Final day in Iceland

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Last day in Iceland today. We visited the capital city which seems to be less like a capital city than pretty much any other place I’ve been. There is some stunning architecture, some lovely art galleries and a whole slew of souvenir shops (almost as many as there are in Whitby) but there was not the level of hustle and bustle that I have seen in most capitals. Not that this was a bad thing, it was nice just to be able to saunter round from one really nice place to another.

Home tomorrow. Oh well.

Keflavik and the Blue Lagoon

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Today finds us at the very edge of Iceland, up past Keflavik at the Garður Old Lighthouse which also hosts a really nice restaurant. The weather is trying to make amends for being super wet earlier in the week, not that it has stopped us doing much but it does rather spoil your photographs when you can’t see the top half of the sky for cloud. Anyhoo, this is an amazing place. Even better in good weather.

For the afternoon we headed to the Blue Lagoon, a hot spring that is a “must visit” in the same way that Disneyland is a must see if you ever go to Florida. Just like Disneyland it was expensive, but the experience was worth it. You are out in the open in cloudy blue water that is around the same temperature as a warm bath. Apparently the minerals in the water are good for your skin. There are also mud packs which we tried (they were included in the package). The consensus of the folks around me was that the mud pack didn’t do much for me. The only comment of note was that I looked slightly less scary once I had washed it off.

The spa is surrounded by amazing landscape.

Travelling the Golden Circle

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What with me now being a confident Icelandic driver we thought we’d spend today driving “The Golden Circle”. After “sanity checking” the route with the ever-helpful hotel staff we headed off into the unknown on the wrong side of the road….

Actually, I’ve decided that it is not “the wrong side of the road” if everyone is doing it. Not that this is stopping me getting this ghastly frisson each time I see a car coming towards me on the “wrong” side. Then I realise that I’m on the wrong side too, and all is well. Roundabouts are a challenge though, it feels as if I’m deliberately turning into the face of oncoming traffic when I enter one.

Anyhoo, we set off with a bunch of locations programmed into the phone. It all worked splendidly,. I’d taken my venerable old Fuji FX100 camera and managed to get some reasonable pictures. You can click through the images to larger versions on Flickr if you are so minded.

Heading to Iceland (not the shop)

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We were up bright and very early this morning to fly to Iceland. Silly me, I thought that because our flight left at 6:30 am the airport would be pretty much deserted when we arrived. Not so. It turns out that, probably because of airport fees or something) that the place was absolutely packed at 5:00 am. Folks were downing lagers and bottles of wine in preparation for their trips. Good for them. We made do with a coffee and a bun.

Never been to Iceland before. We’re staying at a little hotel just outside Reykjavik for a few days. We’ve hired a car too (such bravery). Should be fun. We’ve already discovered that there is a waterfall a few minutes walk from the hotel.