Hvalfell

Hvalfell, (848 m) tuff mountain.

On the east side of Hvalfell is the lake Hvalvatn (“Whale lake”), 160 m deep and the second deepest lake in Iceland.

There are folktales about a man who betrayed a woman of the “hidden people” by refusing to have their child christened. He was changed into a terrible whale that killed many fishermen, including two brothers whose father was a priest and a “poet of power”. He placed poetry spells on the whale forcing it to swim into Hvalfjörður, along the river at its head, up the waterfall Glymur – which brought roars of protest from the whale, and into the lake.

It is said that whale bones have been found in the lake.