Iceland - A photographer's paradise...Heaven on earth

[Rashmi G Rao]

This is my first Travelogue and I am really glad that I am starting with such a wonderful trip of my life...
In the beginning of 2016, we wanted to do an international trip and we pretty much knew it was either New Zealand or Iceland. It was a tough decision to choose one among two wonderful countries on face of earth...Nevertheless we made the choice and the choice was ICELAND...North of the wall..land of Ice and Fire...

The planning started well ahead of time and we wanted to ensure we cover as much land in Iceland as possible... still stay within our budget ...yet not extend beyond 10 days..

Though it was a tourist visa which we knew shouldn't be rejected.. we were still worried until we saw the "Approved" stamp on our passports. Since India doesn't have Iceland embassy, we had to apply for visa through Danish embassy. Visa processing was awfully slow. They processed our visa only 2 weeks prior to our travel dates and this was only after we followed up with embassy and asked them to expedite the request. We wanted enough time to cancel flight if visa was rejected.

Our travel dates were confirmed after our vacations got approved.
We planned to be in Iceland from 28th August to 5th Sept. We flew out of Iceland on 6th Sept early morning.
We also had our friends who joined us from UK for this trip.
Rented car... Hostels booked...planned days..printed itinerary and with all these, we hit the road with so much expectation and anticipation to have a ball...
Will share my entire trip details in this travelogue and to begin with.. here are some pictures...

The route we covered..

A perfect reflection in river Öxará...

Seljalandsfoss..

Sunset view from across the mountains...We just sat for hours and watched the colors change

Öxarárfoss within Þingvellir national park

A welcoming view as we landed in Iceland

So thrilled when we first saw the Rainbow..Eventually realised its a everyday story in Iceland

Fjaðrárgljúfur Canyon

 

[nadz11.ns]

@Rashmi G Rao first of all, welcome to BCMT and this is a wonderful start. Beautiful pictures.

 

[amitw79]

Nice debut at BCMT.

Awesome images. Keep them flowing

 

[Rashmi G Rao]

Thanks @nadz11.ns @amitw79 ..

We started from Bangalore on 26th Aug at 7:30 in the evening. Cheaper option for us was to take KLM airlines from Bangalore to Amsterdam and then we went through Wow airways from Amsterdam to Reykjavik. our flights were peaceful and we landed in Reykjavik on 27th Aug at 11 o clk.

Day 1 and Day 2 - Serendipity ...Dream come true
What we covered:

• Blue lagoon
• Þingvellir National park
• Geysir and Strokkur
• Gullfoss
• Kerid crater

Our friends had arrived from UK the previous night but since the rental car booking was in our name, they had to wait for us to arrive. We had pre-booked DUSTER from carsiceland and their office is pretty close to airport (walkable).

We picked up our car and hit the road in no time. The first adjustment we had to make was driving on right hand side of the road. Luckily it wasnt a big problem for my husband and friend. We opted for 2 drivers and 2 insurance while renting the car. We also had done all the booking in all planned places before we arrived in Iceland. Our stay for day 1 was in Reykjavik HI Hostel. Hostels are cheap option at the same time hygienic as well. As we stepped out for lunch, it started to drizzle and then there it was..A beautiful rainbow as if god is crowning the beauty of this place. Iceland is full of pleasant surprises. Be it nature changing its colors or landscapes changing its faces.Anyways, we then had lunch and did grocery shopping to ensure we had enough reserve for next couple of days. All of us being vegetarians, this was must for us. with just this, our day 1 ended and we hit the bed.

Our day started pretty early. We prepared breakfast and also packed some for lunch. Our first destination for the day was Blue lagoon. Blue lagoon is around 45 minutes drive (around 50 Kms). Though the place is commercialised, it is really worth the visit. Entry fees varies with different things included, but we opted for cheapest as we didn’t wanted welcome drink or mud pack or towels. We had good time here, had some snacks and then we started from here. Our next destination was Þingvellir National park. Þingvellir National park is around 1 hour drive (88Km) from blue lagoon. Driving any distance in Iceland isn't a problem for 2 reasons. First, the entire country is heaven. second, everybody follows rules .

Þingvellir National park is very big and it takes minimum of 2 hours to cover it. We then had egg avacado sandwich in the shop there and left from there. Our next destination was Strokkur Geysir which was about 60 kms from there. We watched the geysir bursting out atleast 3 times and then started towards gullfoss. After driving for 10 minutes, google maps said " you have arrived at your destination". It was a surprise for us because looking at the location, We couldnt really figure out where is the waterfalls. The land appeared very flat and couldn't imagine a falls in such place. We just followed where others were going. After 5 minutes of walk, we saw this magnificent view of Gullfoss ...we just stood there for several minutes admiring the beauty of god's creation, took photos and returned. Our next destination was Kerið crater which was about 56 Kms from here. It was a dead volcanic crater, yet the nature around it and colors in the crater made it so beautiful to look at. Kerið has an entry fee of 400ISK per person. One more surprise was, there was no one to verify if we bought the tickets or not. Its literally Business that works on trust

We then drove to our halting location. Today it was Árnes HI Hostel which was about 45 Kms from here. It was a beautiful hostel in a beautiful small village. The sun finally went down at 9 PM and we went to bed with amazing pictures in our minds.

Iceland's way of welcoming us

Blue Lagoon - warm waters that are rich in minerals like silica and sulfur

Þingvellir National park

Þingvellir National park - Views soo amazing..

Þingvellir National park - Variety of landscapes in just one frame

Öxarárfoss in Þingvellir National park

The Gang - Somewhere on the way

Random clicks on the way - I still feel no camera can capture what your eyes can capture..

continental drift between the North American and Eurasian Plates

Even man made structure looks extraordinary with such a beauty behind them

Geysir Bursting

Ultimate beauty - Gullfoss

One more view

Gushing Gullfoss

Kerid - Volcanic crater

 

[Rashmi G Rao]

Day 3 - Stunning waterfalls, Sólheimasandur, glacier views and Black beach
Every day in Iceland started very early for us and it pretty much was a routine. Get up, get fresh, take bath, Cook for breakfast, cook and pack the Lunch and pack everything and Leave. Today was perfect when we started from our hostel in Arnes, but as we travelled few kms it started becoming gloomy. Immediately it brought back the words of all the bloggers whose blogs I read while planning Iceland. Iceland wheather is very unpredictable. Nevertheless, We were glad that it wasn't raining heavily and that we could still enjoy the nature while driving. Our first destination for the day was Gluggafoss (also called as Merkjarfoss). The location looked dreamy ..with stunning waterfalls, green mountains, a clear water stream, few houses around, glacier view right in front of these houses and to add there were beautiful Icelandic horses. The sun and drizzle gave a wonderful rainbow on the waterfalls. There was a picnic spot (benches laid for tourists every few kms in Iceland) here where we had our lunch. We filled our water bottles in the water stream there and then left from this location.
From here our next destination was pretty close (abour 22 kms) which was Seljalandsfoss. The waterfalls catches everybody's attention from the highway itself. The waterfall drops from 60 m (197 ft) and is part of the Seljalands River that has its origin in the volcano glacier Eyjafjallajökull. It was raining on and off the entire day. After taking few photos, we had a nice hot coffee and then started our journey towards our next destination - Skogafoss which was about 28 Kms from here. Being one of the biggest waterfall in the country, Skogafoss offers a magnificent view in all angles. There is a hiking and trekking trail that leads up to the pass Fimmvörðuháls between the glaciers Eyjafjallajökull and Mýrdalsjökull. The panoramic view from above is breath taking. It takes around an hour plus to reach top and come back form there. Our next destination was Plane wreck at Sólheimasandur. In none of the blog they discussed about the hiking needed to actually see this plane wreck. Its close to about 6-8 Kms hiking back and forth to this location. without knowing it, it felt like we are walking forever. Nonetheless, once we saw the view of beach, plane wreck and glaciers around we felt it was all worth it. Now we started feeling that we might not be able to cover all that we planned for the day as this long walk wasn't expected. Thanks to long daylight of summers (daylight till 9 PM) in Iceland which helped us cover all that we wanted to...Took some pictures here and then walked back to our vehicle. The next destination was 16.5 Kms away from here. It was Dyrhólaey Arch but this view was from top of a mountain. Top of the mountain offered a view of Beautiful lighthouse, a prefect black sand beach below and the Dyrhólaey Arch itself. It was extremely cold and we quickly wanted to snuggle back into our vehicle with heater on. Then we started our travel towards Reynisfjara black beach. It was close to sunset time. The beach was wonderful with variety of rock formations that it offers. We got to see large number of puffins here. However couldnt capture them in our camera due to light, and thier constant flights...
God gradually started painting the sky gold and reflection of which made the entire view gold. We spent a lot of time here and then started to travel towards our hostel in Vik.
We got a 6 people cabin entirely for ourselves. We cooked dinner and Slept with amazing views f the day unfolding like a movie in our minds......

Random view on the way

Gluggafoss

Lunch near gluggafoss

Seljalandsfoss

Seljalandsfoss - another view

Skogafoss

Skogafoss - Top view

Sólheimasandur Plane wreck - yet another view

Dyrhólaey Arch

Reynisfjara Black beach - basalt columns washed in golden shade

Some more

Puffins - chirping

Horizon - in beautiful colors of nature

Colors of sunset

Wonderful scenes on our way

 

[Rashmi G Rao]

Day 4 & 5 – Canyon, Glaciers, and more…

Today’s agenda was very simple and not much to cover (as per itinerary). Vík (where we stayed previous night and starting from there today) is the wettest coastal town in Iceland, with an annual rainfall of 2,250 millimetres (89 in). As we started from Vík, It was raining. The rain actually added to the beauty of the city. Our first destination for the day was Fjaðrárgljúfur canyon. This is about 70 Kms from where we started… but due to rain it felt like a longer distance. Through the entire way from Vík to Fjaðrárgljúfur, we were amazed to see the moss formation and how they made their surroundings look so pretty. It was very windy too. As we stopped in few places to take photos of the mosses, it felt like we would fly away with the wind. Anyways, we reached out destination Fjaðrárgljúfur canyon. This canyon is about 100m deep and close to 2 kms long which you can hike. Needless to say, It was as beautiful as any location in Iceland. Waterfalls, green mountain’s tips kissed by clouds, a faraway village….At this point, I was thinking I should be born here if ever I have another life to live on this earth. The canyon was created by progressive erosion by flowing water from glaciers through the rocks and palagonite over millennia. The government had done a good job of inserting some plastic like flooring so that people do not slip while walking.

We then came back and started our journey towards next destination Skaftafell which is a preservation area within Vatnajökull National Park. Skaftafell Visitor Centre serves the Southern Territory of Vatnajökull National Park and provides information on the park and its environs, trails, nature and history, as well as on other recreation and services (including glacier walking). When we reached here, it was already lunch time. We had our packaged lunch and then started hiking towards Svartifoss (Black Falls). It is surrounded by dark lava columns, which gave rise to its name. It was a little crowded and getting a clear shot of waterfalls, called for lot of waiting time and tons of patience.

After we returned from the waterfalls, our next destination was the one that I awaited the most, Jökulsárlón which literally means"glacial river lagoon"….. Even on the way we came across many glaciers which was right next to the roads we were travelling in. Jökulsárlón has been a setting for some well-known Hollywood movies: A View to a Kill, Die Another Day, Lara Croft: Tomb Raider and Batman Begins. The view is spectacular. Seals gather in large numbers at the mouth of the (in hunt for their food I suppose). Large numbers of seabirds, particularly Arctic terns, which nest nearby, gather to catch their prey as well. There are large icebergs that float on the surface of water on which we saw huge number of terns and gulls sitting and waiting for their prey. It was raining and was too windy. We struggled a lot to take good photo of what we were seeing. This location marked the end of day 4 as we headed towards our hostel in Höfn. Höfn was a beautiful small city. We went out for dinner. Had nice pizza and came back and slept.

As per our agenda, day 5 was just driving through east coast of Iceland. Even this day was very gloomy because of rain. We left from Höfn hostel and within no time reached Stokksnes. Stokksnes is headland. Near the enrty is a café called Viking café where we need to buy an entry ticket which costs 800ISK per person. As we buy ticket and walk, there is a small Viking village set (film set for a Icelandic film called Viking village) and mountain and its perfect reflection in the glacier lagoon. We also took pictures of this pristine lagoon and then headed towards the beach. We saw Seals resting in the black beach, took some pictures and then started our journey towards Husey where our hostel was booked for the night. We also had to do grocery shopping as we were running out of stock for cooking. We did grocery shopping in Egilsstaðir. Kronan and Bonus are the places where you can do grocery shopping and it is quite cheap in these places. We then added “Husey HI Hostel” in GPS and started our journey. But where the GPS lady said, “you have arrived at your destination” - was the place where there was nothing. We then called the hostel and the lady said that we are in the wrong side of the river and should actually be crossing the bridge and then head in same direction as we had come now. So we took a U-turn. As per one of our friend’s direction took a route which was not what the lady suggested and also felt like we were in the middle of nowhere. I was really worried that we might be heading in really wrong direction and I didn’t wanted to take chances in a unknown country. Luckily, we saw the bridge, and then we also started seeing sign board of Husey.

The journey gave us an imagination that we were now going to reach the end of the world, mainly because we hardly saw human there, or any houses or any sign of civilization. After long drive we saw a blue house and it resembled the hostel picture that we had seen in the hihostel website. So now my heartbeat returned to normal J.


We reached at around 6PM and had lot of time for cooking. We made nice tomato onion curry, egg burji and rice. Had amazing dinner and slept thinking it was end of the day. It was around 11 PM in the night that we started hearing people screaming (something like “Polishka polishka”). One of our friend woke up and immediately started to wake all of us saying probably its northern light. I am glad she did because when we went out and saw It was Aurora Borealis. We had been waiting for this phenomenon to occur from the day 1 of our trip in Iceland and ultimately, here it was.. We took pictures in phone and cameras till the lights lasted. Once it disappeared, we then started to realize how cold it was and rushed in and then into the blankets. Now thus came an end to the wonderful day of scenic landscapes, long and beautiful dirve, cooking and having amzing food and ultimately “Northern lights”.

Lava fields:

Fjaðrárgljúfur Canyon:

Fjaðrárgljúfur Canyon with its waterfalls:

Random waterfalls on the way

A dream location

A Panoramic view of glaciers, mountains, cooled lava fields - Breathtaking

Svartifoss in Skaftafell

Jokulsarlon

The viking village in Stokksnes

Reflection in the glacier lagoon

Lazy Seals

Northern lights

 

[Rashmi G Rao]

Day 4 & 5 – Canyon, Glaciers, and more…

Today’s agenda was very simple and not much to cover (as per itinerary). Vík (where we stayed previous night and starting from there today) is the wettest coastal town in Iceland, with an annual rainfall of 2,250 millimetres (89 in). As we started from Vík, It was raining. The rain actually added to the beauty of the city. Our first destination for the day was Fjaðrárgljúfur canyon. This is about 70 Kms from where we started… but due to rain it felt like a longer distance. Through the entire way from Vík to Fjaðrárgljúfur, we were amazed to see the moss formation and how they made their surroundings look so pretty. It was very windy too. As we stopped in few places to take photos of the mosses, it felt like we would fly away with the wind. Anyways, we reached out destination Fjaðrárgljúfur canyon. This canyon is about 100m deep and close to 2 kms long which you can hike. Needless to say, It was as beautiful as any location in Iceland. Waterfalls, green mountain’s tips kissed by clouds, a faraway village….At this point, I was thinking I should be born here if ever I have another life to live on this earth. The canyon was created by progressive erosion by flowing water from glaciers through the rocks and palagonite over millennia. The government had done a good job of inserting some plastic like flooring so that people do not slip while walking.

We then came back and started our journey towards next destination Skaftafell which is a preservation area within Vatnajökull National Park. Skaftafell Visitor Centre serves the Southern Territory of Vatnajökull National Park and provides information on the park and its environs, trails, nature and history, as well as on other recreation and services (including glacier walking). When we reached here, it was already lunch time. We had our packaged lunch and then started hiking towards Svartifoss (Black Falls). It is surrounded by dark lava columns, which gave rise to its name. It was a little crowded and getting a clear shot of waterfalls, called for lot of waiting time and tons of patience.

After we returned from the waterfalls, our next destination was the one that I awaited the most, Jökulsárlón which literally means"glacial river lagoon"….. Even on the way we came across many glaciers which was right next to the roads we were travelling in. Jökulsárlón has been a setting for some well-known Hollywood movies: A View to a Kill, Die Another Day, Lara Croft: Tomb Raider and Batman Begins. The view is spectacular. Seals gather in large numbers at the mouth of the (in hunt for their food I suppose). Large numbers of seabirds, particularly Arctic terns, which nest nearby, gather to catch their prey as well. There are large icebergs that float on the surface of water on which we saw huge number of terns and gulls sitting and waiting for their prey. It was raining and was too windy. We struggled a lot to take good photo of what we were seeing. This location marked the end of day 4 as we headed towards our hostel in Höfn. Höfn was a beautiful small city. We went out for dinner. Had nice pizza and came back and slept.

As per our agenda, day 5 was just driving through east coast of Iceland. Even this day was very gloomy because of rain. We left from Höfn hostel and within no time reached Stokksnes. Stokksnes is headland. Near the enrty is a café called Viking café where we need to buy an entry ticket which costs 800ISK per person. As we buy ticket and walk, there is a small Viking village set (film set for a Icelandic film called Viking village) and mountain and its perfect reflection in the glacier lagoon. We also took pictures of this pristine lagoon and then headed towards the beach. We saw Seals resting in the black beach, took some pictures and then started our journey towards Husey where our hostel was booked for the night. We also had to do grocery shopping as we were running out of stock for cooking. We did grocery shopping in Egilsstaðir. Kronan and Bonus are the places where you can do grocery shopping and it is quite cheap in these places. We then added “Husey HI Hostel” in GPS and started our journey. But where the GPS lady said, “you have arrived at your destination” - was the place where there was nothing. We then called the hostel and the lady said that we are in the wrong side of the river and should actually be crossing the bridge and then head in same direction as we had come now. So we took a U-turn. As per one of our friend’s direction took a route which was not what the lady suggested and also felt like we were in the middle of nowhere. I was really worried that we might be heading in really wrong direction and I didn’t wanted to take chances in a unknown country. Luckily, we saw the bridge, and then we also started seeing sign board of Husey.

The journey gave us an imagination that we were now going to reach the end of the world, mainly because we hardly saw human there, or any houses or any sign of civilization. After long drive we saw a blue house and it resembled the hostel picture that we had seen in the hihostel website. So now my heartbeat returned to normal J.


We reached at around 6PM and had lot of time for cooking. We made nice tomato onion curry, egg burji and rice. Had amazing dinner and slept thinking it was end of the day. It was around 11 PM in the night that we started hearing people screaming (something like “Polishka polishka”). One of our friend woke up and immediately started to wake all of us saying probably its northern light. I am glad she did because when we went out and saw It was Aurora Borealis. We had been waiting for this phenomenon to occur from the day 1 of our trip in Iceland and ultimately, here it was.. We took pictures in phone and cameras till the lights lasted. Once it disappeared, we then started to realize how cold it was and rushed in and then into the blankets. Now thus came an end to the wonderful day of scenic landscapes, long and beautiful dirve, cooking and having amzing food and ultimately “Northern lights”.

Lava fields:
View attachment 701949
Fjaðrárgljúfur Canyon:
View attachment 701950
Fjaðrárgljúfur Canyon with its waterfalls:
View attachment 701948

Random waterfalls on the way
View attachment 701951
A dream location
View attachment 701952
A Panoramic view of glaciers, mountains, cooled lava fields - Breathtaking
View attachment 701953
Svartifoss in Skaftafell
View attachment 701954
Jokulsarlon
View attachment 701955
The viking village in Stokksnes
View attachment 701957 View attachment 701958
Reflection in the glacier lagoon
View attachment 701959

Lazy Seals
View attachment 701960
Northern lights
View attachment 701961

 

[Rashmi G Rao]

Day 6 and 7 – yet another set of falls, geo-thermal stations and whale and Seal watching

We started from Husey hostel towards our first destination- Dettifoss which was 171 kms from the hostel. We never felt the journey was stressful in Iceland for 2 reasons. First, because of the lovely sceneries that nature offered us throughout the country. Second, for the great company we had. As we reached the location, we could hear the roar of the falls from far away. Dettifoss is one of the most powerful waterfall in Europe. The water comes from the nearby Vatnajökull glacier, whose sediment-rich runoff and colors the water a greyish white. When we reached here, we got a view of waterfalls with 2 rainbows across the falls. I really run short of words to explain the view. May be photos below can speak for me(only to some extent, I am sure). There is a hiking trail which takes you to another waterfalls called “selfoss”. We asked some other tourist whether the hike is worth the view and he suggested it isn’t a great waterfall. So we conveniently skipped it. Later we saw the picture of this falls in a Myvatn information center and we all regretted so much about this. So friends, our suggestion is “DO NOT SKIP SELFOSS”.

From here, we started towards Krafla. On the way, we stopped over in many places to take photos. The landscapes here looked so much like Ladakh. Brought back those memories as well. Krafla is a caldera(is a large cauldron-like depression that forms following the evacuation of a magma chamber/reservoir).As we got down from the vehicle, we could smell the pungent smell of sulphur. Blue sky, brown mountains, yellow-grey patches of ground and smoke here and there- A picture that looked very pretty for eyes but not so much for nose through. We took pictures and then drove towards viti crater, another volcanic crater which is about 2 Kms from this location.

Our next location was Lake Myvtn area which was 50km from Viti. Mývatn is a shallow eutrophic lake situated in an area of active volcanism in the north of Iceland. The lake was created by a large lava eruption that happened about 2300 years ago, and the surrounding landscape is dominated by volcanic landforms, including lava pillars and rootless vents (pseudocraters). You could stop in multiple places around the lake which offered different kinds of landscapes and natural formations.

After this, we headed towards Goðafoss (waterfall of the gods) . The Goðafoss is one of the most spectacular waterfalls in Iceland. The legend says that in the year 999 or 1000, a lawspeaker made Christianity the official religion of Iceland. Once he got converted to Christianity, he threw Norse gods (Norse Paganism being followed as religion previously) into this falls and hence they have the name Goðafoss. Its been 6 days in Iceland and we would have seen “n” number of waterfalls so far, yet I am still amused by the sheer beauty of the nature and her offerings to our eyes in the forms of these falls. It’s just BEAUTIFULLLLL…..

We then checked into Akureri hihostel which is in middle of the city.

Next day, with help of hostel owner, we booked whale watching with “Whale watching,Hauganes”. Since we booked through the hostel people, the cost was 7990ISK per person (else everybody quoted 10000 ISK per person). Its 20 minutes’ drive from Akureri to Hauganes. After a bit of fast and furious kind of driving we reached Hauganes just in time (9AM). They offer you warm and waterproof clothes (without which I guess we would freeze in cold). It was close to 20minutes sail in the sea and we started getting views of hump back whales. We were so excited. In next 30min- 1 hr, we saw these whales N number of times, Near – far, in group- alone, dancing – swimming- diving. Got good shots of them in our camera. After this, they took us to some place where they showed us how to fish and allowed us to do fishing. For the first time in my life, I caught a fish and saw it from so near. It was nice experience.

Our stay for the night was booked in Osar HI hostel. The drive through the coastline was amazing. We stopped at few random beaches, took photos, saw jelly fishes floating near the shore, saw seals resting on the rocky edges of the beach, said hi to ba ba black sheep and then checked in to the hostel. We got a nice cozy room and here comes the end of day 7. Zzzzzz………

Beautiful Landscapes that reminded of Ladakh

Two rainbows on Dettifoss

Namafjall Hverir

Dettifoss

Geothermal activities in Hverir

Krafla power station

Viti Crater

Godafoss

Humpback whales

Humpback whales

View on the way

Pebble beach on the way to Osar HI hostel

 

[Vilas Pandey]

Beautiful.. wow...

 

[NeerajVayu]

Beautiful start, keep it rolling