Þingvillar national park

A þ is actually a th. So it is sometimes written Thingvillar. But I beleive ll is not pronounced how we might expect…. Its super easy to be rather lazy in Iceland. All the icelanders speak excellent english. And mainly I meet tourists in any case.

Þingvillar national park marks a very visible point of divide (separation) between the North American and Eurasian tectonic plates. The main tourist focus combines a large fissure with the historical setting of the icelandic parliment (the Alþingi) which operated here from 930 AD to 1798. So there are historic remains of booth structures which were built as shelter by visiting chieftans. It is also the place where christianity was adopted around 1000AD.

Iceland formally separated from Denmark and became a country in 1944 (slightly delayed by WW2). The ceremony of the forming of Iceland also took place place here. Iceland was also occupied by the british during the war in an effort to prevent the Naziis from taking over. They build the small city airport in Reykjavík (which is not the same as the international airport).

The land on which the Alpingi operated is sinking as the plates divide. In the last 10000 years it has dropped 40m and the plates have moved 70m appart. Since the Alþingi was formed it has dropped 4m. This means that the current lake is much closer than it would have been at the time. And already some of the history is below water
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The impressive canyon or fissure that is the main visitor focus is a simplification. There are smaller fissures everywhere and the European plate is 7 km away with a sort of no mans land plate (a microplate) in between. The nearest volcano to this rift valley has not been active for a very long time and this explains why the rift is so unusually visible.

Þingvellir is gently teaming with tourists - I guess they are neatly contained in one small corner of the park leaving the rest to quietly get on with its life.Read more