Iceland's financial crisis had already tested the 41-year-old farmer's dream by driving up repayments on his bank loan. But it was a flash flood triggered by the volcanic eruption last month that devastated him.
"It was very emotional for me. You could say it broke my heart, to see it destroy my land," said Thorhallsson, using a trailer to haul away some of the tons of mud, silt and volcanic ash left behind on the field when melting glacier ice sent floodwaters racing down the mountain.
It is seemingly endless work, but Thorhallsson is stoically determined to clean up the mess. Like many other Icelanders, he's trying to salvage a better future from the wreckage of the country's recent past.
The last few years have been traumatic for this tiny North Atlantic nation of 320,000 people.
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