Tag: Iceland

Our first day on the road!

After a leisurely morning of finishing our packing, having a buffet breakfast and taking photos of some of Reyjkavik’s very active street art scene, we grabbed our trusty steed (a brand new Suzuki Vitara) and hit the road!

Today was all about The Golden Circle – 4 landmarks that are often done in a (very long) day. Unfortunately, one of the biggest attractions, The Blue Lagoon, had major issues with the water pipes and as such, had a 4hr waiting time! Needless to say, we didn’t hang around and hope to do this at the end of our trip now instead.

We pushed on and drove to an important landmark for various reasons in Iceland – Thingvellir National Park. It’s the home of Iceland’s first parliament set up by the vikings in the 900s and it’s also the meeting place for the European and North American tectonic plates which are slowly separating. 

   

   
Next on our list was the home of the original geyser, Geyser! There’s a bunch of very active geysers with one going off every 10 minutes or so. 

 

  
 
The whole Golden Circle has so many vantage points for incredible scenery – Autumn was clearly an ideal time to come with the colour of the leaves and folliage.

 

 
Last on the list, but by no means least, was Gullfoss Waterfall. Absolutely spectacular waterfall with a massive drop and spilling tonnes of water every second. It’s impressive just how close you can get to the waterfalls without the enormous barricades we’re used to back home…

   
  

 
Tonight we’re staying at an AirBnB place in Vik, South Iceland. From our last Golden Circle stop, it was about a 2.5hr drive. We turned that into a lot longer drive as we saw some truly amazing scenery on the way. We saw a large waterfall from a distance so we stopped at that as the sun was setting…

 

  

 
And then not too much further down the road, we start to see some snow-capped mountains. Kept driving and we ask ourselves, “is that a glacier?”. Sure enough, a 5minute drive off the Ring Road and only a 10 minute walk we’re looking at Solheimajokull Glacier. It was around 7:15pm so light was fading quickly so it was a quick snap and back to the car unfortunately:

 

 
Our accommodation is fantastic. Our host is very nice & after a delicious pizza around the corner at the local restaurant, we collapse into a comfortable bed after another huge but incredibly satisfying day. 

Our first full day in Iceland! We’re staying at Hotel Fron, right in the heart of Reykjavik’s central area. This city is amazing!

Basically today was get a lay of the land kind of day…  Lots of walking around, seeing the sights and soaking in the funky architecture, cool shops and bars and eating as much of the food as possible!

Our rather large day consisted of:

• started off at an enormous church and went to the bell tower for a spectacular 360 degree view of the city
• had delicious coffee @ a cool cafe called Haiti – where they roast and grind their coffee direct from, well, Haiti
• found the well known hotdog stand and tried their produce – twas delicious! So many celebrties have eaten here, so we added ourselves to the list
• the port/harbour area and had lobster soup for lunch
• did our washing at the uber cool Laundromat Cafe and had a drink (great concept this – do your washing downstairs, go upstairs for a drink/lunch)
• checked out the Harper Concert Hall which is an amazing piece of architecture inside-and-out
• had a drink in Bunk Bar and people watched
• had dinner at a fine dining restaurant – one of the oldest buildings in Reykjavik – couldn’t bring ourselves to try the fermented shark sadly
• checked out the many cool shops along the main strips
• took photos of amazing street art and architecture

Here’s a few photos of our day!