Photos from this day can be found here.
We rearranged our luggage last night, and it turns out it’s a lot easier to take luggage down steps, than it is up! But before that we had what we are seeing as a typical European breakfast in the restaurant attached to the hotel. There weren’t any hot items, but there were plenty of protein adjacent items to give us some good fuel (though not enough sweet things for Alan’s taste buds).
We had conflicting information about whether we were to meet the Rental Car company driver in the lobby or outside the hotel. Alan waited outside, and Joyce in the lobby. Outside was a little problematic, since cars can’t get to the front of the hotel (or so we thought). So Alan did a fair amount of pacing from the lobby door to the corner, not sure who or what he was looking for. We were supposed to be picked up within 30 minutes of the time posted (8:30), so Alan was ready at 8:25. About 8:55 the van pulled up in front of the hotel. A little more drama, as it was clearly stated that only the driver was to be transported to pick up the car, but a couple appeared that was fearful of missing a scuba excursion, so they insisted that both of them and some luggage be transported. After a bit, the badgered driver agreed, if the rest of us agreed, which we did, but we were packed in pretty tight.
At the rental car office, we had a line of several minutes to work our way through. Alan was near the end of our group, but the line was even longer by the time he got to the counter. He had been joking with one of the other people from our hotel that we had a chance to see all the other drama at the counter, and that surely wouldn’t be us! And he didn’t think it was. Nordic Visitor had us pretty squared away, though the Icelandic lawyers still apparently have a lot of things that need to be signed and initialed.
We got an upgrade to a Kia Sportage AWD, though I don’t think that we will risk doing any off-road or back country driving. We do have a bit more room, and the big suitcases fit nicely/tightly into the back out of sight.
Getting back to the hotel was a little challenge. The GPS took Alan to an address that the front desk person had given Joyce to be able to go behind the hotel to get Joyce and the luggage. But the GPS took him to an adjacent lot, accessible from another street, and the wrong way from about a 1/2 block away from the real lot entrance. Thankfully we had walked around enough yesterday that he had a rough sense of what he needed to do to get up the street in the right direction. While it took a bit longer to get back, Alan was pretty proud that he got it worked out.
From there, we made our way out of the city and off to the east to our first stop on the Golden Circle route. The views, even from the main highway were stunning. It was a relatively clear day, and the temperatures were pretty moderate. Alan took off the fleece jacket after our first stop of the day.
Our first stop was Pingvellir (pronunciation) National Park about 30 miles outside Reykjavik. The “P” is a character we do not have in English. It is called a “thor” and makes a “th” sound. It is the site of the continental rift spitting Iceland between the North American and Eurasian continents. The continents drift apart a couple centimeters a year. Icelanders have used this area for many special moments in their history, from beginning to meet to govern in 930 to celebrating their independence from Denmark in 1944.
We stopped at the visitor center for a map and decided to start with a shorter walking loop, with the goal to see the fissure in the picture above. We took a “wrong” turn and ended up walking a lot of the park. Joyce wanted to walk between the continents which we did. The path was hard packed gravel with a good portion of it uphill. At the top there was a great view of the rift with the rock walls on each side. As we walked down, we started searching for the rift with water that Alan wanted to see by taking each side path. We crossed the river that feeds Pingvallavatn Lake, where you can snorkel and see an underwater rift. Finally, the last side path we took brought us to the rift Alan wanted to see. It was amazing to see how clear the water was and how far down we were able to see.
Video here eventually IMG_0315, Joyce
Between Pingvellier National Park and our next destination, the Haukadalur valley, with an active geothermal area, a homemade ice cream stop was marked on our map provided by Nordic Visitor the tour company. This place was a working farm. Through windows in the ice cream parlor you could see the cows enjoying their hay. Alan enjoyed raspberry and chocolate and Joyce enjoyed raspberry and salted caramel – pretty good stuff!!
As we drove toward the Haukadalur Valley we could see grass, trees, mountains in the background, then started to notice what looked like steam. As we drove closer, it appeared an area like a big field had lots of steam and we started to smell sulphur. The Haukadalur Valley is the location of Geysir, where we get the English word geyser. Geysir, the original geyser was first mentioned in Icelandic literature in 1294 after strong earthquakes and a devastating eruption of Mount Hekla. Geysir has been dormant for many years with the exception of renewed activity in 2000 after an eruption on Mount Hekla. Strokkur, erupts about every 10 minutes with a spectacular fountain of superheated water and billowing steam. The area has about a dozen or so hot water blowholes, some which produce steam and others bubbling water, 80 – 100 degrees Celsius. Wooden and metal walkways were constructed around the various vents making walking around them easy and safe.
Next on our tour around the Golden Circle was Gullfoss, a breathtaking two tiered waterfall on the Hvita river that drops 32 meters (105 feet) into a narrow canyon 70 meters (230 feet) deep and 2 1/2 km (about one and a half miles long). Gullfoss takes its name – the Golden Falls from the clouds of rainbow tinge spray hanging over it. There are three walkways, one to the top overlooking the falls, another down and out a short distance so that you can get a great view of the entire fall, with the final walkway down so you can stand alongside the top tier of water. Alan took this latter walkaway and was treated to some spray and great pictures of the rainbows in the mist. At the bottom of these steps is a commemorative plaque erected in honor of a Sigridur Tomasdottir for her successful campaign to save the falls when in 1907, the landowner had signed away Gullfoss to be submerged by the construction of a hydroelectric dam along the river. Sigridur was so incensed that she took legal action against the developers. Although she lost the case, public opinion ran so high in her favor that construction on the dam never began and Gullfoss was later donated to the Icelandic state. The falls and the canyon below them have been protected as a nature reserve since 1979. Siguidur is sometimes referred to as Iceland‘s first environmentalist. Joyce explored the path overlooking the falls. It was fascinating to watch so much water thunder down and disappear into the deep canyon as well as to see the rainbow on the mist.
Our last stop on the Golden Circle, before heading to our country guest house was Kerid, a volcanic crater over 6000 years old. Contrary to popular belief Kerid was not formed by a volcanic explosion, but rather a cone volcano that erupted and emptied its magma reserve. The weight of the cone, then collapsed into the empty magma chamber, creating the current crater. The water in the bottom of the crater is at the same level as the water table and is not caused by rainfall. The crater is part of the larger Tjarnholar area and connected to the lake of Burrell in the Grimsnes district. When the water level in Kerid goes down it raises in the lake of Burrell and visa vera.
Visitors are able to view the crater from the top and from a path leading down to the edge of lake at the bottom. Joyce opted for a view from the top and Alan made the descent to the lake and back up.
We completed our tour of the Golden Circle and were ready to head toward Vatnsholt Guest House. When we booked the tour with Nordic Visitor we were given 3 levels of accommodations, one of which was guest houses with the possibility of shared bathrooms. We have stayed in B & B’s in the US and thought doing something similar would be a chance to meet typical Icelanders. We were assigned Vatnsholt Guest House. We headed the guest house, toward the town of Selfoss. It was going on 8 pm, so we looked for something quick for dinner. We spotted a Kronan grocery and traditional Iceland hot dog stand. After a quick stop at the grocery, and a refill of our water bottles, we headed for the hot dog stand. Joyce had a hot dog with potato salad on the bottle of the bun. The hot dog was a little more spicy than a US hot dog as was the mustard on the top. The potato salad was typical, altogether a nice bite. Alan decided he would rather have fish and chips, which was also tasty.
Joyce did some research and discovered the guest house was on a farm that had been a dairy farm until 2008 when the owners opened the guest house to withstand the financial crisis. There are currently 34 guest rooms. The car GPS and road side signs got us to the right place. There was one larger building with reception, a couple living rooms and a restaurant. Several smaller buildings held guest accommodations. There also appeared to be accommodations for campers. There was a small children’s play area. The land around the farm was flat with hay fields with hay bales dotting the fields. A couple fields held grazing horses.
We checked in and were given a quick tour of the main building and the building with our room was pointed out. Our building had 9 guests rooms and two shared bathrooms. 5 rooms had en-suite bathrooms. Our room was on the 2nd floor and the bathrooms were on the 1st floor down a spiral staircase. Our room was pretty small, but had all the essentials. We sat in the small living room area and did a little catching up on email and blogging.
The attractions we saw today had free admission, but paid parking. Joyce had downloaded the app Parka as recommended to pay the parking fees. At Thingvellir National Park, our first stop, the parking wasn’t listed in the Parka app. Alan took a picture of the parking sign and attempted to pay the parking several times throughout the day (we had 12 hours to do it.) but encountered difficulties. With the translation help of a gracious young lady working at the guest house, Alan was able to get the parking paid.
While we were hoping to interact a little more with local Icelandic people, the farm was peaceful. It was a bit of a challenge to have our shared bathrooms on the floor below us; however, the bathrooms were very clean and we never had to wait to use them. The morning was especially peaceful and enjoyable.