Iceland - Day 6

Today after breakfast at the hotel we were picked up by 'Iceland Excursions'. Once again routed to bus terminal and boarded our tour van on monster truck wheels. LoL. Everything here is a super jeep. 

Tour of the day: south coast, waterfalls and glacier walk. 

WOW!! That is all I can say. Today was an amazing day out. The usual stopping at pit stops to use bathroom and get a bite because at the glacier walk location, no bathrooms. 

In order of occurrence

Waterfalls: these waterfalls are beautiful. Something about just staring into pouring water. There were steps to go to the top and we took them. I was crossing my fingers that I wouldn't die by the time I reached the top. Out of shape. Shame. View was great. I don't use names because I would just buture them. Ice everywhere. At the bottom of the falls slipping all over but we got close enough to get wet a bit. :)

Waterproof shoes help here a lot. Gloves!!! 

Glacier Walk:

Holy BA-joley! Most amazing thing to experience. We are taught how to put ice clamps on and given ice picks as a third leg. Steep slopes, holes with no end, evil snow. I mean, imagine doing just this the whole trip. I'd be psyched. Sprinkled a bit. And we were told the glacier went further out and it was snowing on the other end. I really enjoyed it. 

All winter gear required here. Jacket , hopefully waterproof. Gloves, beanie or earmuffs. Keep warm up top. Oh. And waterproof shoes!

South Coast, on beach: ash is everywhere. On the beach it is.  Stopped out here to eat and shop. We then walked the beach which had ash of a volcano rather than sand. So squishy. And windy!! 

Jackets and scarves required. Gloves too. 

Waterfalls: 

On the return we stopped at one more waterfall which normally you can walk behind but due to icy conditions we could not walk behind it. It was dark already so I chose to use a ledge as a tripod and photographed us. 

Overheard that the cloud cover tonight is bad. So northern light your is cancelled. Heard they didn't see anything yesterday either. 

Which means when we saw it on the 1st with Volcano Tours we picked a good date. Yay. 

Oh, and food is expensive. $13 for a burger at a pass through restaurant. Why???

Overall, this is top tour besides northern lights. 

Back to Reykjavik and to hotel to prepare for tomorrow. Eating cheap at home! 

Eek, saw northern lights for a second time. Bus pulled over and I got one good shot with camera. Pictures posted when back in the states. 

Iceland - Day 5

On Jan 2nd we woke up, got ready and ate breakfast downstairs. I should mention the water, is powered by the government and is geothermal so it has a smell of sulpher. Interesting but gets getting use to. Breakfast than our your bus picks us up (Iceland Excursions) to take us to their bus terminal to exchange our voucher for tickets. 

The tour we chose for Thursday was "Golden Circle Classic". 

Our tour guide informed us due to it being the shortest day of sunlight of the year we would be doing the tour in reverse. So here is what we did. 

Hellisheiòi Geothermal power plant: this power plant explained how Iceland gets their water and electricity and can provide it to their citizens for free. In Iceland , they aren't charged for heating. 

Bus. 

Skálholt Church: famous church given to Icelanders by Norway. Pretty colored stone glass. Also had remains of old tombstones to view downstairs for 200 ISK. 

Bus. 

waterfall Gullfoss: this waterfall was amazing. It had three main sections to it and several little sections. Took many photos here. Issue was we were faced with hurricane winds (as my husband calls it) and I was being pushed everywhere. Also, Iceland is not called Iceland for nothing. The pathways are super slick and you will slip if you don't have good shoes. They say they salt some areas but really the ground tends to be heated because of the geothermal heat. 

Bus for short time. 

Hot springs of Geysir & Strokkur: Here we watched the Geysir blow up. It was neat to see the bubble expand until it exploded. Again, the wind didn't make me want to stay out too long. It was about 32 degrees, maybe , but the wind cuts that in half. 

Geysir shop to eat & drink. 

Bus. 

Pingvellir National Park: this park makes me think of Games of Thrones. Icy paths and bridges to get across. The oldest church were parliament first met. About a 30 minute walk. Beautiful sunset then boarded bus at end of trail. 

We asked to be dropped off at the Reykjavik city centre and walked to the famous hot dog stand. Cheapest meal yet of Iceland. We got the hot dog with all it came with. It was delicious. 

From there we went to a gift shop and found some more goodies. 

We had to run to bonus, the cheapest supermarket there, before they closed at 6:30pm to pick up dinner and snacks for hotel room.