Thorsmork

Jean Goldfine - Riding in Iceland

Dukka is moving very fast, doing the flying pace in front of a herd of 20 loose horses. I feel the side to side movement of the pace, and I know now why it is called flying. Four other riders are with me, keeping the herd from passing us in the flat river valley. Behind the herd, other riders keep the horses moving. Dukka is a black Icelandic mare, and under her blowing thick mane, white runic letters freeze-burned into her hair tell her age and what farm she comes from. When I think about my Thorsmork trip, this is the first scene I remember, flying along the river valley with the herd pushing up behind, sometimes a big chestnut horse with his head stretched forward almost passing us until I steer Dukka in front of him.

I've wanted to go on the Thorsmork trip in Iceland for three years. My first trip to Iceland was in May, 2001. The Thorsmork dates didn't work for me, so I took another four day riding tour, the Snorri Sturleson Saga Tour. I was hooked on Iceland. I fell in love with a horse, of course. Her name is Skessa. She is the prettiest little dun mare, delicate and gentle. On Skessa, I first felt the tolt. Black-and-decker, black-and-decker, black-and-decker. That is how the hoofbeats sound in tolt.

For May, 2002, I signed up for the Thorsmork tour, flew to Iceland, and arrived at Vellir, the home farm for Eldhestar, the tour company. A tall Viking of a man, Hrodmar, one of the owners of the company, asked me to come into his office. In my jet-lagged state, I imagined the worst, bad news from home. So I was almost relieved when he told me that I was the only one signed up for the tour. They could not run it just for me, so they proposed to take me out riding with shorter tours and keep me busy for the four days. I did get to ride for hours a day and again, of course, fell in love with a horse. Sturdy Strakur, an ivory colored gelding, took me up a mountain and across a river. I thought he had the softest footfall of any horse I'd ever sat on. He tolted as if he were just barely touching the ground, and he had a fine canter too.

Finally, in June 2003, I was on my way to Thorsmork. This trip was planned with a day of horse shopping before the tour. It was time to bring an Icelandic horse home to Swanville. But that day is a story in itself. On June 17th, I was back in Vellir, eating dinner with the other six riders on the tour. There was a young German couple, two English women about my age (don't ask) who own horses and had come to Iceland for their first trip, and a Danish woman who had brought her 13 year old niece for the tour. Our tour guide was Suzanne, a Swedish high school teacher who guides tours for Eldhestar all summer. Suzanne told us that she was a little tired because she and three of the other staff had taken 50 horses over the mountain the night before. They left about nine in the evening, each riding a horse and driving the herd. They got back to Vellir at about three in the morning. Remember, it's light all night in Iceland in the summer. Why, we asked, had they done this trip? For fun, and to exercise a lot of horses at once, she replied. This is what they do for fun in Iceland.

By 10 the next morning, we were at another farm, Skalakot, where our horses were milling around a corral waiting to be tacked up. Icelandic horses don't mind bumping up against each other, and don't kick . My first horse was Yurp, a bay mare who pulled hard on the reins. But I loved feeling the tolt again, and she moved nicely. We were near the sea on the south coast of the country, and the guides riding in front turned their horses right out to sea. We followed, and I, at least, was thinking that the lead riders had gone crazy. The horses splashed through the salt water, making a tremendous noise as they plunged their legs into the water. What on earth are we doing? I thought. The word lemmings came to mind. Then in the distance, I could see a dark line. As the water got deeper, coming close to the bottom of the saddle, I began to see that there was a sand bar way out in the sea. But would we ever get there? Now the water was coming over the tops of my knee-high boots and pouring down in. Splash splash went the horses' legs. The front horses began to swim, and suddenly the lead rider said, "Too deep", and turned around. We all wheeled and headed back to shore. I wish we had made it to the sand bar, because it must be very good riding there. Suzanne said that several times a year it gets too deep to get there. We stopped to pour the water from our boots when we got back to shore, then tolted off towards a waterfall and a glacier.

Thorsmork means Thor's Woods. Mainers might get the wrong impression from the name. Yes, there are actually trees in Thorsmork, but they are small birches, not much taller than a man, and not many of them. The area is a national park, and we rode there for two days, spending the nights in a comfortable bunk house. I think Thor, the god of thunder and lightning, noticed us the first afternoon we arrived. We rode into a narrowing gorge, then up a cleft in the rocks. The cleft got more and more narrow, and finally the guides held the horses as we climbed up between overhanging, dripping rocks, where water tumbled down from the glaciers above. Just then, a thunder clap sounded, then another. Thunder is rare in Iceland, because it comes when clouds of different temperatures meet and boom against each other. In Iceland, the clouds are usually all equally cold.

I always remember the horses I ride in Iceland, and write down their names. One horse I liked was Laufi, a white "no leg" horse. Icelanders ride with their calves off the horses sides, and some Icelandic horses don't like it when tourists ride with calf. Suzanne told everyone who rode Laufi that they would love his gaits, but to keep their calf off him. All the riders did praise his gaits, but I saw him scoot forward frequently as riders forgot and put leg to his side. When my turn to ride him finally came, I was proud to give him an afternoon with not a single scoot forward. He is the horse in the picture above, with a glacier in the background. Look at my smile to see how much fun he was to ride.

Over four days of riding together, the people in the tour get to know each other and enjoy the long, light evenings. Suzanne took us on a walk the first evening in Thorsmork, up over a saddle of hills and onto a ridge that gave us views of two glaciers. We ended the walk on an outcropping of rock over the cabin, singing every song we could think of that we all knew. Amazing that Germans, Swedish and Danes all know "Clementine" and "Home on the Rang"". I taught them "Here We Sit like Birds in the Wilderness".

The riding tours are my kind of fun. I like to be outside all day, and on a horse for 4 or five hours of it. I like the sound of the winnowing snipes circling overhead, the wind and clouds, the cool air and geothermal hot pots to relax in after the day outside. In the late afternoon, Icelanders have a snack time, with cookies, tea, coffee, hot chocolate, and a strange orange drink. On our tour it was a time to relax and compare notes on the horses we had ridden, and to recommend horses for the next day. Even though I have my own Icelandic horse now, I still must go back to Iceland next June. I may take the Krysuvik tour. Want to come along?

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