Iceland

You haven't been nicking my pictures of my hard drive, have you?

Great ptotos M!

Amazing pictures moulsey.  Thanks for sharing them it looks great.  I especially liked  Dimmuborgir, so dramatic with steam coming out of the ground.   The lava rock formations look quite eerie.  

Enjoying your travellers tales Moulesy, when you get back you'll have to start on the Icelandic Sagas to complete your mission.. you can borrow mine if you like, they are sitting around waiting to be read!!  Have you listened to any of the old story telling yet? The history is fascinating. 

It's been a slightly slower pace today, meandering around the fjords of the south east coast (names impossible to pronounce and pretty difficult even to spell!)

The fjords and mountains were shrouded in mist for much of the day, but occasionally the views opened up enough to make it worth recording. The little blue and white chapel is now used as a hostel where, for a modest fee, you can sleep in your sleeping bag stretched out on one of the original pews or, for considerably more, they will make up a proper bed for you!

Stopped for lunch at the amazingly pretty little harbour called Djupivogur and then on past the scenic black sand beaches to our overnight stop at Hofn with distant views of the giant glacier area which we'll be exploring tomorrow.

From time to time I've been practising my best Icelandic phrases on the waitresses in the hotels - they tend to smile (not sure if that's in appreciation for my efforts or because I sound like a Scandinavian version of Officer Crabtree ) and then almost invariably reply in perfect, unaccented English! 

I always got that with my French although not this year. Not sure if my French is improving or I was in places where they didn't speak English.

We have had a fascinating day today in the huge glacier park. Vatnajokull is the third largest glacier in the world, covering almost 10% of the country. In places the ice is up to 1km deep! 

There are several "tongues" leading off the main plateau down to a series of lagoons packed with icebergs. At one point you can watch icebergs being swept down onto one of the black sand beaches and out into the North Atlantic.

An awesome inspiring day, but the scary/depressing news came when our guide showed us where the glacier extended to less than 30 years ago. It is receding at a really alarming rate. 

We are now working our way along the south coast of Iceland back towards Reykjavik. We stopped at the black sand beach at Vik, the most southerly point on the mainland. From here, due south, there is no land until Antarctica! 

The beach was used for the Russell Crowe film, "Noah". It features some amazing scenery - hexagonal basalt columns reminiscent of the Giant's Causeway, a sea cave with diamond shape basalt on the roof (Noah's shelter in the film) and two huge rock stacks just off the  coast.

And it wouldn't be a day in Iceland without a waterfall - this one is Skogarfoss, a 62m vertical drop with lots of spray. Impressive from ground level, or, you can climb the 466 steep steps to view it from the top!

Another busy day, just 2 days left now, and another early night I think!

We are now back in Reykjavik - our final day touring was around the "Golden Circle" and just about every visitor to Reykjavik, including a couple of cruise ship groups must have been following us around - we've been spoiled with quiet spots up until today.

So, one last waterfall - this one is Gulfoss or Golden Falls because of the huge rainbow you can normally see, but sadly today has been overcast so no chance of that.  It's not the biggest waterfall we've seen but probably one of the most powerful and you can really appreciate that by walking down to river level.

Then a stop at the geothermal Geysir Park. The geyser called Strokkur blows regularly every 5 minutes - which seems a long time when you're holding a camera trying to capture the exact moment! The area also has a huge number of boiling pools of water bubbling away.

Tomorrow will be a day for exploring the city, although, after so much glorious weather, the forecast looks a bit grim.