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The Lake Valley
is well vegetated and prosperous looking. The valley’s first settler
was Ingimundur the Old. A grove there is dedicated to his daughter,
Thordis, who was the first native of the Huna District. The eastern
slopes bear witness to many landslides, which have shaped the
landscape and taken many lives over the centuries, just like the
avalanches.
The mouth of
the valley is dotted with a cluster of mounds and hillocks, which are
one of three natural phenomena considered innumerable in this country.
A landslide at the end of the ice age created them. It dammed up the
valley and a lake was created. This lake gradually disappeared when
its discharge carved deeper through the new landscape and a much
younger landslide created the present lake in the valley in 1720. The
total area of the hillocks is about four km˛.
The northernmost part of it, just north
of road # 1, is called Thristapar, or The Three Hummocks, where the
last execution in Iceland took place in 1830. Two young people, a man
and a woman, committed arson, and two men lost their lives in the
fire. The delinquents were beheaded, their heads put on stakes and
their bodies buried on the spot. Their bodies were moved and reburied
in consecrated ground in the 20th century. Both the axe and
the block are on display in the National Museum in the capital. River
Vatnsdalsa and the lake are renowned for trout, char, and salmon
fishing.
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