Iceland, Land of Fire and Ice

I think I frightened the geese

These were on the menu last night!

At the waterfall

Two waterfalls

Vik Black beach, white surf and frozen goblins

Iceburgs calving

Sun still on the high peaks

Wonderful light
Now on with the story

We picked up our car at the airport and after overnight in Reykjavik, we headed out to circumnavigate the island.  Highway 1 goes all the way around the coast which we eventually managed to find.  We saw so much in that one day, the trip to Iceland is already a great success.

We stopped at the thermal geographic fields at Hyeragerdi which is also the centre of a huge glasshouse industry.  A good trivia question.  What country produces the most cut flowers for the European market?  Yes it is Iceland, not the Netherlands.

We visited 2 major ice fields and as we drove along, the glacial tongues were heading towards the coast and on the other side, the braided streams flowed through the terminal murrain.  The larger, Myrdalsjokull, is three times the size of Luxemburg and the largest outside the polar caps.

We stopped at the village of Vik for lunch but did not meet up with Vik the Viking.  We did see its black sand beach with the contrasting white of the breakers and a series of sea stacks believed to be trolls who were caught at sunlight.  Over 40% of the Icelandic population believe in elves, goblins and trolls.

The scenery was magical as we drove on changing from the earlier type lunar landscape to basalt boulders fused together with moss and sedges - just like you would imagine a green cheese lunar landscape.

At Jokulsarlon, we saw the famous glacial lake where the glaciers from Vatnajokull calve icebergs into the lake.  Eventually these float out to sea.  You have seen this is you watched James Bond's ' Die Another Day, Batman the Beginning or Lara Croft Tomb Raider.

From our hotel in Hofn, as we type this, we can see 4 glaciers descending.  It can't get any better than this.

Power to the people