Driving my way around Iceland

Every section of photos is better and better.

Next, we went upriver to the Hólmatungur area, which includes a series of waterfalls on the Jökulsá river, as well as several secondary falls also feeding into the river.

Here's the overall area:



Here's Urriðafoss:



Here's the "Katlar" ("Kettle"), where several waterfalls all mix:

Next stop was Dettifoss, Iceland's largest (by water volume) waterfall:

Getting there involves a short walk through a pretty cool basalt field:


You can tell when you are getting close to the falls from the sound, and the mist clouds:


Dettifoss.  This is one powerful waterfall.  And it kicks up so much spray that it's really difficult to photograph, since it sprays your nice SLR lens with droplets:




The mist also made for some impressive rainbows:


(The last of these was taken with my iPhone; with the much, much smaller lens, it was actually easier to keep clean for photos in the blowing mist)

Just barely south of Dettifoss is Selfoss, another waterfall.  If you look closely, Carol and I are completely soaked from standing by Dettifoss:



You've got a nice view of the basalt layer here:


 
 

After Dettifoss, our next stop was Möðrudalur, a very remote farm settlement.

On the way there, the road was amazing.  From Ásbyrgi to Möðrudalur, the drive on F842 and Highway 1 yielded terrain that resembled each of these environments: "Ireland", "Death Valley", "Sahara Desert", "Iowa", "Mars", "The Moon", "Niagara Falls", and "Weird Sci Fi Movie". All in 25 miles of driving.  Add in the constant switching between "cloudy with rain" and "sunny and dry", it was truly bizarre.

My pictures don't begin to capture it (since I was, umm, driving).  If I do that drive again, I'm taking a video out the front window.

But here are the images I did take:

After Dettifoss, when we got back to Route 1, after a while we got a bit hungry and decided to take a ~15 mile detour to Möðrudalur for a snack.

Möðrudalur is one of the highest altitude settlements in Iceland, located on the plains north of Vatnajokull.  It's pretty remote (although it used to be on the Ring Road before they rerouted it, and it's still a bus refreshment stop).

Möðrudalur is also home to Fjalladýrð, a farm that has a campground, a guest house, and restaurant.   With waffles.



The main building is a sod building:





We ended up getting both Astarpungur  ("Love Ball"), beautiful little filled donut-like pastries:



and waffles:

And this was approximately the halfway point...

Can't wait for more!

What a beautiful country!!!!!! Thanks.

Amazing rock formations and great photos! Love the sod house - I'm always interested in seeing those....don't know why, but I just love them.

As a good example of the sporadic Icelandic weather: it was warm and sunny when we go to Fjalladýrð:



10 minutes later it was sleeting:




But we headed on to Egilsstaðir.  The valley in which Egilsstaðir was filled with waterfall after waterfall, to the point where I seem to have been looking at them more than photographing them, since I only seem to have photographed one:



Egilsstaðir itself wasn't terribly picturesque, although most of the horses there had punk hairdos:

The next day, we went to the eastern Fjords.  Here's Egilsstaðir, seen from the road on the way to Seyðisfjörður:



Driving from Egilsstaðir to Seyðisfjörður involved driving over a fairly high pass, which took us well into the snow belt.  The resulting scenery was impressive:

By the way, as I'm writing this, that general part of Iceland, two weeks later, is under a state of emergency since they had an unexpected several feet of snow drop in the area.  Since this happened before the sheep roundup, it's a major problem for Icelandic sheep farmers:
 
http://www.icelandreview....and_0_393447.news.aspx

Kas..............if the Nobel Committe ever gets around to giving out a prize for the best Roadfoood/Vacation shots and commentary, you have won it hands down! ( Can't wait to see your shots of Sweden when you go to accept the prize!).

Believe it or not, I've eaten there. In 1998 I was in Stockholm for a conference, and our conference dinner was in the Nobel award room in Stockholms stadshus. Nice place. I should find my pictures.

I hiked up Hverfjall as well but fortunately it was sunny and warm.  Unfortunately, it was midge season which made it quite aggravating.
 
Ate lunch of soup and bread at Gaemli Baerinn too.  Hey, it's a small country.
 
One lane tunnels and bridges are pretty exciting.
 
Enjoying the return trip.

Extreme Glow

I hiked up Hverfjall as well but fortunately it was sunny and warm.  Unfortunately, it was midge season which made it quite aggravating.

I hear I missed out on part of the fundamental Lake Myvatn experience due to arriving after midge season.
 
Indeed, that was one almost eery thing about Iceland: it was 100% dead quiet at night.  No crickets.

Incredible trip report and pix!!  Thank you!!

Gufufoss is a rather nice waterfall above Seyðisfjörður:





The hills around Seyðisfjörður were covered with blooming flowers.



The colorful wooden buildings of Seyðisfjörður.  Most of these are actually pretty old, and were built by Norwegian settlers using imported wood, giving Seyðisfjörður a pretty unique look:

After Seyðisfjörður, we started working our way down the Eastern Fjords.  Our next stop was Reyðarfjörður, which wasn't terribly scenic (mostly, it hosts a giant Alcoa smelter), but right past town was a nice promontory that looked out over the fjord:



From that same point, you can see the next town, Eskifjörður, which is one of the major fishing ports of Eastern Iceland:



Here's looking back at that same point from Eskifjörður



Many of the smaller fjords, such as Neskaupstaður, are only accessible via boat or tunnel.  The Neskaupstaður tunnel is kind of fun, since it is 650 m long (one of the shorter tunnels... the longest we did that day was 6.5 km!)... and just like almost every highway bridge, it's single lane.

Wow! Your photos are beautiful and it just sounds like a great trip!

So spectacular. reminds me a bit of Alaska.

Kaszeta, was this a vacation/pleasure trip or are you fortunate enough to occasionally travel for business reasons?

We have been to Iceland three times so far.
The part we most enjoyed was the drive in a rented car taking the "summer road" to Isafjorour in the northwest section of Iceland.
The road is gravel but in good condition
We very seldom saw another car and the views were magnificant

I'll be honest, I spent most of the rest of that day just enjoying my driving in the fjords and not taking pictures, but did stop a few times...

For example, coming back through Reyðarfjörður, we stopped at the Iceland in WWII Museum.  Reyðarfjörður was a substantial Allied base for defending convoy operations.  Some of the base is still here, and is now used for the museum



Fáskrúðsfjörður was a nice, pleasant little fjord town that had one notable feature that jumped out to my eyes:  It was settled primarily by French fisherman, and in recognition of this, the street signs are bilingual.

I actually learned a few Icelandic words from these signs, since my French comprehension is pretty good.





At the mouth of Fáskrúðsfjörður is a boarded up and semi-derelict farm, with a nice view of the island Skrúður.

Maybe I should put in an offer?



Looking across Berufjörður towards Djúpivogur (which you can't quite make out)

ScreamingChicken

Kaszeta, was this a vacation/pleasure trip or are you fortunate enough to occasionally travel for business reasons?

Completely pleasure for this trip. 
But most of my food travels are actually combined with business.  Indeed, I'm trying to get these pictures and travel log updated before I leave for Germany on Sunday (on a work trip)
I've tried to get work, or my clients at work, to send me off to New Zealand, Antarctica, Greenland, or Iceland.  So far, no luck (I got close with New Zealand, however).

Just past Djúpivogur was this mountain that had a particular layer cake appearance.



Much of the East Coast of Iceland has some pretty cool beaches:



On our way to Höfn, we passed through the Lón area (the name means "Lagoon", it's really a giant lagoon).  The area is scenic, with nice mountains, calm water, and swans.

Yes, a *lot* of swans (look carefully in the image, and most of those black dots on the water are swans).  And at dusk, they make a lot of noise.






 
 

A particularly good example of an "Einbreið Brú" (One Lane Bridge) on the Ring Road.  At least this one had a good vantage point to see if the coast was clear:



Another view of Lón, with some cool clouds:





Once you get past Lon, you can then see the Vatnajökull ice cap, and the many tongue glaciers that form off of it.  This impressive one is Fláajökull:

The next stop was Höfn, a modestly-sized Icelandic fishing village, particularly famous for its langoustines (Norwegian lobsters).   So when we were looking for dinner, we went to the well-regarded Humarhöfnin in Höfn for Langoustines:



Carol started with the smoked duck salad, which was very nicely done. 

Smoked items in Iceland had an interesting flavor, since they smoke them on lighter wood than we usually use in the US (mostly birch and alder, those being the wood that's actually available)



And some local beer:



And finally, a boatload of lobster tails (which were phenomenal):