Woke up by the mobile phone alarm. After a hearty breakfast and some strong coffee in the hotel lounge, we packed for a road trip. Doing the Golden Circle today, rain or shine. There were 4 main places to visit. The Ţingvellir National Park, the Geysir, Gullfoss and Kerid Crater.
It took only minutes for us to leave the city behind and immediately greeted by the awesome landscape of Iceland. Driving east was particularly interesting as the rising sun peeked in and out of the clouds, painting the landscape with colors of the rainbow! I loved Iceland already!
The Golden Circle – Driving Clockwise
The Golden Circle - Amazing landscape
The Golden Circle - – Pleasant Drive
The Golden Circle – First stop, Pingvellir National Park
The Golden Circle - Iceland's Prime Minister's Residence photo:
Pingvellir National Park, a UNESCO World Heritage site, is also where the North American and Eurasian tectonic plates are located. According to the Park information, the tectonic plates are moving apart almost 1 millimeter a year.
Historically, the world’s first democratically elected parliament that remains functioning, Alţingi, was formed near here in 930 AD.
The Goldlen Circle - Pingvellir NP & The Tetonic Plates
The Golden Circle - Pingvellir NP
The Golden Circle – Next Stop the Geysir
Next we drove to the famous Geysir. It is a hot spring in the geothermal area of Haukadalur valley. Strokkur is the country’s most famous hot spring, shooting vast jets of boiling water as high as 40 meters (130 feet) high. Strokkur erupts frequently, once every seven to ten minutes.
The Goldlen Circle – Geysir in Action
The Golden Circle – Farms and Ranches
We passed by some horse ranches. We stopped at one to shoot some photos. According to information that I found online about Icelandic horses. The Icelandic horse is known for its genuine and gentle character. The horses are friendly, adventurous, smart, and quick to learn. They are usually very easy to handle, cooperative both on the ground and while ridden, yet also powerful and with a great will to work.
Although their role has changed quite dramatically in the last 100 years, the horses remain an important part of Icelandic culture. For that reason, I captured a few images of horses while driving around the Golden Circle and later at Hafn (in many days later).
The Golden Circle – A Horse Ranch
A short drive from the Geysir is the Gullfoss (aka Golden Falls), an iconic sight-seeing attraction on the Golden Circle. Gullfoss is found in the Hvítá river canyon. The water in Hvítá river is fed by the glacier Langjökull. The falls consist of two falls. The top one has a short cascade of 11 meters (36 feet), whilst the second drops 21 meters (69 feet) down to a canyon below.
The Golden Circle - Gullfoss
The Golden Circle - Gullfoss
The Golden Circle – Moving On
Our last planned destination for the day was Kerid Crater. I was hoping to hike up to the rim. Unfortunately by now it was getting late and it had resumed raining again. We decided to skip the Crater and head straight back to Reykjavik and our hotel.
The Golden Circle – Driving Back to the City in the rain
The Golden Circle has a lot more to offer than what we had time for in one day. Each place visited we spent far more time than budgeted due to hiking and exploring, not to mention shooting photos. Per plan, we were not going to visit the overly touristy Blue Lagoon (however, we had plan later on to soak in the Myvatn Nature Baths). The Geothermal Energy Exhibition just off the main road would have been interesting, but for obvious reason, we skipped it as well.
Now we were back to the Hilton. After canapes in the executive lounge, we kept on checking local weather for possible Aurora Borealis, but in vain. The entire night will be overcast within 50km radius.
Tonight we packed up and got ready for tomorrow's drive to Hellnar, in the Western Region of Iceland. Other nightly routine things to do include charging many batteries, uploading photos to laptop and catching up with emails.
Up next Part 04 – Western Region of Iceland