I went to Iceland with my sister Sue, her husband Ian, and their twins Jenna and Sam. We took the 7.05am Easyjet plane from my local airport, Luton, and in three hours time we were in a hire car, a big 4wd Ford. We went to Reykjavik to have a look round, my first impression was of a very modern town of flats, there were no rows of old terrace brick houses to be seen at all. A clean town, fresh and colourful with an attractive waterfront area. We went to a big modern cathedral, Hallsgrimkirkja, and up to the 8th floor to see the town from above.
After lunch we were ready to drive out to our cottage, a 1.5 hour journey from here. We drove past lovely mountains and lakes, and there was very little traffic about. Uthlid Cottage was massive, with 4 en-suite bedrooms and a jacuzzi , but the most surprising thing was the stag head on the wall!
Uthlid is not far from Geysir, so we went to have a look at the World famous site. There were lots of tourists here, taking photos, waiting around the hot, muddy, bubbling pools for the gushers to activate. And they did activate, about every 8 minutes or so, one was impressive.Such an eerie landscape, with steam coming out of the ground, and pools of boiling water.
this video was not too great, because I missed the actual eruption!
It was a fascinating place to visit.
Then back to the cottage, and a meal in the local bar.
We had a hot tub in the back room of the cottage, so we heated it up and had a nice sit in it. All the hot water and heating was from natural geothermal sources, as it is everywhere is Iceland. The hot tub was a nice idea, but it was rather smelly, sort of sulphurous, and when I got out, I realised that it had tarnished my lovely silver bracelet. Ian suggested we soak it in vinegar, and when that didn't work, I soaked it in salt water, but no luck. (in the end I used silver polish at home - that worked)
The showers smelled of sulphur too.
On Saturday we headed for Skaefellsnes Peninsular, towards the North West. We went to the lake Dingvallavatn, right through the mountains on route 550 Kaldiddur as far as the road allowed, because at this point, the internal roads were closed for winter. Incredible views, the lakes were calm and cold-looking, with perfect reflections of the sky and mountains.
I spotted what looked like a hobbit house from the road, so we stopped to have a closer look...
Turning off west onto the route 52 to Borgarnes, where we stopped to eat lunch, then north on the 5 and 55, the roads turned bumpy and winding, long routes through the mountains, where we enjoyed stopping to explore the local terrain. Eventually we arrived at Stykkisholmur where there was a harbour and fabulous views.
The light faded very slowly, almost imperceptibly, but it was dark by 7pm. A very long car journey home. Very long.
On Sunday morning, I watched the sky over the mountains from our cottage, all pink and orange and blue. There was a chapel down the hill with a glass bell-tower, very pretty when the sun shone through it.
A few miles away was Gullfoss, a wide waterfall, well a series of waterfalls in fact. I managed to fall down on my bottom on the icy slope, so didn't quite make it down to the lower viewing platform, but I did get fantastic views from the higher platforms.
The spectacular Gullfoss
Onto the next waterfall - this time Seljalandsfoss, and it was very special because we walked behind it! What an amazing experience this was, totally exhilarating, as well as very wet! In the absence of the Northern Lights on this trip, I decided to make this experience on of my 50 List things - a fair substitution.
One part was particularly steep and slippery, but a woman held out her hand to me, supporting my ascent.
Seljalandsfoss Waterfall, from behind
Nearby was a third waterfall, called Skogafoss,with a powerful 64m drop. As we walked towards it, we realised that actually, you can't get anywhere near it, because it creates such a strong wind and big waves in the pool below it. You get soaking wet and frozen, and the wind blows you backwards.
After these 3, we had had enough of waterfalls, and went to visit a glacier. The route took us off the road and onto a very bumpy track - good thing we had the 4wd, or it would have been impossible. We parked up and walked down the track to the front of the glacier, which was dirty with ash, but close up we could see the ice was blue in places.
We also drove over to the Eyjafjallajokull volcano that had erupted in 2010, creating an ash cloud that disrupted flights for weeks.
On Monday, we went back to Reykjavik to take a longer walk round, taking in the opera house, that reminded me of the Millennium Music Hall in Cardiff, that square frontage that looks as if it is learning forward.
Once I got to the pool, I found the water warm, verging on hot in parts - 37 to 39 degrees in fact. There is a temperature display sign. The Blue Lagoon was the oddest place I have ever seen, heads bobbing about in a hot pool with steam coming off the surface the whole time.
There were buckets of silica to rub onto our faces, so we had a go, and you get the extraordinary sight of half the heads bobbing about in the water are covered in a white coating, which is cracking up like glazing on an old pot. I kept laughing aloud at the sheer weirdness of the whole experience. The air temperature was around 5 degrees, yet here we were, swimming in a hot outdoor pool, steam and mist blocking our view of the surrounding mountains, and of other people bobbing about in the water.
When you read about the Blue Lagoon, it loses some of its romance - 'The lagoon is a man-made lagoon which is fed by the water output of the nearby geothermal power plant Svartsengi and is renewed every two days. Superheated water is vented from the ground near a lava flow and used to run turbines that generate electricity. After going through the turbines, the steam and hot water passes through a heat exchanger to provide heat for a municipal water heating system. Then the water is fed into the lagoon for recreational and medicinal users to bathe in.'
I am very pleased that I went to the Blue Lagoon, and would recommend it to visitors, but if I go back to Iceland, I would not visit it again - after all, it is just a swimming pool.
Iceland is a fascinating and extraordinary place, the landscape is beautiful, extreme, and often simply strange. I enjoyed my visit, and would love to go back some day. Thank you to Sue and Ian for taking me with them and making all the arrangements, I really do appreciate it.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=BFQPNApwJGU
No comments:
Post a Comment