Ever wanted to see 400 feet inside the belly of a volcano?

By Maria Kyriacou

Image: The Volcano
Image: The Volcano
A tour of the Thrihnukagigur volcano in Iceland lets thrill-seekers see a rare sight - just as long as you're not afraid of heights!

Iceland is famous for its breathtaking landscapes, fjords and having a higher number of erupting volcanos than most parts of the world.

Now it’s also gaining attention due to an incredible volcano tour, only 25 minutes from the centre of Reykjavík. Intrepid explorers can enter right into the Thrihnukagigur volcano’s belly, but it’s not as scary as it seems with the chance of an eruption being very slim. It’s been 4000-years since the dormant volcano erupted.

The volcano’s name translates directly as ‘Three Peaks Crater’. So what can you expect inside? The beauty of the crater mostly consists in the various colourations found inside it and its incredibly expansive size. 

The heart of a volcano is known as the magma chamber, as it is there that the liquid rock lies waiting to find its way to the surface, resulting in a volcanic eruption.

The Thrihnukagigur volcano differs to most, because the magma in the chamber seems to have disappeared, believed to have solidified in the walls or perhaps retreated deep into the earth.

Haraldur Sigurdsson, volcanoist, explaines it like this:

 “Thrihnukagigur is unique (…) It’s like somebody came and pulled the plug and all the magma ran down out of it”

The affordable tour  takes around 4-5 hours as you need to hike for approximately 3km each way to reach the 40-minutes of quality time you’ll spend within the actual volcano. Entering via the 12-foot entrance, visitors will need to don a hard-hat with light, and steel themselves for a 400 feet drop which takes about six minutes.

Photos are allowed (- to prove you were deep inside a volcano!) followed by some well-earned traditional Icelandic soup, tea or coffee.

 

Would you like to see the inside of a volcano?

 

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