Iceland : Fire, Ice and Wind
Iceland is special. You won’t hear that often about a place, nor feel it. While travelling, you will see a wide range of natural and urban locations and you will like one less than another, but when you reach Iceland, you will just feel its somehow different than anything you’ve seen so far. It is the far North, “beyond the Wall”, as we used to joke before departing. It is frozen in glaciers while at the same time boiling with volcanos and geysers. It has such a diversity of natural shapes and configurations formed by a constant strong wind, rain, snow, lakes, rivers and the sea. You will love how great it all looks on the photographs; it is called a photographer’s paradise after all (especially if you are lucky enough to also catch the northers lights).
But the thing that makes Iceland so special is the simplicity and calmness of the place. It feels as if the time has slowed down and you are instantly relaxed from all the rush and craziness of our daily lives. We both felt it immediately and it wasn’t the usual relief of finally starting the long awaited vacation. It was the simplicity of the place that calms you down. There are barely any commercials or billboards on Iceland, no flashy advertising, no signs, no visuals. We realised that after walking 2 rounds around the same block trying to find the Saga museum or when driving by the famous Seljalandsfoss waterfall because nothing was pointing towards it.
To be honest, after spending a week on Iceland, we realised that there is actually no need for marketing or advertising. The island is self-sufficient, but it’s producing only one type of each product for its citizens, so you can only get what its offered – Skyr yoghurt, Rúgbrauð rye bread, salmon, Sirius chocolate etc. Limited choice, combined with sky-high prices everywhere on the island actually puts you in a situation that you just accept things as they are and enjoy the simplicity of life on Iceland. So we went with the flow, prepared home-made sandwiches, filled bottles with water (so called Icelandic champagne), packed layers of wind-stoppers and body warmers and hit the road. We had a nice big 4x4 car ready to face all weather conditions and we’ve explored the key sights in the Capital and Southern part of the island; the Golden Circle, the city of Reykjavik, series of waterfalls on the southern part of the Ring road, Jökulsárlón glacier and the Blue lagoon. Have in mind that you will need a car to move around the island (unless you book a bus tour), so before you start driving make sure you have a reliable vehicle, full gas tank and don’t forget to consult the driving regulation for Iceland, there are some tips and tricks for crossing bridges, parking against the wind and driving in the storm (Icelandair has a nice short video about it on board of their flights). Below you can find a selection of destinations we visited during a weeklong stay on the island.
Top 5 things to see on Iceland
1. The Golden Circle
Even before we arrived we knew that the Golden Circle is the one thing we shouldn’t miss on our first tip to Iceland. Favourable weather conditions allowed us to take this practical round trip of top Icelandic sights already on our first day. We started driving early in the morning to make the most of our day and stop on the extended number of sights on the circular route, starting from Þingvellir National Park, Geysir Geothermal Area, Gullfoss Waterfall, Faxi Waterfall to Kerið Crater Lake (tour buses usually limit the tours to first 3 key stops). Þingvellir National Park is located on the shore of the lake Þingvallavatn where you can explore a number of smaller waterfalls surrounded by amazing formations of volcanic cliffs and rocks. One of the submerged rifts in the park is also a location of Continental drift between Eurasian and American tectonic plate. It took us a while to hike around and come to the exact spot of the drift, but we couldn’t miss a photo opportunity with one foot on Eurasian and the other on American continent.
The Þingvellir park, literally translated Parliament plains, also hosts a seat of the first ever Icelandic parliament from the year 390. While expecting the ruins of some ancient parliament, we realised only later, when we saw the actual painting of the Parliament in the Saga museum in Reykjavik, that the assembly was held outdoor on the slopes of volcanic rocks. The Law rock - Lögberg, where the speaker was reciting laws, is now marked with the flagpole. Wondering around the park can easily take half of your day, so aware of the time constraints we continued towards the Great Geysir.
It was our first time to see geysers, so we were pretty excited to see and film the activities in the geothermal area. While there is a lot of smaller boiling mud pits, the main sight is the central geyser Strokkur who is still actively sprouting hot water up to 30 meters into the air. We loved the sight of the erupting geyser, so we stayed in the area for several erupting cyclises which occur approximately every 5-6 minutes.
We continued our tour with the visit to the great terraced Gullfoss Waterfall and the smaller Faxi Waterfall. The often neglected last stop of the Golden Circle, Kerið is a deep blue-green lake in 3000 years old volcano crater. You will need to pay for the entry (400 ISK) but it’s well worth a visit. We walked the whole round on the edge of the crater and took some great photos of contrasting blue lake, red volcanic soil and green moss. There is also a path down the crater to the surface of the lake.
We finished the whole Golden Circle in approximately 9 hours, so a full day is more than enough to see all of the sights and enjoy the surrounding nature in between the stops, from couple of frozen lakes, occasional Icelandic turf houses to wide open fields with herds of Icelandic horses.
2. Reykjavik
Reykjavik, a small and charming capital of Iceland, was our base through the whole length of our stay on the island. We were conveniently located on its northern shoreline, right next to the famous statue of the Sun voyager, which made all of main sights in the city centre accessible on foot. When staying at your friend’s place you can’t really pick the location, but in this case we couldn’t have asked for more. It was a cosy and warm apartment with amazing view over the harbour, perfect for enjoying both sunrise and sunset from a comfortable couch.
In couple of days we spent in the city itself we managed to see all of its main sights. The first thing we visited was a newly built Harpa concert hall, a modern building with impressive indoor and outdoor architecture which is lit in different colours during the night. Continuing further in that direction we headed towards the Saga museum to get to know a bit of Icelandic history. Despite being poorly advertised and visually unnoticeable, the Saga museum offers a relatively short but very efficient and amusing introduction into the history and life of the island. The storyline leads you through key historic events and introduces individuals who shaped Iceland as it is today. We enjoyed the museum very much and would highly recommend it, as it gives you a much better understanding of the country and the development of this remote island. Additional bonus inside of the museum is also the opportunity to try Viking costumes, which we of course couldn’t miss.
Nearby, in the harbour area, is also the renowned Kolaportið flea market, opened only on Saturdays, which sells new and used good and some of the traditional Icelandic seafood. We were not impressed by the offer nor the market itself and pricewise it’s not much cheaper than the rest of the shops downtown. Most of the restaurants and shops in Reykjavik are located around Ingólfur Square and in the central street Laugavegur, the liveliest area of the city. Following the central street further up, you will come close to the highest building in the city, the Hallgrimskirkja cathedral. With its unconventional stepped concrete façade and minimalistic interior, the cathedral is one of the highlights of Reykjavik. The church offers the possibility to access its tower (900 ISK) and as we climb to every available rooftop or tower everywhere, we didn’t miss the opportunity to take some nice panoramic photographs of Reykjavik’s skyline.
Being a political junkie, our standard sightseeing routes in every city always lead to the parliament, so we did visit both the Parliament house and the modern building of the Reykjavik City Hall, inside of which you can find a large 3D map of the whole island. The city hall is located on the lake Tjörnin, around which you can take a nice walk and observe both the birdlife and the numerous statues on the path, the famous one being the Monument to the Unknown Bureaucrat in front of the city hall. We took the walk around, despite the wind and rain on that day, as we were heading towards the National Museum of Iceland. While you can hear the short version of the history in the Saga museum, National museum present you with the real artefacts and exhibits, which further enhanced our understanding of Iceland. As our friend is a student at the University of Iceland, we grabbed drinks in the university cantina, located door to door with the National museum. When it comes to dining, we limited our spending due to quite extreme price difference between European mainland and Iceland and therefore we didn’t really engage in our typical food tasting expedition. Nevertheless, we did try some of the recommended food places in Reykjavik. We stood in line to try the famous Icelandic hot dogs from Bæjarins Beztu Pylsur, tried traditional fish and chips in the Icelandic Fish and Chips restaurant in the harbour, but the best food we had was in the Café Loki right next to Hallgrimskirkja cathedral. For a reasonable price we tried traditional Icelandic meat soup and local rye bread with lamb pâté. They also offer tasting of fermented shark for the brave ones (read - not us :).
Outside of the city centre, 5 minutes away with the car, we visited the sight of the Grotta Lighthouse, located on the very top of the Reykjavik peninsula. We walked around the black volcanic sand beach and around the lighthouse during sunset, probably the only one we managed to catch among the cloudy winter days of our stay. Additionally, and due to the fact that the better half of our couple is a serious gamer, we visited the EVE online monument located right next to the Marine museum in the Reykjavik harbour.
Having friends around is great to get to know the local life of the city. Like the real locals, we went to the hot tub in the oldest public bath in the city (built in 1937), the Sundhöllin. Compared to the newly build fancy touristic baths, this one is genuine Icelandic, simple, raw in décor and full of locals. The pool itself is indoor, but the hot tub is on the open air terrace, so we spent some times enjoying the warmth of boiling water in the tub while light snow was falling on us. Call it a real Icelandic experience and a true test of your resilience, both on coldness and hotness. We also explored the famous Reykjavik nightlife, which consist of a couple of smaller bars on and around the main street Laugavegur. We started with drinks in the Dillon Rokkbar, with one of the oldest female DJs playing good old rock tunes, but as the night evolved and the streets filled with young Icelanders, we moved to the most popular bar in the city, the Kaffibarinn, which is approximately the same size despite its popularity. Like the island as such, the bars as well have this retro feeling around them, like you’ve stepped into some good and relaxed old times. The simplicity and calmness of the island can really be felt in every corner of it.
3. The northern lights
Iceland, similarly enough to Belgium where we’ve came from, has a very volatile weather, especially in February when we were visiting the island. Due to strong winds, weather can change couple of times a day, so in planning our travel we’ve regularly consulted the local weather forecast website vedur.is, not just for hunting the sunny areas but also for the never-ending hunt for Aurora Borealis or the northern lights. We did manage to see this amazing natural phenomenon with our own eyes in the surroundings of Reykjavik and enjoyed this dance of light in the night sky, therefore we recommend you to start regularly checking the website even before you reach Iceland in order not to miss this special bucket list moment. Also, have in mind before you go that Aurora Borealis is most likely to be visible in the winter months (November to February) and that you will need to drive to a less light polluted area on the island (as Reykjavik is one of the brightest and lightest cities in the world). On the fourth night of our stay, when the forecast was finally showing a bright night with high possibility of aurora activity we’ve driven to the park Heiðmörk near Reykjavik, as the high trees in the park were successfully blocking the city lights and enabling us to see the northern lights. There are also other recommended areas close to the city such as Grotta Lighthouse and Reynisvatn or a bit more distant þingvellir National Park. Also, be aware you can’t successfully take photos of the northern lights with the phone, even though there are a couple of specialised applications for that purpose.
4. On the road towards Jökulsárlón glacier
Following the advice not to drive to and from the glacier in one day, we booked our overnight stay and started our journey along the southern part of the famous Ring road early in the morning. Between Reykjavik and Vik there are a number of interesting sights, but all of them pretty badly indicated on the road. We visited both of the grand waterfalls on the way, Seljalandsfoss and Skógafoss. The visit turned into a real wet adventure as there is a path which takes you behind Seljalandsfoss and allows you to see the waterfall from all sides, which we of course did. As we were well prepared for Icelandic weather conditions, we had waterproof jackets and hiking boots, as well as enough of clothes to change into and we really enjoyed this unique experience.
Driving further, before entering the city of Vik, there is a road which leads you to the black beach of Reynisfjara, famous for its black pebbles and stepped column shaped slopes. offshore you will also see Reynisdrangar, two basalt cliffs rising from the sea. The legend says that its actually petrified trolls (mythical inhabitants of Iceland) caught by the sunlight when they were trying to pull a ship out of the sea. After strolling along the beach, we stopped for a coffee and a very good Skyr cheesecake in the nearby Black beach restaurant.
Between Vik and the Glacier there are no specific sites on the way, but the changing landscape of river deltas, surreal rocks covered with moss to hay-like fields are alone pretty impressive. We headed towards the Jökulsárlón glacier lagoon to explore the ice-caves, but heavy rain in the last couple of days made the caves inaccessible and therefore the tour was cancelled. We were quite disappointed with that information, but nevertheless went to explore the Glacier lagoon and a nearby Diamond beach. We loved the sight of lake filled with ice floes. We walked along the shore of lake and spotted also sea lions in the water. Further down, on the spot where the lake flows into the sea, you can find the Diamond beach with thousands of ice rocks on the black volcanic shore. 10 minutes away from that location, there is also a smaller and less popular Fjallsárlón glacier lagoon, but surely as beautiful as the Jökulsárlón. From there you can have a direct view on the grandness of the Vatnajökull glacier, the largest one on Iceland and in Europe.
On our way back we slept in the small village of Klaustur (Icelandair Hotel Klaustur) and visited the same sights as before, due to the changed weather conditions for photography. We also read about the original Icelandic volcanic rye bread from Hveragerði baked in the active volcanic ground, so we stopped on our way to taste and buy this delicacy.
5. The Blue lagoon
We were very excited about our visit to Blue lagoon, but a bit too relaxed when it comes to buying our tickets. We were already on Iceland when we consulted the website for purchasing the tickets and all of the timeslots were already sold out. It was pure luck that we’ve got an opening for the last night of our stay on the island, so we’ve managed to check The Blue lagoon off the bucket list as well. Blue lagoon is located very close to the Keflavík International Airport and it is well-known for its white therapeutic silica mud and geothermal seawater. We spent the evening there bathing and enjoying the contrast of milky white water against the black volcanic rock surrounding. Inside of the pool there is a bar, Silica bar which offers complementary mud masks, an artificial waterfall, sauna and steam room. We of course tried all of it and walked around with the white mud masks on our faces. It really does leave your skin soft and amazing (but at the same time don’t forget to protect the hair with complementary conditioner as the mud dries it out).
*First visit to Iceland was quite an experience, but moreover quite a love at first sight. We are already looking into dates for coming back, as there are many more things attracting our attention. Iceland will surely see us again very soon. But first we need to warm up a bit in the sunny Mediterranean. *
V & S