Category: Iceland

Our final day in Iceland was bitter-sweet. The trip was fantastic, but fast. We were certainly exhausted but not ready to be back home. We joked about staying, or maybe hopping on a different plane going anywhere but back.

We let ourselves sleep in a little bit and woke up to another delicious breakfast by our host. Afterward, we packed up our stuff and started driving back West.

While driving, we saw a beautiful valley between mountains that had around 10 waterfalls flowing into it, so we turned down the gravel road to check it out.

We reached the end of the road and parked, seeing a river to hike along. After awhile we saw some steam, so we decided to go as far as that before turning around. That’s when we saw the hot pool in the ground. We stripped down and changed into our bathing suits to hop in.

The water was a bit cooler than we would have liked, so we didn’t stay in very long. We changed again and started our half hour hike back to the car. We still had a few hours until we needed to be at the airport, so we decided to take a detour to a small village called Flúðir that we had heard rumor was hiding a small hot spring of its own.

It took some searching but eventually we found a small parking lot in the middle of nowhere and decided to park and hike over the hill to see if the hot spring was there. We got over the hill and saw a river which sparked our excitement, but it was freezing. We continued on over another hill, and there it was. A beautiful, clear hot spring with steam coming from it that flowed on as a stream.  We changed back into our wet, cold suits and hopped in.

The water temperature was perfect, as were the views.

We knew we didn’t have long, so we soaked it in quickly and got back out to head on our way. We had spent more time there than I had planned, so we started rushing to the airport.

Unfortunately, our GPS got us lost in Reykjavik, causing me to enter freak-out mode. We finally found the highway we needed and sped to the airport, stopping just to gas the rental car back up.

My concern was for naught as we had no problems returning the car and making it to our air terminal before our plane took off.

Once back in the air, we bade farewell to magnificent Iceland and its blue ocean, volcanic landscape, and white mountains.

On our last full day in Iceland, we decided to venture further east, but not before having a delicious, fresh breakfast spread prepared for us by our friendly host. Local cheeses, vegetables, fresh-baked bread, smoked trout, and eggs gave us the energy to head out on the road bright and early. Our first destination was Skaftafell National Park with our first sighting of Vatnajökull glacier.

We met up with our tour guide and got crampons and an ice ax. We were given some instruction on how to hike on the glacier and awkwardly stomped our way over to it. It was a gorgeous, sunny day, and the ice gleamed all around us.

We started out a little timid, quite sure that we were going to fall and bust our faces on the ice, but eventually, we got the hang of it and started climbing up and down steeper slopes.  Our guide gave us some history on the glacier and information on how much it retreats. She took us around different crevices so that we could see blue ice and ice caves.  We spent around two hours on the ice and had an amazing time.  Hiking a glacier sounded awfully cold to us so we bundled up in multiply layers. By the end, we were melting under the sun with the ice.

We decided to continue hiking after that anyway though, this time up a large hill to Svartifoss waterfall, a waterfall set amidst basalt columns.

We had to stop to take off layers multiple times on the way up.  By the time we got to the top, I was carrying half my clothes.

We finally got back to the car and devoured some bread and cheese and red bull. Since we have been searching for northern lights every night since we got here, we have not slept much.

We trod on, heading to Jökulsárlón, the glacier lagoon.

The area was full of photographers, and I could see why. The lagoon was magical, but unfortunately, our little camera couldn’t do it the same justice.

It was silent other than the creaking of ice on ice. We crossed the street to see the contrast of ice on black sand and watch the waves crash against them.

We stood there for awhile, taking it all in, realizing this was as far as we would go in Iceland. We turned back to the car and headed back to Vik for the evening, stopping to eat dinner at a charming restaurant overlooking the sea. The raw beauty of Iceland was really hitting us, and we prepared ourselves for our farewell the next day.

My fifth day in Iceland was my favorite day.  We packed up our stuff and headed east along the south coast toward the town of Vik.  Vik is a tiny fishing village on the southernmost tip of Iceland, but there is much to see and do on the way there.

Shortly after we got out of Reykjavik, we stopped in a town called Hveragerði to fill up the car and get some bread and cheese to snack on. While there, we decided to see if the town had anything to offer. It did.

It turns out it’s a little geothermal village with a long hiking path through steam vents and rivers.  We managed to spend around two hours exploring the area and still had more to see when we decided it was time to turn back and keep on.

 

We drove through mountains and small towns, stopping to take pictures when we found something of interest, like roaring rivers.

Or Icelandic horses, which are bred to be short, sturdy, and sure-footed. And cute, obviously.

Eventually we saw a waterfall a ways down the road and decided to go take some pictures of it, too. We got closer and closer, its size and beauty becoming more apparent.  We turned down the road toward it and realized it was the waterfall Seljalandsfoss, and it was breathtaking.

Ever since I was a little girl, I’ve had this fascination with waterfalls and have always wanted to find one that I could walk behind. I’m not sure why this was so appealing to me, but it turns out it’s as amazing as I had dreamed. I spent probably 20 minutes behind the waterfall, just gazing at it and feeling its spray.

I didn’t want to leave, but other people were starting to show up and I knew we had a ways to go still. So we kept going, counting around 30 more waterfalls (mostly small ones) on our way. But then we saw Skogafoss from the road, another stunning waterfall, so we stopped in.

There were stairs that led to the top of the waterfall, so we eagerlystarted climbing. Our appreciation for how big Skogafoss was heightened pretty quickly as we had to stop and breathe for awhile about 3 times on the way up. And we’re in pretty good shape.  Eventually, we reached the top and looked down. It was beautiful.

But did we stop there? Nope, we decided we needed to climb further to get views of as much of Iceland as we could.

My feet were exhausted, but seeing miles and miles of black sand beaches in the distance kept me going.

I finally had my fill and started the journey back to the bottom.  We headed straight to our new home after this to meet our new host. He gave us some suggestions of places to check out nearby, so we headed out again to Dyrhólaey, a nature reserve up on some tall cliffs, formerly a volcanic island, to view waves and bird life. It was unreal up there. The ocean was so violent with the strongest waves I have ever imagined crashing into the cliffs, shaking them and sounding like thunder.

We could have stood there all day, but we saw a lighthouse on the top of a distant cliff and decided to try and find it.

We hopped in the car until we found a road that said “Impassable”.  It didn’t look impassable though, so we turned our little car up the steep hill and drove to the top. It was the lighthouse.

And I felt like I was on top of the world. I pretty much was.

Eventually, we headed back down to explore the ground a bit. We found a road that took us straight down to the beautiful black sand beaches of Vik.

We walked along watching the tumultuous waves crash ashore, leaving white foam behind on black sand.

The sun was setting, so we headed home for the evening.

If you go to Iceland, drive the south coast.