We flew Icelandair and actually had a stop over on the way to northern Europe (I suppose it is implied in the airline name). One neat feature about Icelandair is the ability to take a free stay up to 7 days. For Ashley and I, this was a perfect opportunity to see the marvelous landscape of Iceland.
Since the church is the highest structure in Iceland, it served as a marvelous viewing point to perch and view the city down to the harbor.
It was kind of a miserable flight from Washington D.C. to Reykjavik, luckily it was fairly short at 5 hours. It is basically the same time to fly to Iceland as it is to California from the east coast. However, our arrival in Iceland was quick enough of a shock in terms of cold, rain and rawness to snap us back from a stale world of cramped seats. Although the flight is only 5 hours, you actually gain 4 hours and arrive at 6am in the morning!
Upon arrival it felt very Scandinavian influenced- as far as the highways, cars and buildings were concerned. After picking up the rental car and driving into downtown Reykjavik we were exhausted. Having an opportunity to check into our room at 10am in the morning to nap for a short bit was excellent! We woke to chilly air and a brisk wind to tour the town. The highlight of the quick tour we took was definitely Hallgrimskirkja, the large Lutheran church which dominates the city for height. The architecture is a sort of expressionist and was said to have been the architects idea to show basalt lava flows.
The inside of the church had a really neat 25 ton pipe organ which definitely bellowed!
Since the church is the highest structure in Iceland, it served as a marvelous viewing point to perch and view the city down to the harbor.
The 50F temperatures were a bit cold for us so we decided to drive to see the sights outside town. We knew we wanted to check out some parts of the Golden Circle tour, which sort of combines all the major sites near Reykjavik. Ashley and I did our own tour and saw what was to be the essence of Iceland. First though we had to navigate to the sites and the roadside tourist maps were all we had to make sense of!
We decided to drive furthest first to see the geysers. Actually, this place is where the English word for geyser came from and (to the best of my knowledge) is the only Icelandic word which has made its way into English. On the way to Geysir the place and other geysers we stopped by a stream to take in the rugged landscape. Iceland is just such a young place, it feels like the soil is forming beneath you as you walk- perhaps because it is!
It felt like a scene from the movie Lord of the Rings, astonishingly beautiful.
We arrived at the geyser spot after taking quite a few breaks to walk the terrain. The area around the infamous Geysir is flanked by other geysers which are more active. Some were photogenic and some were not. However, to view these geothermal features up close was very cool. The only large erupting geyser was saw was Strokkur, which means churn in Icelandic. On the whole it was a bit of a smelly place due to the sulphur gases.
The next stop was the infamous Gullfloss waterfall, it means golden falls in English. This is perhaps the most famous attraction in Iceland and it was a real crowd pleaser. The Hvita river turns abruptly and then falls into a crevice which is about a hundred feet deep and adjusts the flow of the river by 90 degrees. It was quite dramatic, the misting spray can actually be seen from the highway on the way in!
Iceland has several large glaciers, I believe the name of the one presented in the photo below in Langjokull. The sheer size of it is difficult to fathom, it is probably a half mile thick in places.
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