The Munchkin's Notebook

Today was our last day in Iceland, we fly home tomorrow.  We capped the trip off with an hour snowmobiling ride on a glacier.  We were picked up at the Gullfoss visitor center, by a Mercedes off road van, it had really big tires. Think jacked up pickup truck with monster tires. It was a thirty minute drive on an “F” road (mountain dirt road requiring 4 wheel drive, actual 4 wheel drive not AWD).  They are serious about the “F” roads, regular passenger cars on them can get fined, they don’t really plow them, and the snow can be several meters deep.  So after the bumpy thirty minute drive we arrived at the shack to suit up into snowsuits suits and get on the snowmobiles. We had new four stroke, bright red snowmobiles, the handle bars were even heated to keep your hands toasty. When we started I was leading then was passed by my husband because I wasn’t going fast enough. It was interesting riding because there was a thin crust with snow underneath, very differen...

Husafoss Today we traveled from the northern area of Iceland past Reykjavik to the Golden Circle area.  It is about a 4 to 5 hour drive without stops, but we made several stops along the way.  Our first stop was at Husafoss to see two waterfalls. One of which comes out of lava rocks from underground rivers.  The second stop was at a point of interest which had a bunch of little cairns. The third stop was at Þingveller, which is a national park and was the location of the Viking Althing. We did a little bit of light hiking there, to a waterfall.  Then we headed up to Geysir, before heading to our hotel.  The Geysir was not as impressive as I hoped, especially after being at Yellowstone.  The Geysir area is small little cluster of geysers with one that erupts about every 10 to 15 minutes.  It was cute. Little Cairs before  Þingveller Waterfall at Þingveller Our hotel seems rather old; at least the furnishings make it feel that ...

Today we slept in, if you call sleeping till 7:30 AM sleeping in, and took our time to eat breakfast and leave the hotel.  We still left by 9:30 AM that gave us several hours to kill before we could check into our next hotel or go horseback riding, which were only about an hour and half away.  We are determining the route could have been better spaced or activities better timed. So we to fill time we stopped at almost every information and point of interest point along the way.  We also tried to take a ferry out to one of the islands but they don’t run in the morning on Sunday.    Some of the points of interest were good, others were busts. The most interesting one we stopped at was the sod homes at Glaumbær along route 75.  Those were interesting, but the two busloads of senior citizens on vacation overwhelmed the place.  We also stopped at a point of interest which had a statue of a fisherman looking out to sea, and another stop were there ...

Today we woke up to sunshine and blue sky, the first time we seen those on the trip.  We then grabbed a quick breakfast and headed down to Myvatn to go caving.  Entrance to Cave Our guide picked us and eight other people up at the Myvatn visitor center for the hour drive, on very rough terrine through the lava field to the cave site. Once we reached the cave site we had about a 30 minute hike across the lava field to the cave entrance. Once at the entrance we descended down some stairs and then put on the special cave boots and rain or waterproof pants.  The boots were basically those trendy galoshes people like to wear, except these had little metal studs in the bottom so you could walk on ice.  This was required because the whole floor of the cave is ice.   To enter the main section of the cave must climb up about 7 feet then crawl on your belly through an opening that is 1.5 feet tall and 6 feet wide, while executing a turn to flip your feet in ...

Today we drove out to Asbyrgi to hike and then were supposed to drive down to Dettifoss, the largest waterfall in Iceland.  It was a two hour drive from Akureyri to Asbyrgi in overcast and cloudy weather.  The Asbyrgi visitor center, for the national park, is nice and is the trailhead for several trails of varying difficulty.  We took a red trail, which is medium difficulty and marked by sticks with yellow paint on them. The hike was about 7 or 8 km long.  We hiked to the top of the basalt wall, granting us a good view of Jokulsargljufur canyon below; we also hiked through some birch woods and moorland.  After lunch, we hiked down to a small waterfall and pond.   We then were supposed to travel down to Dettifoss and hike in that area, however the both roads leading from Asbyrgi to the falls were closed, thus we could not get there today.  We are hoping after tomorrow’s excursion through the lava tubes and caves near Myvatn, the road to Dettifoss ...

Today we made the two hour drive to Akureyri.  When we left the hotel in the morning it was raining/snowing, which the hotel owner said was very unusual for this time of year.  She said they had a longer and colder winter then in the past and by now it is usually warmer and not as wet.    The journey to Akureyri was uneventful; however we encountered two unique tunnels.  The tunnels which were 4 kilometers and 7 kilometers long were one car wide with pull offs for cars going in the opposite direction.  We were going in the direction that had right of way.  It can be nerve racking watching for headlights and hoping they move over into a pull off before you get to them.   Akureyri from the whale watching boat We arrived in Akureyri around 11:00 AM, it is tiny for being a major city. So after checking into our hotel, where we will stay for a few nights, we went to find lunch.  We at a place called Serrano, which is Iceland...

Today we left Hellnar today and drove around the Snaefellsnes peninsula all the way to Lonkot, which is an eight hour drive.  We made very few stops along the way, and the few stops we did make were very short.  The first stop we made was in Hellissandur to get gas. Getting gas involved us going inside to figure out how the gas pump works because you have to prepay by guess how much gas you will need, but the system will only charge you for the amount used. The other hard part was estimating liters instead of gallons.  Our next stop was Kirkjufell, outside of Grundarfjordur to photograph a waterfall.  Several people were stopped at that water fall taking pictures.    We ran out of paved road about 22 kilometers past Grundarfjordur, at that point it turned into a gravel and dirt road.  Yes it is still a main road and even indicates on the map it turns to gravel and dirt.  The gravel and dirt road lasted for approximately 66 kilometers. ...