Jul 24
The first half of our summer ended when our team of long-term volunteers and second group of 2-week volunteers recently completed their projects.
The team gathered for a last evening together at the Langidalur base camp before heading home. We would like to thank everyone who joined us, for their hard work and for coping with all that rain! We hope you are all now adjusting to life back home with dry feet, hot showers and real beds… We miss you all!
This week we have been training our volunteer team leaders and preparing them for the season ahead.
Five leaders from our operations team joined us for a week of induction and training which included helping to set up the Langidalur base camp and organise food and equipment for the teams arriving in June. The group tent is now up, the hut is ready and the new drying room is nearing completion. The Langidalur base camp is now ready for business!
The leaders course was organised and presented by Tony Newby and hosted by Ferðafélag Íslands at Langidalur. Tony helped to establish our training programme last season and has a long history of training volunteer team leaders in both the UK and Iceland. The course has been developed specifically for our programme and it addresses the challenges faced by our team leaders and volunteers, living, working and hiking in the area through the summer months.
Now we are ready…
Our first volunteers arrived in Thórsmörk last week to help with preparations at the Langidalur base camp. The team included EVS (European Voluntary Service) volunteers from the Hafnafjöður Scouts who joined for the first time this season. As well as general repairs at the camp, work included setting up a new composting system, planting a few birch trees and painting our hut – inside and out (they were also very good at lighting the campfire!).
The team had a chance to explore the area and help begin this season’s GIS data collection as we continue our work extending the pathfinder mapping project throughout the area. After ten days alone at the Langidalur camp it was good to have some company – Thank you to everyone who came to help!
Now we can start the summer…
Our weekend pre-summer planning meeting recently took place at Monkton Wyld Court, a sustainable community in Dorset, UK. It was our first activity outside Iceland and the aim of the meeting was to gather together people who will be joining us this summer, to answer questions and explain our plans. We were able to catch up with old friends as well as get to know some of the volunteers who will be joining us in Thórsmörk for the first time this season. We were also able to finalise details of the leaders training week that will take place in Thórsmörk in May. The last stages of preparation for volunteers joining us this season will take place in our forum; Langidalur.is.
Our meeting took the form of a weekend of practical conservation and organic gardening. On Saturday our work included cutting willow, clearing out a stream and processing fire wood. On Sunday the team worked in the gardens, digging and preparing for potatoes and experimenting with the harrow. We do hope that experiencing the human harrow team didn’t put anyone off too much, and we look forward to seeing everyone again this summer in Thórsmörk.
We would like to thank the community at Monkton Wyld Court for hosting the meeting, for their support and friendship, and for the extremely good food!
More pictures from the weekend.
Although our friends in the north might not feel it yet, summer is most definitely on the way!
We are now only about 4 week away from returning to Langidalur to setup the volunteer base camp in preparation for official start of the 2014 programme planned for 20th May.
As we move into our fieldwork season, we need to complete the registration process for everyone intending to join us this summer. Once we are back out on the trails, communications can be difficult (we don’t leave anyone behind in the office) so we ask all our returning volunteers to complete the registration process by 18th April.
Don’t miss your chance!
Thórsmörk Trail Volunteers 