Iceland 2016

Day 4

4th day started with Gullfoss waterfall. Very big, picturesque, not that easy to photograph. There are many angles and places to shoot from but I wasn’t entirely happy with them. Also it’s a very popular attraction.

While travelling through Iceland I was constantly amused by huge “tourists buses”, big ass 4x4 cars. This is unlike anything else.

I bought cheap Samyang fish-eye lenses shortly before this trip. I never thought I would use in on horses, but here it is. :) We met those horses near Keldur turf houses. One of the few still left and well preserved. The area was small and not that eye catching as Glaumbauer, but if you don’t plan to go far from Reykjavik, it’s definitely worth visiting.

Rest of the day was filled with more waterfalls. Starting with the most famous Seljalandsfoss. It’s a must-go place, even though it can get crowded. A few meters on the left from Seljalandsfoss is Gljufrabui waterfall. It’s absolutely amazing, hidden, you have to pass a narrow rock passage walking on the stones (because river flows over there from the waterfall). Inside it’s very wet, so be careful about your photo equipment.

We settled for a night on a camping site right in front of another famous waterfall - Skogafoss. It was featured in Game of Thrones. It almost impossible to take a wider shot without people in the frame so if you’re planning on doing one - go very early in the morning.

Day 5

5th day.. First stop - Solheimajokull glacier. Very dirty one, not so picturesque. One good thing - you can walk up to the ice sheet, there are no huge water tanks or other obstacles. The road leading towards it was very nice.

Next stop - one of the places I really wanted to visit - the wreckage of US Navy DC plane. It’s well known but I guess not everyone wants to walk 4 km from the parking (or something that serves it’s role) and then 4km back to the car. Few years earlier it was possible to drive all the way (or almost all the way) to the plane but since then owners of the fields, between road no 1 and crash site, closed it to vehicles. The plane itself crashed on the beach in 1973 due to fuel problems and is lying there to this day. Of course it had been stripped of most important machine parts. The beach sand is dark brown / black which makes for really neat effect. Unfortunately for us a storm was coming (can be seen on one photo) and therefore we had to walk last 2km back to the car in the rain.

All soaked wet we rode to Kirkufjara beach. There we waited for a while in the car for the rain to stop and visited this lovely black beach. We had our first encounter with Puffins although they were not easily accessible for photos. I would love to go back to this place but in nicer weather.

Day 6

The night between fifth and sixth was at the most amazing camping, Thakgil (þakgil). The drive there was the most amazing part. Yellowish-green hills with nothing but grass and moss, black road and breathtaking views. We didn’t see much while going there because the weather was nasty, thick fog, a bit of rain. But we already had a feeling this is something special. While we were driving and driving on a bumpy road (supposedly only for 4x4 cars but normal vehicles got through as well) we finally arrived at the camping site which was a nice field, surrounded by hills, basically a closed arena. It was raining so we went to the cave which was a designated cooking and eating area. The evening was very nice as well, there was a big group of German tourists. They had a lot of alcohol and their own radio which they used for sing-along to old 80s disco hits. It was actually fun to sit nearby. We also talked with other campers. Really nice, fun evening. And in the morning, while we were going back to the main road, we could really see all the beautiful landscapes. Something Hobbit like, magical land.

After coming back to the main road we set course to the famous black beach near Vik. The beach was beautiful indeed but the amount of tourists was bugging me again. We weren’t there early enough to get some decent photos without them. Maybe next time…

Another interesting stop on our journey was Fjadrargljufur gorge. Last few kilometers before the gorge were pretty neat as well as we passed fields of yellow-green moss on the rocks. Very surreal surrioundings. The gorge itself was really magical, even in the rain that greeted us there. I hoped to be able to take a walk downstairs but the water was too high to go in in trekking shoes. So, only upstairs trail, but it was magical.

More of colour yellow followed us along the way as we were driving towards Fagrifoss waterfall. This time, 4x4 road F206 was really for 4x4 cars only. The road was pretty bumpy, with a lot of holes and one bigger stream we had to ride through. I was really hoping for a chance to do that. Boy, was I happy like a kid in a candy store. :)

Close to our camping site at camping Svinafell, we stopped to to check our plans for tomorrow - glaciers Skaftafellsjokull and Svínafellsjokull (left and right on the photo below). This photo shows how magnificent Icelandic landscape can be. Barren land, ceiling made of clouds and possibility to see mountains far ahead due to lack of trees. Much more breathtaking to see it live.