Iceland and The Golden Circle

It was a quick turnaround between trips, with a day and a half in Zuerich, a trip to Zuoz to discuss the canp and catch up with my friend Marc there, then home  to Russikon to pack and the next day we, Trudi and I, were on our way by Icelandic Air, a very tight-fisted airline, to Iceland, home to the gorgeous Icelandic horses, about 80,000 of them! Everywhere you look there are pastures full of them, many with their young foals. How I wish I could still ride.

With our comfortable hire car and great roads, we soon made it to our first stop, Sellfoss. Our first evening's experience was wonderful in an old 19 th century house which had been converted into a very cosy, up- market restaurant. The food was not cheap but was extremely tasty, and most importantly, we felt we were in Iceland! 

Looks as if my run of good weather might have come to an abrupt end, although we had some clear spells with no rain and good visibility today, so nothing to complain about if you had the right clothes. Luckily, at the magnificent crater, Kerid, it was dry and so the walk around the crater rim afforded fantastic views of this huge 55 m deep crater.  The vegetation on the rim was really beautiful too, as seen in this photo.

Just up the road is the famous Geysir geo- thermal area which I visited a couple of years back. The big geyser is still letting off steam every 3-5 minutes. An incredible sight.

Despite being motivated to learn Icelandic after the Polyglot gathering, I sadly met my match and gave up days after starting. The pronunciation of words could not be further removed from the spelling, and even with the help of other languages, guessing meaning is generally hard- going. 

The restaurant area at Geysir had this fabulous wall made of small logs. What a clever and effective idea! Would love to do something like that at home.

Ten minutes further on is the massive Gullfoss, Europe's largest waterfall in terms of the volume of water. Even though the last time I saw it was in perfect weather, the cloudy skies and drizzle today did not detract at all from this breathtaking view and the noise of those millions of litres of water thundering down into the valley. 

Our final stop was a bit of fun! Just in the neighbouring town, village, of Hveragerdi, we visited the small geothermal park where you could buy an egg and boil it in the bubbling thermal water. 10 minutes was needed for a perfectly boiled, softish egg. It was a super, one- off experience!

Next door was a local bakery, with its geothermal kitchen, and unbelievably high prices! About 13 euros for a piece of cake. I don't see myself eating many desserts here! That's good 😀