July 15 – Golden Circle: The Golden Circle is where most of the tourists go when they are Reykjavik centered and have limited time. But has some wonderful places, so you can see why they are all tourist attractions. Left lodgings about 8:30 returning about 5:30.
First stop was Þingvellir National Park. It was cold and raining for most of this visit and we were pestered by bugs. But it was good to see the park and see if it a place Jeff wants to take folks. The park straddles two tectonic plates – Eurasian and North American. It’s the place where the first parliament of Iceland met, has a church, river running through the valley. It’s a nice walk over the trail even with the busloads of other folks. We mostly stayed away from them. Good vistas over long distances. Had some respite from the rain. Hard, long walk uphill back to car park.
Next to Geysir for the geyser. Before going out, we had a nice salmon sandwich at the reception building. Again, busloads of folks, but could get really nice burst shots of the main geyser when it blew every 5-8 minutes. Spent a lot of time waiting for the geyser to erupt to get more and better shots. And the sun came out. Part of this place is like Yellowstone and like other places with hot springs and geysers. Very nice.
The main deal was Gullfoss waterfall. Its really big and broad. Our thing there was to use neutral density filters to slow the water in our images to a silky consistency. Experimented and got some nice images. Also worked with Jeff’s crystal ball there. As we left, it really started to rain and rained most of the way back.
Finally, on our way back to Reykjavik, we stopped at Laugarvatn at a place called Galleri and had teatime snacks. I had a fresh baked rye with Brie and an espresso. Yum.
Got home about 5:30, downloaded images, and out to dinner about 7:00 to Old Iceland Restaurant where we had a three-course dinner of smoked salmon, fillet of lamb, and brownie with ice cream. Best meal we’ve had so far. Expensive, but worth it. Oh, and had the Iceland aquavit, Brennivin. Lovely!
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