati, but he didn´t show up.
”He´ll manage. Come in girl and find some things you want to take with you. We must leave the island,” Sigurður said and he added,
that animals are said to sense earthquakes, so Snati was probably in hiding somewhere.”
”I´m not going without Snati,” Anna cried out.
”We´ll ask someone to take care of him,” Guðrún said, while packing a suitcase full of clothes.
Sigurður drove Anna and Páll like sheep into the house, ordered them to get dressed and put their most valuable things into two bags which he gave them.
The earth shook violently.
The strange thing was that there was no panic in the village. People just walked about, in and out of their houses, some started loading trailers with suitcases, furniture, even washing machines and refrigerators. Some stood inside their houses and watched nature go amok.
A red lava river had taken shape and moved towards the village. Would it devour their homes, their church, their school, their fishing factory,
their boats and fill the harbor with lava?
The fire brigade, the police, the doctor, seamen, women and children started fleeing from one end of the island to the other.
Still there was no panic among them. In the calm of the winternight lit up by the volcano, they walked as if on a Sunday afternoon to the harbor.
What great luck that most of their fleet was at home. This was very unusual. What great luck, that the weather was so mild and calm.
It was very unusual in January. It was, as if some hand of mercy were held over them. They would be able to flee to the mainland,
if lava and ash came closer. And it did.
Anna, Páll, Guðrún and Sigurður didn´t have a boat, but they knew Steindór, the old skipper next door.
Steindór was their best friend and had often taken the children with him on small errands to the mainland.
He was one of those very old, yet ageless persons, who always keep calm and ready to help others.
He had once saved their school, when the weather was so furious that the roof of the school building was about to be ripped off by the storm
and thrown into the high waves of the Atlantic Ocean. He had arranged to fasten it down with ropes and rocks, even if standing against the storm was almost impossible.
Now he came to their house and told them to get ready. He would sail to the mainland in half an hour.
“Don´t bother about heavy things,” he said.
“Take only some clothes with you.”
His voice was stronger than the thunders from the volcano. His eyes shone in the dark.
“He´s a witch,” Anna whispered in Páll´s ear.
“A man cannot be a witch. It´s only women who are,” Páll said.
Steindór heard them and laughed so loud, that even the volcano seemed to shut up for a while.
Anna went to him and whispered:
”My dog Snati has run away. I´m not going anywhere without him. The volcano will take him, if he tries to come home.”
”Don´t worry girl,” the big man thundered. ”Snati knows better than any of us humans how to behave in this situation.
If necessary he may swim to the mainland.”
Anna cried while they drove to the harbor. They had to leave their car there.
“The rescuers will take care of our cars,” Steindór said, “so leave the keys in your car.”
He started the engine of his boat. Some of his neighbours were on the deck. It looked like Noah´s Ark,
as he had also taken his two dogs and three sheep with him. They barked and bleeted.
Gradually they moved out of the harbor, past the Homecliff and out on the strait between the island and the mainland. Everyone kept quiet, even the dogs, the sheep and the birds on the cliff. The only sounds heard were those coming from the eruption and the Holy Mountain was illuminated between two clouds of smoke.
The further they sailed away from the island, the less roars were heard, but the more beautiful was the scenery where the inner glow of the earth rose up to the sky. No machine or artificial light could produce such a fascinating sight. You feel the earth is a living being who shapes itself according to a law which all creation must bow to.
Gradually only the sound from the engine of the boat was heard. Nobody had words to describe the situation. It was beyond words.
Anna´s face was bathed in tears. She felt guilty having left Snati alone in the middle of a catastrophy.
“We have to sail to the the Thorlaks Harbor,” Steindór said. “The Reykjavik rescue force, fire brigade and social aid are ready for us. I´ve talked to them on my radio. Some buses will be available for those who want to go to Reykjavik. Others may want to stay in this village. My radio connexion now says individual homes and hotels are ready for as many as needed, both here and in Reykjavik.”
“Will we ever be able to go home again?” Anna sobbed.
“When the eruption finishes,” Steindór answered in a soft voice, but didn´t smile, so Anna sensed that this was not for sure.
“Have you heard the old warlock´s prophecy about this eruption?” Steindór asked.
“No,” the children and some of the 40 passengers on his boat said like one voice.
He paused for a long while listening to the radio news.
He was thinking about hís two storey light blue wooden house with the decorative little tower, wherefrom he could see far with his telescope.
Even if Steindór was a seaman, he was a star enthusiast and knew all the names of the stars, he could see in his telescope. Now, even he looked worried.
A local radio reporter was as close to Holy Mountain as possible and sent immediate news. Hearing what was happening on their island was almost unbearable, but they couldn´t help listening.
“Please tell us what the warlock said,” Páll pleaded.
“Well, many years ago he foresaw, that when the habitation on the island expanded beyond Hásteinn – the High Stone-, more than five thousand people lived on the island, a son of a bishop became their priest and the water hole Vilpa were propped, the island would become uninhabitable.
-This has all happened now,” Steindór said and a deep silence filled the air.
Then Steindór added: “but the warlock didn´t say for how long the island would be uninhabitable.” And he chuckled.
Steindór loved telling strange stories.
“How did he know?” Anna asked.
Steindór didn´t answer.
“How did the warlock know?” Anna repeated.
There was no answer, but there were deep lines in Steindór´s forehead and then he continued while Holy Mountain seemed to confirm his words
as a thunderous noise reached them and high tongues of fire shot into the sky.
“One of the bishop´s sons is our priest,” Steindór mumbled.
- Had their island exploded? – they all thought.
“My god,” Guðrún said.
“My god,” said all the others.
”Oh, my little dog,” Anna sighed.
Finally they arrived at he little Thorláks harbor, where a crowd of people and some buses were waiting for them.
They saw that many different fishing boats and ships were behind them, also heading for this tiny little place in the middle of night
and it seemed to be in the middle of nowhere.
It was totally dark with some huge shadows in the background which were the hills around the tiny fishing place.
Yet, they could still see the violent fire on their island.
Guðrún and Sigurður and their kids said goodbye to Steindór who was going to sail back and ferry some more people over to the mainland, if needed, if possible.
They went by bus to Reykjavik and were brought to a hotel in the middle of town. Everything was arranged, so they only had to write their names in the guest book. They were very tired, so they went to bed and slept until late in the morning.
“Gosh,” Anna said,” how cool! Look at the furniture, a leather sofa, a tv, a telephone, a big bathroom with a tub and all. I´m not going back ever.
And we don´t have to go to school. We can be tourists in Reykjavik. I´d rather stay here than go to Spain.”
“Yeah, we may as well drop that tour.
We can´t leave Iceland, while we don´t know what´s happening to our home, can we?
We have to make the best of the situation, visit museums and monuments,” Guðrún suggested. “That´s a kind of a school too, isn´t it?”
“I want to go to the hot spring baths,” Anna demanded.
“I want to go to the soccer match tomorrow,” Páll demanded.
“I´m going to see if I can be of any use in the rescue plans for our island,” Sigurður uttered a bit disappointed at his children´s lightheartedness,
but Guðrún whispered to him, that theirs was a very healthy reaction to the enormous shock of the night.
”Please find Snati,” Anna pleaded. ”I´m so afraid he may be caught by the lava.”
”Of course I´ll find him. He probably fled as far as possible from the fire,” her father answered.
They had lunch at the restaurant in the hotel. It was so strange to be struck by a catastrophe in your own country
and then be treated like royalty at one of the finest hotels in the capital. The insurance company or helping funds would pay the bill.
In the evening, they could see pictures on tv from Holy Mountain. The volcanic eruption was so vigorous that it sent streams of lava heading for the village.
“How awful,” Guðrún sighed, “it may reach our house.”
And some days later it did. The red lava stream ran slowly but surely towards the village and some days later it started consuming houses
or loading hot ash on them, so they broke down. The church stood there as if doomed, fire all around, but was spared.
“It is a miracle,” people said.
“It is a miracle,” was repeated all over the country.
However, the red hot lava headed straight for the harbour, the most valuable part of town, where the fishing factory was,
where it had taken years to create facilities for lots of work and good living conditions on the island.
Sigurður came to the hotel from a meeting with their MP, who said that all sorts of decisions had been made.
The government would provide for accommodation and daily necessities for the refugees.
A great fundraising had already started in the whole of Scandinavia to help those who had lost their homes.
Some Swedish and Finnish houses would be sent to Iceland and assembled where needed.
“We´re lucky to be a part of the Scandinavian family,” Sigurður said with tears in his eyes.
He was to join a group which would try to stop the lava flow.
“Stop the lava flow!” Guðrún almost yelled at him, as if he were crazy.
“How in the world do you think anyone can stop a lava flow?”
Sigurður was quite calm and said they would use powerful water cannons and cool the lava edges down with seawater.
They had to save the harbor and the fishing factory. If the lava filled the harbor, life on the island would be impossible, because no fish could be landed.
Sigurður´s work to save as much as possible on their island became so demanding that he moved back to the island and had to leave his family at the hotel.
Sigurður had a little cabin on Steindór´s boat.
Steindór was one of the leaders of the water cannon team. There were also forces from Reykjavik, fire brigade people and first aid specialists.
The worst thing for Guðrún and the children was watching tv and seeing how lava and ash hit their part of town.
They watched how their own house and those of the neighbours, they knew so well, just crumbled like papmache.
Stories about people´s reactions when they had to leave their homes started spreading.
A young man was in such a rush fleeing from his house, that´he left his month´s pay on the kitchen table, but took a leg of roast lamb from the oven with him to the boat.
One person had died from the poisonous vapor, that came from the new crater. He lay unawares in a basement where the poison reached him.
Guðrún decided to stop watching tv news from the destruction. It was too much, too depressing.
It would damage their belief, that one day they would be able to return to their island.
They started going to museums, galleries, cafés, the Nordic House, the university, art exhibitions, cinemas,
anything that could help lead their thoughts away from the catastrophe.
“Oh, all my good books,” Guðrún sobbed, when she turned the tv on.
“Oh, my chessboard,” Anna sighed.
”And my little Snati. He´s probably trying to find us.” She started crying.
Her mother hugged her and tried to assure her, that Snati would keep away from the burning lava.
They turned the tv off and went to the National Muesum where they spent the whole day and saw all kinds of Viking remnants,
paintings, runes and strange things from more than a thousand years ago when some refugees from Norway settled on the island.
Some say there were Irish, Scottish, Celtic refugees and monks on the island before that.
Most scholars want to believe that the Vikings from Norway were the only ones or at least the first ones.
“Anyway, we got the Sagas out of it,” Guðrún told them.
“When you go to High School, you´ll read some of the Sagas.”
One morning Sigurður called his family and said he had good news.
They thought the volcanic eruption was over now and they could go home, but no.
The news was that he had found Snati, safe and sound.
They now lived together on Steindórs boat and always when Sigurður showed him a picture of Anna,
the little dog barked somewhat like singing from happiness.
”Let me talk to him,” Anna yelled and she did and Sigurður said they had to stop this, because Snati was about to eat the phone out of sheer happiness.
The next day Sigurður called and told them to turn the tv on, because now he thought they had succeeded in stopping the lava stream by spraying it with ice cold seawater day and night. Their harbour was saved. If it stayed like this, it would even be better than before and the new lava ridge would give some extra shelter.
Two days later he came back to the hotel and told them yet another great news.
The other Scandinavian countries had raised a lot of money to help those who had lost their homes.
Some Finnish and Swedish wooden houses were on the way and some of the families who had lost their homes were to get these.
Anna and Páll liked Reykjavik. They had started going to school there. It was great.
Because of the eruption on their island their Reykjavik schoolmates found them very interesting and never got enough of the description of the night when it all started.
Yet, Guðrún and Sigurður decided to have a new house built on their Home Island, not far from where their old house had been.
They moved back a year and a half after the eruption. In the meanwhile they could live in one of the Swedish houses placed close to Reykjavik.
Their new house on Home Island was beautiful and very modern. They even had a little tower put on it, similar to Steindór´s tower.
They too were going to study stars.
Out of the windows on the east side, they could see a new mountain which had risen out of the earth during the eruption.
It had already got a name – Eldfjall – Fire Mountain. Holy Mountain and Fire Mountain stood there side by side.
Some said they symbolize Heaven and Hell.
Now these stand there like twins.
They were born by forces humankind cannot control and has to bow to.
People had to flee and wait till Earth allowed them to turn back.
When Sigurður, Guðrún, Anna and Páll landed at the harbor on their island,
they saw a little brown creature standing there with its tail waving like a welcoming flag.
Their car was there too. Steindór helped them go on land.
Snati ran into Anna´s arms. He had been staying on the boat all the time and had grown into a real big and beautiful dog.
”That dog has nearly eaten me out of my house,” Steindór said.
”I´ve made dinner for all of us though,” he added smiling.
When they entered their new house Anna and Páll gasped.
It was so beautiful with two extra rooms for them and a door to the garden.
”I can play football here,” Páll yelled and ran about in the new garden.
”Snati is going to live with me in my own room and I´m never ever going to leave him alone in danger,”
Anna said and hugged Snati.
THE END