Author: jo

Invertebrates

Broom moth caterpillar (marmite Caterpillar!) – spotted by Mila on the path between the car park and the waterfall at Gullfoss.

Birds

Gyrfalcon – seen flying along the road between Reykjavik and Geysir. I am assuming it was a Gyrfalcon by picture reference and the fact it was too big to be a merlin. No promises!! A much more definite sighting happened in Siglufjordur, where I saw a pair playing on the thermals.

Rock Ptarmigan – in summer plumage wandered onto the path in front of us as we explored the geysirs late at night. It had flashes of white under it’s wings and didn’t bother flying away from us, just waddled along the path until it go where it was going.

Greylag goose – spotted next to a small lake at the side of the road in a family of about 6.

Whooper Swan – again a really common bird seen in fields and alongside water of every description in massive numbers. Flocks seen on the sea as well.

Black backed gull – no idea whether we saw the greater or the lesser or both. If anyone wants to teach me how to spot the difference…

Oyster catcher – we saw these at the edge of every gravel road; on every field and at the edge of every puddle. Keith claimed to keep missing them!

Arctic tern – We got slightly attacked by these on a beach when we got a bit close to resting juveniles and saw them at the edge of the sea everywhere we saw the sea!

Arctic Skua – seen on a tarmac road in the way to Gluggafoss and then EVERYWHERE we went on the coast. They confused me as I thought I was watching two separate birds until I worked out they have dark and light phase and were the same bird. We frequently saw them harassing other sea birds: arctic terns particularly.

White wagtail – seen at Gluggafoss taking insects from the moss walls and the edges of the quieter water.

Common snipe – we saw this everywhere there was water!! Common indeed.

Puffin
We saw puffins in two places: Dyrholaey and Borgarfjordur. We were told that the second (Borgarfjordur) was the best and most reliable, but obviously this is entirely dependent on the season. We saw literally thousands in the colony at Dyrholaey and they were constantly flying from the cliffs to the sea and back – so we assumed they were still feeding young. At Borgarfjordur, about a week later, we still saw some puffins flying back and forth and these ones were clearly successful in their hunting – returning with fish – most of the birds were sitting our on the sea resting. I presumed that was families whose chicks had fledged.

Shag – Danny spotted this and thought it was a cormorant, but when we looked at the pictures, pretty sure it was a shag…

Fulmar – Once I had worked out what these were, I saw them everywhere! We also saw them nesting with the puffins.

Kittiwake – these were easy to identify feeding on the nest as they were SO noisy!! When they were flying, it was much harder.

We also saw wrens, black birds, starlings, ravens and a red wing that required a direct translation from the latin by one of our guides. Thanks god for google!!

Mammals

Icelandic horses – we saw more of these than I would have expected to support the tourists who want to ride them. I assume they are kept for breeding and export as well as they must be expensive to feed over the winter.

Few horse breeds have more than four gaits. The Icelandic Horse is a breed apart from all other horse breeds, in more than a few aspects, and among its most celebrated features is its five natural, and unique gaits: the walk, the trot, the canter, the tölt, and the flying pace.

Sheep – Icelandic sheep are particularly stupid. Icelandic people constantly moan about how stupid their sheep are: they go into cracks and get stuck, they fall over and can’t get up, they fall into caves and have to be rescued. Poor sheep!!

Cows – we saw more cows than I expected, but apparently they are kept indoors throughout the winter as they wouldn’t cope with the extreme cold. They were very pretty and didn’t seem to be kept in “breed herds” like we see in this country.

Goats – we were warned that we would see loads of these, but actually we only saw them once, running full tilt down the road we were driving on. I am not sure if they were escaping or commuting!!

Harbour seals – these were such a joy to observe. We saw them in the glacier lagoon, on the beach outside the glacier lagoon and near the puffin sanctuary. We were hoping to visit another two seal colonies, but didn’t have time. Next trip!!

Humpback whale – seen on our whale watching trip from a boat off Hauganes. All credit to the spotter and pilot who managed to get us close to where they came back up after being submerged for 10 minutes. Beautiful creatures!!

Harbour porpoise – seen as black shapes in the distance (spotted by Danny and Jo, identified by the boat spotter) but we didn’t get close enough for photos.

Fish

Brown trout baby – spotted in the cauldera. Again, it is only internet research that has decided on its genus, so don’t hold me to it!

Flora

Prizes available if you can name any of these…

Lupins – I read about this phenomena before we left home. In summary, concerned about erosion, an Icelandic man visited places with similar climates and brought back lupins to help hold the soil together. He returned with a handful of seeds and now there are lupins EVERYWHERE! We missed the main flowering as we arrived a little too late, but there were still odd plants in flower.

The alarm went off at 4.30am. Rooms checked out of, we collected our breakfast bags from the nice (tired) receptionist and we were ready to go home.

The taxi arrived at 5.15am which was terrifying because we expected it at 5.00am. The taxi driver needed a wee when he arrived, but then entertained us all the way to the airport with excellent stupid tourist stories. Americans and Germans don’t seem to have made themselves popular in general, although obviously he has met some lovely individuals. He had been asked to drive some Americans straight from the the airport to the volcano and refused as they were wearing crocs and shorts!

He was a big football fan and had been to many British football grounds. He was momentarily disappointed to realise that we weren’t, but Keith managed to maintain a conversation. He asked whether we remembered the England, Iceland match in 2016 in France. He said that 35,000 Icelandic people attended… which is 9.5% of the population!!!

He told us a bit about the Icelandic school system: 10 years in primary school (in local schools) and then 3 or 4 in secondary schools that they probably had to travel to. About 60% of Icelandic children go on to secondary school and half of those go onto further education. Reykjavik has two universities. There are vocational secondary schools as well that seem to work like our apprenticeships as they work for at least a year with a company before they gain qualification.

The airport was very busy, but clever Keith found automated check-in and automated bag drop and we whizzed through to security. This was straightforward too – apart from Danny being put on a step like a naughty child to have a lolly stick put up his sleeve to test for firearms residue, drugs or whatever else he shouldn’t have been touching!

We filled our water bottles and bought coffees to sustain us and then went to the gate. The lady working there did not help the queueing situation: anyone who hadn’t been through a check-in desk with a person (like us) was told to go to the front of the queue. Sadly it was a scrum, so it wasn’t clear where the front was. We tried to walk forwards, only to be accosted by an older British man who told a British woman near him that he found that highly unlikely when she repeated the instruction she had been given. Evidence that everyone was a bit tired and emotional. (EDIT: Keith – I offered a suitably sarcastic comment in response to his pathetic “let’s block them” comment. Yes, he really did say that….we spend 2 weeks in Icelandic with nothing but polite, generous people then arrive at the airport to meet a Brit who was rude, ignorant and generally stupid. Ashamed to be British sometimes).

It turned out to be true – to get back into the UK, an actual human had to see our passports and boarding passes. That meant that about half the flight had to queue up and go through the check-in process we skipped by doing the automated route earlier. Deep joy! Strangely enough the plane didn’t leave without us and after everyone had finally got on, we joined the plane queue and took off. Danny was worried about the wind – which was about 30mph – and we did go up pretty steeply, but it made our journey a lot quicker on the way home – 2 hours 10 minutes compared with 3 hours 50 minutes!

The kids sat a long way behind us, so we didn’t hear a peep out of them all flight. The toddler kicking my chair for two hours reminded me how glorious it is to travel with teenagers!

Manchester was full of people, but apart from that, entirely easy and very fast: security was easy (fast track well worth it – although the border guard did make Danny sign his psssport!!) the bags came out pretty much first, the car collection was super easy and the traffic was fine.

I managed to rustle up cupboard lunch for everyone and Keith fetched a very giddy Moss back from the kennels. It is official: we are home and the holiday is over.

Breakfast was exactly as we have come to expect, except with many more biscuits than usual and “oatmeal” that tasted like rice pudding.

We were collected for our excursion from the bus stop outside the hotel by minibus and then swapped to a coach at the city bus station to get to the Lava Tunnel at Raufarholshellir. We were not immediately greeted and given instructions, so our tour acted like a flock of chickens trying to find scraps of food! The poor lady behind the desk must have said the same thing twenty times! After a little patience had been applied “Mr Guide” appeared to tell us what to do and everyone relaxed. He did have an Icelandic name, but it was too hard so he told us to call him “excuse me” or “Mr Guide”. He was funny. Lots of dad jokes but they were genuinely amusing and made most of his English speaking audience giggle. The poor Spanish people didn’t have a clue as normal! He told us not to be idiots and led us into the tunnel.

The first section was well lit as there were “sky lights” (direct translation) where the ceiling had fallen in. It was a big tunnel – about 16m high and littered with debris. They had done an excellent job of paving the floor with rocks so it was pretty flat to walk on. He told us how the tunnel had formed and that when full, the lava was the consistency of ketchup and flowed as fast as a man could run. He told us that the red colour was simply rust (iron oxide) and the yellow was sulphur. Then he told us that if you smell sulphur in the tunnel, it isn’t an imminent eruption, just the person in front of you farting! He said most tunnels are named after the person who found them. He recounted that Icelandic sheep are stupid and fall into tunnels from above all the time…the farmer then goes looking for the sheep and falls into the same hole – and this is why the Icelandic population is so small!

He took us into a darker section where the tunnel was intact and explained that the only thing living there (apart from the obvious trolls) was a white bacteria that feeds on the iron and other minerals. It doesn’t need air, oxygen or light. NASA have been to look at it as they think it might be the kind of life present on Mars. Then he apologised for what he was about to say and asked us not to lick the walls! He said it wouldn’t hurt us but was really bad for the bacteria!!

The next section had the original lava glass tunnel lining, or something very close to obsidian in loads of coffee cup rings. Hanging from some of the rings were “lava dicks”, recently renamed to “lava candles” to avoid offending tourists! They look a bit like stalactites but are formed by molten rock dripping and not water and so they will never grow back. There is a two year prison sentence associated with damaging them or being found in possession of them – but he said that since Icelandic hotels are nicer than their hotels that we might like to extend our stay.

Next he turned off all the lights and let us experience the complete dark under ground. He said that if we stayed in the dark for too long, our brains would stop looking for signals from our eyes and effectively we would go blind. Then he told us he had turned the light back on (without actually turning it on) and said that was his best joke! Finally he showed us some hollow lava straws hanging from the ceiling and told us we were allowed to take photos.

Keith took a few and then we headed back to the entrance. Helmets off, thank yous made, lava tunnel done!!

We got the coach back to the hotel, changed into city-clothes (with waterproofs!) and headed off to explore Reykjavík! Danny was desperate to try a rental scooter so we had to find a time to do that. I wanted to visit the phallological museum but Keith and Danny were not keen.

We started on Laugavegur which is the main shopping street, on the lookout for our lunch recommendation: Sandholt bakery. We popped into a few touristy shops before finding the bakery, but only had to wait one minute while the waitress wiped the table before we sat down to lunch. The cakes and pastries looked amazing on the way in and the savoury food on tables round us was also enticing! We ordered two sandwiches and a bowl of shashlick. After a little disagreement about the lack of sausage, we very much enjoyed the food and started planning pudding. Weirdly the pastries are not that expensive and we went all out and had one each. They were good, but the bun that had just been iced in the kitchen was the best. Annoyingly I can’t remember what it was called but it was a bit like a tall Belgian bun. Delicious. (EDIT: Keith – this was the first proper cup of coffee we found. Iceland is not a place if you like real coffee, as nearly everywhere uses cheap coffee machines which do a pathetic job!)

Next stop was Hallsgrimskirkja which is Reykjavík’s famous church. It is striking from the outside and you can see the echoes of the vertical basalt pillars we have seen at waterfalls all over the country and the silhouette is a replica of a classic volcano. It took 45 years to build and was only finished in 1984. It is free to enter and we were lucky enough to witness an organist practising for a marathon four hour recital tomorrow (EDIT: Keith – fortunately we didn’t stay and listen for the whole recital!). He was pretty good; his organ was amazing (EDIT: Keith – did she really just say that…) I didn’t recognise what he was playing but we were all amused by tourists trying to decide whether or not to clap. They came down on the side of not. Thank goodness! The inside of the church is positively ascetic. Imagine a Catholic church and then think of the absolute opposite in poured concrete with no decoration whatsoever and only function.

We continued our meander down Laugavegur, pausing at a few jewellery shops, an art shop with a gorgeous abstract original of a waterfall (a snip at quarter of a million Kroner) and a t-shirt shop with some epic logos. We restricted the children to clean ones and I got an Icelandic reusable shopping bag.

We popped out of the end of the road at the ring road and the harbour. Keith and Danny checked out the DJI drone shop (to see if Ian in London had popped in!) and Mila and I wandered around H&M checking out prices and wondering who in Iceland buys any of these floaty, summery clothes, except maybe to take on holiday to Spain!

Just around the corner was a nice, big, open pedestrianised area, perfect for teenagers to practise their scootering! I went inside the Harpa concert hall where it was warm and dry (and made of concrete and glass!) while they played in the rain! They came in happy but soggy after about 10 minutes. Sadly the rain had set in and although we waited for a while, it didn’t look like stopping. We had a 25 minute walk along the seafront to get to our last excursion of the trip: Fly Over Iceland. Uber doesn’t exist in Iceland and the app we were sent to for buses didn’t want to work. I went to ask a cashier in a tourist shop for help and she gave me another app to try. Keith managed to download it, register his credit card and buy four tickets in time to set off for the bus stop (which didn’t have a shelter!). We stood in the rain like stoic sheep waiting for the bus, which was early! We hopped on and were magically whizzed to our destination! We were a bit soggy but not as bad as if we had walked the whole way.

Fly Over Iceland was by far the most touristy place we have been, but there were Icelandic families taking their children as well. We had a short wait before our “flight” and then we were encouraged to have our photo taken on the way in (Alton Towers style!) Our sense of humour had been compromised by the weather so we declined that bit (EDIT: Keith – we never have our photos taken before rides…..shocking way of fleecing people!)

The first room was a video of a man touching on the hardships Icelandic settlers experienced and the mindset of perseverance required to live successfully in such an uncompromising landscape. I liked his beard but thought the length of time he left snow coming in the open door unrealistic. I am pretty sure that if you have to collect drift wood and dry it out to light a fire, you are going to get through that door pretty quickly!

The next room featured images being projected vertically onto a moving screen in front of us and horizontally onto the floor. It was quite clever: when you saw the viking ship on front of you, you could see the sea on the floor. I genuinely don’t remember what information we were given at this point, but trolls were involved! (EDIT: Keith – I also don’t remember since it was just a way of prolonging the ‘experience’ so it felt better value for money!)

The screen promised that a troll would show us onto the ride, but that didn’t happen. To be honest I was ready to be disappointed, but I was wrong. We were securely strapped into a bank of ten seats. I think there were four banks in total. Then the barrier right in front of us was dropped and the seats moved to the edge so we were feet from a 180° curved screen and from above aromas, hot/cold air and water was sprayed onto us at the right moment.

The film looked like drone or helicopter footage of some of the most spectacular places in Iceland. We recognised some of them. The seats moved to simulate the motion of the viewpoint and waterfalls, cloud or steam all resulted in a puff of vapour in your face. I would love to do it again – perhaps next time I wouldn’t need to lift my feet up every time the water or top of the mountain got too close!

Our journey back to the hotel was uneventful due to Keith levelling up on Icelandic public transport from member to fellow (that is a Chartered Institute of Management joke in case that was not obvious!!). We were a little damp again when we got back to the hotel.

It was time to start packing. Keith’s genius idea of taking reusable shopping bags in the suitcases so we could have “outdoor” bags in the car had paid off in full over the last two weeks, but now we had to squeeze it all back into the suitcases. Nobody wants to be forced to plastic wrap a Sainsbury’s bag in the airport!

Our last Icelandic dinner was the other end of town but the rain had stopped, so we set off for our 8pm table. I had adopted a high risk strategy of wearing my travelling outfit, so was now desperate to stay dry! We wandered down the same street as earlier, this time surrounded by rowdy but good natured Icelandic youth as well as tourists. Tomorrow is a national holiday, so I guess most people had finished work, ready to party for the weekend.

We found the restaurant easily enough with Google Maps and took our seats. Our starter came almost immediately, but for some reason we then had to wait about 40 minutes for our main course. It turned out to be worth the wait. I had wolf fish (lobster texture and tasted of seafood as well – apparently they eat almost exclusively shellfish) which was amazing, Danny had a salmon burger that he very much enjoyed. Mila will tell you about the rest of the meal!

It was quite late by the time we finished eating and headed back up the hill to the hotel. Danny commented VERY subtley on what a good system the scooters were and that he might have to pick his university city based on where they were available! We let them both have another go in the pedestrianised area, which made Danny very happy!

Back to the hotel, kids to bed, packing finished, sleep!

It was a very early start as we were planning a 2 hour journey, a 5 hour hike and a hire car drop off by 3pm. We collected our hilarious packed “breakfast” from reception and were on our way by 7.00am.

All we saw for a while were deserted roads apart from the odd car doing silly speeds. There was an interesting pipe running parallel to the road but we weren’t sure what it was – unusual to see in the normally unspoilt landscape. We saw geese and sheep and the beautiful Icelandic ponies but not much else. Both kids went back to sleep, so there was peace in the back and the front!

When we reached Hvalfjordr, we realised we had a tunnel to go through under the fjord. It was weirdly v-shaped tunnel: 6km long with an 8% decline and then a 10% incline. It made our ears pop. I don’t think the children even noticed!

After that it was a much busier run into Reykjavik and, after a quick stop for pastries and fruit, straight out the other side towards the active volcano. We were a bit tense as the weather had been shocking the day before and the site had been closed. The notice put up at about 10pm said they would update the website after the 10am meeting on the next day. We had been planning to start our hike at 9am to make everything fit, so we figured we would get the drive done and wait in the car park if necessary with baited breath.

Handily, when Keith checked the official website at a junction at about 8.50am, there was a notice saying all routes were open. With much woohooing, we drove the final 10 minutes to the parking and found a spot amongst another 50 cars. They were frantically building a new parking area, even at that time in the morning in the middle of nowhere, but it wasn’t open yet. We had to yomp across some open land (apologising to the delicate flora as we went) to cross the road and get the nod from the policeman. The family in front of us got turned back as the children were quite clearly under 12. They have had to put an age limit on it as gas pockets collect close to the ground and short people are particularly susceptible. Cue all the jokes about my height…

The start of the path is the one used last year to get to the previous eruption. It is a wide and easy climb to the cooling lava flow, which doesn’t look that big when you are right next to it. The path keeps climbing and around another switchback you can see the extent of the flow. Immense and SO black. Another few climbs got most of the 990m of ascent completed and all of us very hot! We shed many layers and set off again. The path was still pretty easy and took us across an undulating area. We came to another lava field – this one still steaming in many places. Understandably we kept our distance. Here the path went many kinds of wrong – essentially disappeared – and left us with posts to follow through scattered rocks in moss. I would love to know  the statistics on twisted ankles and broken legs – it was awful and lasted about 1km. We had to go so slowly and you couldn’t look up at all with immediately tripping on a very rough rock.

The path reappeared amongst diggers and workmen trying to improve the route and the relief in all the walkers was palpable. It wasn’t super busy, but we overtook a few parties in our enthusiasm. I am not sure when I became the slowest member of the family, but now my little legs hamper me!!

We had a small drop in elevation round and past the end if another lava flow. I checked and it was cool, but after Oli’s warning I didn’t fancy a walk on it. Other people did. Natural selection did not take place, to the mutual dissatisfaction of all the people tutting on the path!

The last rise was a slow incline and revealed it’s treasure incrementally. Mila and I both squeaked as we saw red being shot into the sky in the diference. A couple of American ladies had exactly the same response and we shared that the 6km hike was already worthwhile!

As we approached the edge, the crater was revealed with a small lava lake just outside and a single lava flow around to the right. We took our places on the steep scree slope to watch and take photos. It was like being in an amphitheatre and the crowd was very appreciative of the drama: a chunk of the crater edge fell into the lava with a sound between a crash and a gurgle (we have had a family discussion and no-one can come up with a good description of the noise, sorry!)

It was very surreal eating sandwiches and Giflar while watching a volcano erupt. Puts A-level results day into perspective anyway!

We sat for about 30 minutes while Keith took (more than 1,000) photos. Danny identified and worried about the drones flying around and about the crater. We have been watching “Ian in London” on YouTube, who has been filming the eruption using various drones – most of which he has melted, getting too close to the lava. I am not surprised, we could feel the heat coming off it from 300m away.

Shock horror, I had every scrap of clothing I owned on by this point (having walked up  in a jumper) and was shivering with white fingers. I didn’t want to curtail Keith’s fun, so I didn’t moan, but when he was ready to go, I was very ready! It took me half way back across the awful bit to get sensation back in my fingers and then 5 minutes later I had to take my coat off again!

Mila did a fantastic job – she has had a cold and has had a sore throat for 3 days now. She didn’t moan at all and kept going like a regular trooper. Travelling with teenagers is so much easier than when they were younger – practically a joy!!

We got stopped twice on the way back by British people wanting to know how far it was and whether it was worth it. We were as honest as possible. We saw two babies in backpacks and about four children that were too small. We also saw some spectacularly poor outfit choices: jeans and fashion trainers being the most popular choice. So many people didn’t even have a coat with them and most people weren’t carrying water… to walk for four hours!! (EDIT: Keith – or waterproofs, gloves, hats, emergency bags…..no risk assessment at all).

There were a LOT more people walking up by the time we were walking back and they didn’t seem to appreciate that the path was not one way. Made for some shocked expressions when they finally looked up! I did feel sorry for the search and rescue volunteers on duty. On the surface, it looked like they had a great job – driving off-road golf buggies up and down the path (with an almost Portuguese disregard for pedestrians). But they all looked absolutely miserable. We decided that they probably get called all the time by tourists who get tired and want a lift. Thor warned us about that.

My highlight was the two geography teachers (I mean who else?!) who calmly rode past us, separately, on e-bikes to get to the eruption site. I didn’t get to see them getting over the rough bit, which I was disappointed by. I am guessing it took some skill.

More information about the volcano van be found here:
https://anywhereweroam.com/fagradalsfjall-volcano
https://safetravel.is/eruption-information-site

We were pretty tired by the time we got to the bottom but we very much enjoyed the French family having a loud discussion about the fact they had forgotten the portable charger . Theirs is definitely a blame culture!! The car park was complete carnage, with more than 500 vehicles parked on every scrap of level ground and some not so level. I was worried that we wouldn’t be able to escape, but in the end Keith managed to squeeze the trusty Santa Fe back onto the road. We said thank you to the long suffering policeman and headed back to Reykjavik.

We filled up with petrol and found the hotel with relative ease. The receptionist did not think unloading in the bus waiting bay was a good idea at all, so Keith tucked the car behind the hotel while we checked in and put everything in the rooms. We left the kids to have showers and chill while we took the car back to Avis. The stupid sat-nav took us to the wrong place to start with, but we got their in the end and giving it back was hassle free. The nice lady was impressed by the 2,987 km we had driven in a week and explained how the e-scooters worked so we could get back to the hotel without navigating the buses.

Keith downloaded the Hopp app and handily it showed him that there were two scooters very close by. We worked out how to select them (even adding another to the same account so I didn’t need a backy!) and set off. It wasn’t entirely obvious how to get them to go (push off and press Go!), but we used our collective engineering and management degrees and worked it out! They were a bit binary and it took a while to work out how to go at anything other than full speed. Keith was much braver, but very tired. It is a good thing that pedestrians and scooters have priority, otherwise he would have been squished flat by the car that he didn’t see because he looked right and not left. It started to become fun (it would have been a 47 minute walk, so it was a considerable distance) but then it started raining. Again… We shouldn’t complain as it didn’t rain when we were climbing the volcano this morning, but it is not pleasant to have rain smack you in the face as you stand on an e-scooter doing 25 kmph. That has made me giggle just typing it. We were drenched by the time we got back. We hadn’t put rain coats (see my judgemental comment about inept climbers from earlier – karma!) on and our puffer jackets were ringable. Ah well.

Back in the hotel, we hung up the wet stuff and got warm and dry. We had a precious hour and a half before dinner and so sat down. Imagine!

We went to an Icelandic restaurant for tea and had delicious food. Even the service station burgers have been good here. It is pricey, but never rubbish. I think we may have developed scurvy though, I am planning many vegetables when we get home. Not as bad as Japan from that perspective, but choosing cheaper options often means chips and not greens and when a salad is as expensive as a local fish pie, who is going for the salad?

Back to the hotel to drink decaf instant coffee without cooking in the kettle. By the way, if anyone can explain to me why the kettle has a tea/coffee setting on it, I would love to know. I made a cup of tea, having boiled it with the lever set to coffee and nothing bad happened… yet!

Our last day tomorrow and lots planned, including an 8.30am start, so now to bed.

There was a metal squeezy tube of caviar laid casually on the table for breakfast – this is a super-shmancy hotel! An American lady was in the bar being all 80’s yuppy on a work call at 8am. She mentioned lobbying qualifications in various states (yes I was listening deliberately to see what she did!) so I think she was in marketing of some sort.

After checking out, we went for a little wander around the piers. We saw lots of shy wading bird with red legs (redshank?) and while I was trying to point out some workmen really high up on the mountain, I caught sight of a pair of gerfalcons playing together with some amazing aerial acrobatics. Wonderful! No idea what the workmen on the cliffs were doing though…

I read all the information boards (of course) and learnt about the herring trade that made Sigulfjordur famous for over 60 years. In fish alone they contributed 20% of 40% of the GDP of Iceland. Of course they got greedy, experienced manmade and natural disasters, and the industry collapsed. They massively over-fished the herring (with the help of the Norwegians and Russians) and one year the shoals just didn’t appear. No fish, no town. Just before the fish stopped coming, an enterprising family had built a state of the art canning factory which employed loads of local people. Sadly a landslide destroyed the factory and killed 8 people. They did rebuild, but ended up moving to Norway. It goes without saying that the rest of the family got bored half way through the information boards of herring facts and so have employed me to summarise. I take no responsibility for factual inaccuracies or artistic license!

Our journey around the north coast of the Trollaskagi peninsular was epic: a short tunnel followed by stunning coastal views, and a herd of goats running towards us on the road. We weren’t sure whether they had escaped or were doing their normal morning commute! I was looking forward to the swimming pool in Hofsos, which overlooks the fjord, but when we arrived it looked like any other outdoor swimming pool and we were right on time so we didn’t bother. We saw massive crews of eider ducks chilling in the water just off the coast all the way round.

The turf houses at Glaumbaer felt a bit culty with men and women sleeping separately but two to a bed… it was a fascinating insight into unheated life! Mila and I are all about the kitchen implements: excellent whisk, milk churns, bread boxes and a special bread knife that they used to cut rhubarb (direct quote from the sign!), whale bone sledges and horse hair bridles.

We had an Ob burger lunch deal, along with rest of north Iceland, and then continued our journey south. We bought picnic tea for after the hike and swim later.

After about another hour of driving down VERY windy roads that left Keith super tired, we arrived at the hotel that Fosshotels forgot. The rooms were massive but meh, with the sole redeeming feature being the fridge. The nice lady at reception said it was fine to arrange packed breakfast for our volcano hike the next day as we would have to leave before breakfast started.

On the way to Husafel for our hike and hot bath experience, we saw an incredible double rainbow that meant numerous photo stops.

After waiting 15 minutes for a Spanish couple who couldn’t decide if they were joining us for the canyon hike, we set off with our guide Oli (real name truly unpronounceable) driving extremely slowly whilst providing a detailed history of the local area: they generate 2MW from hydro power, and the whole community’s hot and cold water is drawn from the ground but would be enough to supply 500,000 people! Before the swish hotel that was built by a local family, only 2 out of 25 of Oli’s school class stayed to work in the area. Now lots of families have moved back and 500 work in the hotel or in related tourism.

After about 10 minutes in the mini bus on main roads, Oli turned off onto a track leading up into Whale-Fell-Woods, which was a very old volcano. We parked and Oli gave is the choice of going to look at the waterfall first or hiking straight to the canyon. We chose the waterfall, to the groans of the children, and I started Strava to log our walk as normal. We climbed out of the mini bus and Oli checked that the Spanish couple understood what he had been saying.

They hadn’t got a word and had no idea what he was now trying to tell them! I bet they were glad they had paid for the tour! He led us right off the main path round two corners and down a slightly slippery slope to a viewing platform, from which we could see the waterfall. It was quite tall and pretty and landed in a bowl that was broken so it flowed out under the lintel.

He then asked if we were ready to hike to the baths. We all said yes with enthusiasm (apart from the Spanish couple who still looked confused!) and we set off. We went back past the mini bus and collected our towels and took another path. I was ready for our hike and felt well prepared. We went around two twists of the path and came across a gate. Oli proudly announced that we had reaches the canyon! Strava was disgusted to report that the whole “hike” was 1.25km. We climbed down 63 steps (Mila counted them!) and walked to a beautiful bathing area.

Oli explained that a local stone mason had created the two pools: one was a copy of a much older pool in Reykholt with a pattern of stones tightly fitting around it and one was more roughly hewn. They were approximately the same temperature and there was another horse shoe shaped pool in the river where the outflow from the hot pools flows back into the river. That didn’t have much effect as the water still felt icy cold!

The Spanish couple claimed the top (crafted) pool and we slid into the rough hewn one. The rocks were covered in soft slippery green stuff so you had to be careful not to slip. The floor was also pretty rough so stubbed toes were a probability if you weren’t careful. While we were marinating, Oli explained some of  the rock formations in the canyon: rhyolite, obsidian and one we can’t quite remember the name of: maybe impervite? He apologised to the Spanish couple for not being able to repeat himself in Spanish.

Oli then left us in peace to soak. Danny was a massive fidget but made us laugh, I went for a chilly dip in the river with Mila (who only got in up to the knee!) and then requested a swap with the Spanish couple to try the top pool. That was a mistake, there were no slippery rocks to sit on and it felt cooler. There was moaning, but we made the best of it!

In no time, Oli was back to get us moving and we headed for the warm shower and the heat lamps in the changing rooms- which each had their own geology shelf!! Then it was the exhausting hike back to the mini bus and some more commentary on the way back. Oli told us about the ancient lava flow down the valley and the lava flows he had been to see last year. He repeated what other people have told us about old lava flows staying hot for a very long time. He said that the last eruption in the region (1973) had warmed people’s houses for 25 years and even now was still hot enough to bake bread in. He warned us to be careful tomorrow as the weight of the new lava was causing the liquid lava inside the old flows to be squeezed out and was very dangerous. We promised to be careful!!

We went back to the hotel for a picnic tea of pot noodles, bread and cheese, yoghurts, Giflar and Police Interceptors. Having repacked absolutely everything to allow a painless transition to a carless state tomorrow afternoon, it was time for bed again!

There was a new biscuit at breakfast, so obviosuly I had to try it. Someone once told me that every flock of geese has one that is better at taking risks than the others. The children have nominated me risky-goose as far as new food testing is concerned. It was a bit like a custard cream if you even care any more!!

We attempted to stop along the shoreline of Lake Myvatn for some bird spotting, but it was so hard to find a safe place to stop and then all I could see were eider ducks and whooper swans (very last week…). Keith enjoyed using the “passenger talk” facility in the Santa Fe to attempt communication with the teenagers in the back. Mixed results!!

So we were on our way north to the whales!! On the way we saw some geese on the road and a fancy house with solar panels. We are still referring to the words of Thor as if a biblical reference – the mark of a convincing (if not accurate) guide!!

Godafoss is another two sided waterfall and required a tripod to fully capture its magnificence. We saw a policeman, two tax officials eating blueberries, 3 drones and their operators (prohibited) and lots of people on the wrong side of the barrier at the top of the cliff. Sigh. There were some great rainbows and I would agree that it is a really pretty waterfall. It would be improved by fewer people.

Mila took a photo for a couple in front of the waterfall and I horrified the children by asking the lady when her baby was due. Her unphased response was three months. I thought it was a sure thing- her jeans had elastic over her tummy and she had pulled them up three times since I had been watching her! The kids were much more worried that I had just accused a random French lady of being fat!! Where is the faith??

We avoided the tolled tunnel in preference for the views and arrived in Akureyi (the srcond biggest town in Iceland). It took forever to work out the ridiculous parking as, although it was cheap, you can’t set up the app without receiving a text from the bank. We are in Iceland with only Keith’s phone roaming and our only credit card in my name. Il ne marche pas!!!!. Danny was very jealous of all the kids on electric scooters. Mila was disturbed by the enormous troll thing that they had left out for tourist to take their photo with. We found a city farm, a city waterfall and a pretty church. Then it was time for food again and I volunteered as wasp removal consultant in a yummy bakery while they put together our order. The poor girl working there was terrified of them. Next we found a fairly reasonable clothes shop with an amazing suede jacket that we didn’t buy. We were too excited sbout our afternoon activity to relax for long so we headed off to Hauganes. On our way out of town, Keith had to navigate his first Icelandic traffic lights. The best thing about them was that the red light was in the shape of a heart!! ❤

So, now we were ready for our whale watching trip.  We donned our amazing flotation suits (although I prefer the autocorrect of flirtation suit!!) to keep us warm even though it was 17°C but I for one wanted hats, gloves and spare coats packed just in case. I have been cold too many times already here.

Our boat left at 2.30pm and was full of thirty-ish tourists. Most of them were part of a coach tour and seemed to think that gave them special privileges – like getting on the boat first after pushing in front of the children. I firmly dissuaded them of that misapprehension and got all of us onboard sharpish. We took our places st the right of the bow and settled down. We were expecting at least 20 minutes to get out onto the fjord and to somewhere we might see things. Mila was very nervous of feeling sick and took a while to realise she was going to be absolutely fine. Our last whale watching experience was a disaster – we didn’t see any whales and were all sick as dogs!

The weather couldn’t have been better- almost flat calm and a fresh breeze to cool the strong sunshine. We went all the way out to where other boats were reporting orcas and humpback whales . It took about an hour and by that point, I had hat and gloves on already. The fresh breeze became quite a headwind when we were moving. Almost immediately we came up to the other boats, we saw two humpback whales blowing. They breathe five times and then dive for about ten minutes. Then you hsve to guess where they are going to surfsce next – sometimes 300m away and sometimes six foot from the boat. I wasn’t keen on the way the boat moved when everyone ran to one side and then the other  but I did discover that the tilt meant I could stand on the step on the far side and see over everyone else’s heads!

We saw the whales go through their cycle about five times. The driver did set off after Orcas he had seen in the distance and the spotter pointed from the crows nest to where he could see them but I didn’t see them. Danny and I were convinced we had seen black shapes in the distance but they disappeared quickly and no-one else seemed to see them. It was very surreal to see them so close to the boat – they clearly weren’t bothered by our wooden hull or the rib that was also watching them. They came up and went back down again so quickly that you didn’t really get time to focus on them before they had gone again. Such amazing creatures and such efficient boat crews to get us exactly where we needed to be more often than not.

On the way back, we were served hot chocolate and homemade cinnamon biscuits. I was grateful for the heat as I was getting quite chilly. I was sitting on the side, binoculars in hand spotting and trying to identify birds and avoiding the enormous patch of glare on the water from the sun. I saw a bigger than bird splash and pointed to it. When they came up again, Danny saw them too. They came up once more and another handful of people saw them. The spotter saw the last time and said they were harbour porpoises  and they don’t like the boats so they are very hard to spot when they come back up as they swim as far away as they can. He claimed to see them come up again (he had a significant height advantage!) but I didn’t.

Company supplied wildlife checklists and I tucked mine inside my suit where it travelled slowly downwards throughout the trip until it was balanced on my boot by the end. We saw many guillemots with one or two juveniles, a huge number of fulmar- some of which flew within a foot of my face, many guls, an arctic skua (still didn’t catch anything!!) and of course some eider ducks!

Through three tunnels of varying length: 5km, 7.5km and 2.5km with only a tiny – drive across the botttom of the valley between the last two to get to Siglofjordur – or most northerly stop. Hotel Siglo is our fanciest hotel on this trip, so it is a shame that we didn’t arrive until 6.30pm and have to leave pretty early tomorrow to drive 2/3 of the way back to Reykjavik.  We managed to squeeze in a visit to the hot tub on the edge of the fjord and dodged the  “high end” restaurant (definition given by waitress in bow tie) in favour of the less terrifying Bistro.

Having been told by the hotel that we didn’t need to book a table, they were pretty busy when we arrived and the waitress had to do some juggling to fit us in. We were suitably grateful and in our gushing, got in the way of a man who had dressed according to the “Icelandic fisherman” template, complete with long strawberry blond hair, bushy gingery beard, local patterned wool jumper and a lovely fisher dog. He sat at a table outside to smoke his cigarette and talk to his dog. When he went to get on his boat, he tried to pull the boat between his and the quay close to the wall so the dog could get on. He was really nervous and paced up and down without jumping the gap. In the end his Daddy grabbed him and lifted him onto the boat. Then he had to lift him again to get him onto his boat. Then his tail wagged like crazy: obviously just the gaps he isn’t keen on!!

Dinner was lovely. We felt unadventurous for not trying herring since we got here- especially as we watched the whales scoffing them today, so we ordered that as our starter and even Danny enjoyed it. By this point, Mila was complaining of a sore throat and all of us were very tired, so we headed back to our rooms via the bar. The lovely barman made Mila a hot honey and lemon and didn’t even charge us. Fingers crossed she feels better tomorrow when she wakes up.

After a disturbed night due to a room party that finished about 2.30am (and everyone else slept through!) We got up, destroyed another Fosshotel breakfast and got on the road. There were no weird food experiments today, so we just filled our bellies with goodness.

We backtracked a bit first of all as the weather had been shocking when we drove past Dettifoss yesterday and we were all a bit lacking in enthisiasm for getting soaked. Sadly, it wasn’t much better today, but like Yorkshire, Icelandic people have a saying: If you don’t like the weather, wait 20 minutes and it will have changed!

We headed for the west car park first where there were four cars and hardly any people. It is quite a walk to and along the falls and a lot of the path is wet and slippery from the spray. The views are worth it though and Keith was happy clicking away. Dettifoss is the biggest (by volume of water) waterfall in Europe and definitely gets the adjective angry. The water is bluey-green, but whipped up so much that it looks white.

We also walked up to Selfoss which is a horse shoe shaped falls.By the time we got back to the car park, there were lots of campervans, coaches and cars and the compost toilets were pretty busy. It was going to take an hour on mostly gravel roads to get around to the other side, but interestingly the sat nav wanted us to go north to cross a bridge near the start of the estuary instead of the route we had planned, which was back south to route 1 and along. Naturally we went with the sat navs more interesting route and as a result got to see a bit more of the country!

The road to the other side was a bit rough, but nothing the Santa fe couldn’t handle in Keith’s capable hands. The tourist facilities on the east of the falls are not quite as extensive and the parking was pretty full, but the views were way better. There was less spray as the wind was blowing it onto the other side and great visibility of the cliffs we had been standing on an hour earlier, showing layers of vertical, hexagonal pillars of slowly cooled lava and deep layers of gravel, rocks and ash. There were more people, but nowhere near as busy as the west side was by 12pm. Keith has been looking forward to today since we decided to come to Iceland and expressed his excitement by jumping in puddles all the way from the car park to the falls. Bless (which apparently means goodby in Icelandic!).

Mila has discovered a new talent: apparently she can identify a person’s nationality by their yawn.  She is particularly good at Uzbekistan and has identified a personal weakness in specifying the particular country in people from the African continent. It is good to have capacity for personal development. We had a while to chat about this as Keith was getting the perfect waterfall shot as per Prometheus (ask him…).

The road back to route 1 was officially the worst road we have been on so far, there was no way to pick a route as the whole thing was covered in pot holes. Keith discovered that he could achieve an impressive vibrato by singing as he drove over them. We have been travelling for a while now…

A supposedly quick trip to Leirhnjukur crater before getting lunch turned into a big hike over some impressive lava tunnels and flows. We spotted another golden plover walking from the car park and this time I think Keith managed to get a picture. She was calling but nothing was answering. On the way back we saw a chick doing the same thing. Clearly they hadn’t had the: “if you get lost stand still and I will come and find you” conversation!!

Our first lava flows. In places the ground is still hot and the path is signposted to tell you where you can go. That is the theory… in practice this site is a bit of a free for all, so it only your moral code keeping you from climbing on everything! It wasn’t as smelly as yesterday, but there were moments of sulphur stink. We saw some fascinating features that the vulcanologist taught us about at the lava show, particularly lots of collapsed lava tunnels and the wrinkling you get when the bottom of the flow has cooled more than the top so it scrunches up as it travels down. It was difficult to get a sense of scale until we climbed to the top, then you could see different lava flows overlaying each other. Fascinating… but we were very hungry so had to move on after an hour or so.

We saw another little bird in our travels but I have no idea what it is. Answers on a postcard please!! Edit: I had to look it up for the photograph naming police… I think it is a ringed plover chick.

We had driven up the hill from route 1 past a geothermal power station. Thor told us that hydro-electric is much more popular in Iceland as it can almost all be hidden under ground. Today I understood – so many pipes and buildings and steam outlets. Very unsightly – interesting to me, but I can see why locals would think it was ugly.

Dimmuborgir is a really strange place – like most places in Iceland it feels completely devoid of animal life, but you do occasionally get shouted at by a wren or glimpse a blackbird. The weird lava chimneys the area is famous for were formed when a lava pool formed over a marshy area, causing the water to boil. Steam rose through the lava, creating hollow pillars. Normally these only form underwater and then stay there so it is really rare to see them on land. The area has been colonised by stunted silver birch and blueberries. We also saw some crowberrys and used Google (and tonight’s restaurant’s collection of flavoured gins!) to work it out!

The children were really struggling by this point – we had walked about 14km in some pretty challenging conditions and terrain and their evil parents are getting them up for breakfast at 8am every day, so lie-ins are not on the cards. We cancelled our plan to climb a massive crater and just had a pootle about in and amongst the chimneys before heading back to the hotel for a little rest before dinner.

Mila wanted to try the sauna, so we went upstairs and sat in the hotness for about two and a half minutes. It was way too hot for us. We went outside onto a little sheltered balcony instead and sat in beautiful sunlight and snoozed for half an hour. Blissfully relaxing. Although apparently I twitched!!

We had denied ourselves the pleasure of eating in the Fosshotel again and went to abhighly recommended nearby cow farm. I don’t think vegetarians would enjoy the experience: you can drink their milk, eat their cheese (mozzarella and “salad cheese” which I think is trying to be feta) and eat beef burgers! Even better, one wall of the restaurant is glass and the cows are on the other side chilling and eating. The food was delicious – especially the mided started with dill pickled char and raw smoked lamb. There was also cottage cheese, one of their amazingly intense jams, some “salad cheese” and slifed tomato and mozzarella. For mains everyone except me had burgers (obviously!) with homemade mozzarella again. I went for a beef goulash with bread cooked in the heat of a geysir. Really tasty. We finished with the restaurant’s signature cake – pecans, chocolate and caramel yumminess! An early bed and much needed sleep.

Edit: I forgot to tell you the purple paint story. While we were checking in, an American lady came to talk to the gentleman working on reception. She told him that she had sat down on a chair on the balcony and got purple paint on her hands and clothes. She told him he should get it cleaned before someone got it on their clothes. He tried to respond but she interrupted him. He politely asked if he could finish and then told her that they clean everything at least every day a

There was a queue for a table at the buffet breakfast  but we employed a boy-child waiter to tell us when a table for four people became free. I wasn’t as keen on the chia porridge today, but I enjoyed the beetroot and ginger shot enough to give it a three word review: spicy purple mud.

Rooms packed in hyper-efficient style and checkout completed, we were on our way again! Another day with no deadlines so we headed in totally the opposite direction to the next hotel to visit the eastern fjords. We had two recommendations: Seydisfjorur and Borgarfjordur. The first for listening to Americans fresh off a cruise ship chatting with locals and the second for the mushroom soup!

Seydisfjordur is at the head of a fjord and to get there, you have to go through an enormous plateau and then up and over a ridge between fjords. The top was so high it went through cloud and we felt for the three cyclists (Keith and I thought probably cruise boat crew) half way up the switchback road. We saw a waterfall on the way down to the fjord called Gufufoss which was very pretty. I will let Danny rate it!

Seydisfjordur is a small town with the best preserved collection of wooden buildings and a painted road leading up to the pastel blue church. When we arrived (on a Sunday) at about 10.30am, the cruise boat had just disgorged it’s cargo in the form of multiple walking tours. They moved at a rather shuffling pace so overtaking was doable, but waiting for them to move out of shot was rather more frustrating!

Mila and I took advantage of the few touristy shops being open to have a look round. That meant we got to listen to an older American lady opening a conversation with the shop owner that started with “Do y’all live upstairs?”, moving on to “Does it snow here?” And ending with “Do the children go to school?”. The Icelandic lady taking the American lady’s money for grossly inflated (even for Iceland) products managed to be polite but her assistant grinned at us when she saw us rolling our eyes! The shops clearly only existed for the cruise boat crowd, but they did have some nice vases. Keith said no. Then I looked online, and you can buy them in the UK from Oliver Bonas. Hate it when he is right!

Keith got the church shot he wanted so we headed off to the second puffin colony of the trip at Borgarfjordur. It was quite a long way as we had to go back almost to last night’s hotel before we could go up the next fjord. Half way up there was a stopping place with information and a toilet: no running water, just a hole in the ground with a toilet above it and some hand gel. I didn’t notice when I sat down (until I stood up!), but Danny enjoyed weeing into the abyss!

Apparently it was worth rhe journey as he managed to take a photo of a puffin with its beak full of fish and one in flight. Most of the puffins were sat out on the water, but there were a few still feeding young. I saw lots of fulmar and kittiwakes feeding juveniles and making the expected levels of noise.

We took a break to have a wee and something warm to eat. The toilets were clean and functional and the cafe ladies were lovely. They sold us a panini and a bowl of a soup and told us to help ourselves to refills. Keith reckoned that the last cruise ship tour had been and they had some left. But it was delicious and we all hoovered it up!

We went back out for another observation/photography session and I snuck off to a quieter observation platform on the left of the promontory. I was just as interested in the nesting guls as the puffins. I had been standing there for a few minutes when the kittiwakes started fighting and splashing about in the water, then they started diving and coming up with tiny fish. They could only have been 100m from where I was standing in a tiny cliffed bay just beyond the harbour. A massive splash made me jump but I missed the cause, I turned to look and a seal breached on it’s side, slapping the water violently with its flipper. The birds all took to the air briefly and then landed again. Another seal breached and slapped. I don’t know if they were trying to scare the birds of coral the fish, but I didn’t think the rest of the family would forgive me if I let them miss it. I crept off the platform and ran around to the other side to let them know with stealthy signals. Then I ran back. We were lucky snd the seals were still there although I think they had snaffled all the fish while I was away. They were curious but unafraid of us and gave Keith some good head shots! Unexpected wildlife spotting makes me so happy!

On our journey back across the country we stumbled across Lagarfoss power station. It is a hydro electric power station, originally built in the 1970s and greatly upgraded in 2007 from 8MW to 28MW. They have diverted part of the river to go through the power station and there are enormous gates that can be opened or closed to control the flow. It is an amazing piece of engineering, miles away from the closest town or village and yet there are still people on the internet complaining that they have ruined the waterfall!

The next landmark we found was a bridge across Canyon Moira. It wasn’t marked on any of our maps but it was worth a stop: vertical walls, with turquoise water rhat was so clear you could see the canyon walls under the water level. Keith and the children entertained themselves by dropping different sized rocks (not Dwayne or Chris obviously!) into the water to listen to the different plopping noises they made. Each to their own.

Our only planned stop of the afternoon was a waterfall called Rjukandafoss. It was only a short walk today and worth it for the view. A coach pulled up as we were coating up, so we rushed to get up so Keith could take photos without people spoiling it! We made it and got the snap – you would not believe the pressure. We had more opportunity for tutting on the way down as at least five people from the coach had left the path (contrary to the bloody enormous sign at the bottom!) and were wandering right down by the water and right up on the ridge line. Very naughty and definitely damaging the delicate flora.

We got our self-righteous-selves back in the car and headed up into a moonscape. We have been pleasantly surprised by the amount of vegetation in the east of the island, but we were back into a landscape that could only have been created by volcanos. Eveywhere you look is gravel, gravel, gravel. It is amazing but must have been terrifying as a settler (assuming they even went up there!) as there is no possible way you could survive.

Fortunately, the desert ended quite quickly and we came back down to the area around Lake Myvatn. Our last stop for the day was Hverir, where the lunar landscape is pitted with bubbling mud pots, steaming vents and stinking hydrogen sulphide (fumaroles). The ground is the colour of ochre and the bubbling mud is light blue. There are ropes to tell you where it is safe to walk – in some places the ground is 100°C – but obviously there were still tourists walking on the wrong side of the ropes. We watched a lady bend down and put her hand into a small stream. She didn’t scream or pass out so I am assuming it wasn’t hot. Lucky her.

It had been a long day, so we made our way to the hotel and checked in successfully. Lovely rooms and attractive public areas, but we couldn’t face our dinner booking in the hotel. TripAdvisor advice took us to a fish and chips restaurant (I really want to say shed with a porch!). I had a cup of prawns and the others had fish and chips. I got the giggles while the lady was reading our order back to us as the man behind her was trying to make the batter with an electric whisk and it was noisy, so whenever she started talking, he stopped and then started again when she had finished. It was silly but funny – I like the Icelandic sense of humour! Tea was quick, cheap and delicious. Back to the hotel for a bit of therapeutic British television and then bed.

Edit: I was genuinely saddened today by an older American lady, climbing gingerly off the coach, picking her way across the car park and taking a photo of a picture of a puffin on the information sign. As she turned to turned to make her way back to the coach, the gentleman she was with said:”and that’s as close as you are going to get!”. Getting old sucks…

Another hotel, another buffet breakfast! I felt bad for not trying the chia seed porridge the other day, so I started there today and was pleasantly surprised. They had make your own oatmeal as well, but the expected me to make it with water and add salt. Grandpa would have been happy but no thanks! Had to get some bacon and eggs instead. Then I found some happy marriage cake. Ironically, Keith didn’t have any!! (EDIT: Keith – that’s because I don’t link needing cake at breakfast with a happy marriage…!)

We tried to follow the confusing directions to the hiking trail in Hallormsstaoir. We managed not to fall out, driving the same road three times, but it was a little frustrating. It was a peaceful walk up either side of a creek with lots of little waterfalls. While we were putting our boots on by the car, we heard a really strange noise. It turned out to be a very big, flappy-winged bird. I only caught a glimpse from underneath, so I have no idea what it was. That big, I am guessing raven. The only thing (inland) here that is bigger is an eagle and that seems unlikely at head level right next to a road.

The woods were creepily quiet once we were away from the road, but I did hear and see a wren and what I think were multiple blackbirds. There were loads of mushrooms and flowers, some of which I could identify. The trail had posts with orange paint at the top, so all we had to do was walk from one to the next – no navigation required!

Our next recommended stop was the Wilderness centre and local museum. The boys decided they weren’t interested after an extended gravel road journey to get there, so only Mila and I went around the museum. My highlight was a stuffed reindeer, but the YHA space upstairs was pretty cool as well. Fourteen children were born to the couple who lived on this farm in the early 1900s and they had loads of artefacts from then and also had information about how Iceland was mapped – it took twenty seven summers of climbing every peak and they didn’t finish until 1940! The Danish army and some cartographers did it. Quite a contract!!

We retreated from the end of the very long valley and started to climb the 910 – a very long winding road up to Snaefell which is 1,833m high. The winding road had about 10 hair pins to get up to the top so it climbed pretty quickly! The view down the valley from the top was amazing. We drove a long way along the 910 with a view to driving up the approach road to Snaefell. We saw sheep and about three 4x4s, but that was it. It is a strange plateau with volcano shaped peaks all around it, the most impressive of which is the black and white streaked multi-peak of Snaefell. We arrived at the turning to discover a stern signpost that implied the Santa Fe was not capable of the scary road in front of us. We turned around and headed to an Audley-approved hiking start point instead.

Laugerfell is another YHA-type with bunk house and basic thermal baths. From here you can do one of two hiking trails: 14km back down to the Wilderness centre, or a 7km loop around the local waterfalls. We sent for the second option, with a strong probability of not making it all the way around. We walked along the edge of a river with small drops every few hundred metres. Again, posts (this time with red tops) marked the way, although this time it was a bit trickier to see the next post and a LOT trickier to stay on the path as the sheep had somewhat muddied the navigational waters.

We diverted away from the river at one point, through a heath-like area and heard a bird. Binoculars didn’t help me locate it but Danny did!! It was a beautiful little thing with a medium length narrow beak and the most beautiful yellow and brown plumage. We saw it again on the way back – this time face on so I could see the black and white markings on its chest – and this time we saw it’s chicks which were also covered in the yellow and brown mottled feathers (Had a chat with Uncle Google, who says it is a Golden Plover). What a treat! Again, we saw loads of wild flowers, but this time they were all tiny. I would say alpine, but maybe Arctic would be more accurate. I stopped many times to direct my photographer to capture them, so I hope he was successful.

By the time we got back to the car, the sun was out in all of it’s glory and we were all very warm. Getting back into the car for the way back down the crazy 910, I did succumb to my first car nap. For those of you who know me well, I am sure you are impressed I lasted a whole week without an afternoon nap. I have Linda/Grandma to thank for teaching me to nap successfully! I did feel bad for Keith though as he isn’t allowed to sleep while he is driving…

It was a serious climb to get up to Hengifoss. I fear Danny’s review of this waterfall is going to be scathing! A two hour round trip, with an elevation of 253m (according to Strava!) and when you get to the end of the path, you are still 500m from the base of the waterfall! The rock strata made it worthwhile for me though as from that distance you can see the stripes of ash, lava, ash, lava (etc.) really clearly. The ash has a high concentration of iron in it, so it shows up really red. There were some really interesting formations further down as well, where the lava had filled the stream bed and then cooled down really slowly so you get hexagonal vertical pillars. In this case, you can see the bend at the top as it was still warm enough to move. Roll on retirement and a U3A degree in Geology!!

The sun made the climb warm, the wind made it cold. The weather here (even in August) is relentless and aggressive, but the East does seem dryer (so far!) than the South. We took the shortest route back to Egilstadir and went straight to “Salt” for our tea. Four beef burgers and two beers later and we were full and ready for chilling (so then Keith started editing photos and I started writing the blog while the children chilled!!).

Breakfast was yummy and uncomplicated. We all have a buffet routine now and watching everyone collect their food is like a beautiful ballet!

Today was a big driving day – 6 hours altogether, but we had a few stops planned along the way. The first was our last glacier tongue this holiday, called Flaajokull. To get there, the instructions told us to turn left off route 1 and drive to the parking lot. From there, there was a short hike to the face of the glacier. It was a rough gravel track that seemed to repeatedly go the wrong way! There was a large river that the track had to follow, so it meandered about in a very inefficient manner! I saw a small flock of ptarmigan at the side of the road, but apart from that, one other car was the only sign of life. There was a spectacular causeway to drive across – that felt very narrow – but the car park was disappointing: four white stones with P painted on them and a sign in Icelandic that was too faded for Google translate to help us with. The short hike has extended as the glacier has shrunk until it would have taken us at least two hours to get there and it was chucking it down with rain. Slightly frustrated, Keith started back along the track to the main road.

Our next planned stop for the town of Hofn. We went to the Netto to buy lunch and top up the snack bag. We found mini pizzas and a weird foot long pastry thing, and then headed to the petrol station to top the car up and buy petrol station ice cream (a speciality of an Ob station). In Reykjavik, we saw a man buy an ice cream that had been dipped in chocolate and covered in sprinkles. We decided the time was now and ordered the smallest tub they had, which cost £4. I didn’t know how to ask for the chocolate dipping and the lady was not encouraging, so we might have to try again later.

The rest of our journey was sprinkled with unscheduled stops wherever we could pull over to identify birds or take photos. Our route took us along the coast for quite a long way and we saw loads of flocks of eider ducks in both plumages on the sea. When we turned inland into the first proper fjord, we also saw ducklings.

Jamie promised us whales on this journey yesterday. We didn’t see any. Jamie promised us that when we went through the tunnel to the East, the weather would magically improve. I think Jamie has lied to us. We have seen a lot of rain today.

We did manage to see the blue cliffs at Blabjorg and added another stone to our geological shelf in the Hyundai Santa Fe. Not entirely sure how we are going to get them home yet, but we are particularly fond of Dwayne and Chris.

At this point we detoured from the prescribed route, which took us around 4 more fjords and took the up and over route inland. This turned out to be spectacular. It was categorised as a “secondary road – gravel” and was in the process of being resurfaced, which left piles of gravel in the middle of the road. Keith navigated his way around the road flattening device and we climbed steep sections and twisty sections, past waterfalls and chunks of rock to get up to the cloud level. We kept climbing even after this until we were about 900m above sea level, then we dropped out of the cloud the other side and into a very fertile valley being farmed more intensively than most other areas we have seen. They had a lot of sheep, horses and cows and even a field of wheat a bit further down. The secondary road became a primary road and was eventually paved as we descended into the valley and towards Egilsstadir.

We arrived at the hotel with just enough time to check in, find our bathing stuff and head slightly further north to the Vok Baths. These were a much classier bathing facility than the previous one with three different hot tub like pools at gradually increasing temperatures. There was also the option of taking a dip in the lake (which most of us managed at least a bit of) to then return gratefully to soak in the warmth. There were, of course, some noisy Americans, but they were eclipsed by the fifteen Icelandic 12 year olds hurling themselves into the lake, throwing metal straws at each other and collecting lake weed to take into the baths. Such a joy. Mila and I had a lovely pat-the-water conversation with a Spanish baby and we used our drinks token to get a delicious strawberry and yoghurt smoothie to drink in the pool bar area. The baths are in a beautiful location and the hot/cold experience was invigorating.

We enjoyed out post dip infusions (I had a barley one, which I enjoyed, but the children have been ruined by Ribena and discovering the blackcurrant tea was made with the leaves and not the fruit was too much disappointment!) We then headed back to the hotel to relax and then change for dinner.

Keith had booked a restaurant in another hotel for dinner and we made our way there – past the sight and smell of the cow barn – in time for our reservation. The food on the menu was super complicated and every option either had prawns (allergic), celeriac (yuk) in or was over £40 each. Fortunately, they were happy for Danny (at nearly 17!) to eat the chicken and chips off the children’s menu (for 12 years or younger) and it was a generous portion so he was happy! We rounded the meal off with a crème bruleé in a bucket and some raspberry sorbet with crumble.

With a 10.30am activity to get to today, we went for an 8am breakfast. It went much more smoothly than dinner. We got a lovely window table with views right down to the sea as the skies were clear. We are not taking for granted our Icelandic buffet and I am still following the policy of trying anything I don’t recognise (unless it is pickled fish… bravery only extends so far!). I have to admit that I didn’t fancy the cold chia seed porridge, but I did sample the cake with chocolate icing! I had great respect for the older lady who brought her walking frame with integral seat into the dining room and proceeded to collect an obscene amount of food on 5 dishes on the seat before she wheeled her “trolley” back to the table and picked at it. Humph.

We followed an Audley recommendation to visit Fjosralan glacier lagoon on the way to our activity, but we didn’t leave ourselves much time so it was a flying visit. The pristine icebergs were impressive and the lagoon was sparkly in the sun. I had my second conversation of the day about the digestive effects of black crust pizza, but I won’t go into that here!

Jokursarlon was easy to find as there was a big car park absolutely crammed with cars, camper vans and coaches. We found our guide and his shed/trailer chained to the ground and propped up with timber. I presumed that reflected how windy it can be (a fact that our guide confirmed later – apparently the chains were ripped out of the ground by wind a few weeks ago and the trailer ended up on its side. The weather here is not forgiving!) We agreed the number of layers required to be comfortable out on the water and then added the outer gear. Trousers with integral waterproof socks came first. No boob tubes were available with these even though it was tempting to try and pull them up that far. Then came a waterproof pullover with tight cuffs and ankle high wellies. Finally a life jacket and paddle completed the ensemble. Keith accessorised his with a fetching drybag for his camera. Jamie was our guide for the kayaking experience. He was born in Manchester and left when he was ten. He works in Iceland in the summer and then lives in the south of Spain for 6 months over winter. He doesn’t need to work in Spain as he makes enough to live on in the summer. He was impressed with Keith’s shoe size and congratulated me on being a lucky woman. That confused the children and non English speakers in the party…

We went down to the edge of the lagoon with the paddles and watched a paddling demonstration from Jamie. Keith and I chose the two person kayak so it would be easier for him to take photos and the children picked one each. To start with the only concern was trying to go in a straight line – Keith had a wonky row! But apart from that it was quite straightforward. We stopped near an iceberg to have a look and Jamie told us that the only tourist to go in the water from a kayak was too close to a flipping iceberg and got knocked off. He said that each iceberg has chunks fall off six or seven times a day and when they become unbalanced they flip over. We watched chunks fall off one but mercifully were not close to one flipping.

Jamie set off across the lagoon to where he thought seals most likely. Only the young ones stay in the lagoon all summer – about 30, but there are about 600 during the breeding season. This was the point that the wind picked up and the kids started to struggle. Mila in particular just couldn’t make any headway and got tired and upset. Jamie was not happy with how strung out we were and turned us around. I was happy to be in an enclosed area as every time we stopped paddling, we were blown back the way we had come. On the sea it would have been terrifying. The way back was much easier, except the waves really wanted us perpendicular to our direction of travel. I was the steerer and it was hard work to keep the boat straight. By this time we were nearly back where we started and Mila had had enough. Jamie took her back to shore to wait while we stayed in the sheltered bit to look at a few more icebergs.

We were all starting to feel the work in our arms and I was grateful when he said it was time to head back. Jamie was apologetic that we hadnt been able to do what he wanted and had only seen a glimpse of a seal’s head around the corner of an iceberg, but I think we were about done. The trip back to the beach was against a head wind and took determination. Jamie stayed with Danny – who is going to moan about sore arms and shoulders tomorrow I am sure!

Back on dry land, Jamie explained that the glacial tongue stretched to the sea, but by 1976 was where the lake is now, but 200m deep. Now it takes 5 hours to kayak from the parking lot to the glacier face. In the time he has worked here (ten years), it has gone from half way up the mountain at the side to the bottom.

We climbed out of our gear, rescued our phones, thanked Jamie and headed for the snack vans. There was a bit of a wait, but then we enjoyed our langoustine soup and fish and chips in the car. We wouldn’t be allowed to do that at home!

Just across the main road from where we had ben parked was Breioamerkursandur beach. This delivered on its promise of seals straight away and soothed my disappointment over the lack from the kayak. The chunks of ice washed up on the beach were amazing and the sun shone brightly on them making them look like blown glass full of bubbles. The waves were still a bit tricky and poor Mila tripped over a pesky hunk of ice trying to avoid getting wet feet. I loved spotting seals for Keith to photograph and watching the arctic skuas chasing arctic terns, followed by the arctic terns chasing the arctic skuas. I still haven’t seen a successful hunt but they were trying. I have learnt a lot about skua behaviour from observation – they hunt in packs, rest on land an water in-between and are regularly unsuccessful. Jamie had promised us whales if we waited long enough, but the wind was our enemy, whipping the waves into white water and leaching our body heat. Fingers crossed for the whale watching trip further north.

Keith didn’t manage many photos from the kayak, so we went back to Jokursarlon to take photos of the icebergs and laugh at the contortions tourists performed to take their photos. I am not sure about paddling in water with ice floating in it, but we walked past a young man doing exactly that. I kept my four head coverings firmly in place!

We were all ready for a rest now and headed back to the hotel. We found a comfortable corner of the bar and then Mila proceeded to comprehensively beat Danny and I at drafts. She and Keith drew twice and decided they wouldn’t win against each other. Mila gave credit to Sam for her expertise! I accidentally encouraged my family to steal bread from next to the complementary cucumber flavoured water, which resulted in a member of staff putting a price label on it. Whoops! I don’t know why I thought anything here would be free. We did decide though that anything with no label was free until informed otherwise!

We had booked a hot tub and sauna for 6pm so we donned swimming costumes, hotel slippers and dressing gowns and went downstairs. We had suspicions that some people had just turned up as I am sure they said it was private, but fortunately no-one tried to get in our hot tub. The poor family next to us had to share with some very noisy Americans. Quote of the day: “I know how to dress in Fahrenheit but just can’t get the knack in Celsius”.

We had a little time in the sauna while Danny went outside, but we were all so hot we couldn’t manage very long. Sitting outside in wet dressing gowns was pretty nice, so we must have been hot!

Service was much improved at dinner tonight, but the company was not. They put us on a table of four, next to two large tables of an American group who thought nothing of shouting from one table to the other and walking around with spoonfuls of food so parents and children could taste each other’s food. Our children were horrified by the waste – they all had three courses, but the children hardly ate any of it. Keith asked our waiter if we could move, but he came back and said the restaurant was full. We ordered, ate bread and waited for it to improve. We did attempt to plan our next day with help of the map and schedule, but it was very noisy.

Keith had enough and went to the bar to arrange a shift. Apparently it is not normal in Iceland to ask to speak to the manager, but it worked and the other end of the restaurant was much quieter… until they all sang happy birthday, in harmony. Sniff.

The food was delicious and we ate in peace – nearly an hour earlier than yesterday. We had a piece of chocolate brownie with raspberry sorbet for pudding before having a family snuggle watching First Dates and then sleep.

We were up early with the intention of being first into breakfast and then heading back to the beach for some tourist-free photos but when we got up, Keith spotted 3 coaches outside reception and switched the plan to go to the beach first.

It turned put to be a good plan. The roads were deserted; there were 4 cars in the car park and 3 people on the beach. The weather was awful over the top, but was clear when we arrived, showing us the puffin-filled headland on the other side of the bay (maybe 5km away) that had not been visible yesterday.

The tide was a little lower, so we could comfortably walk around the outcrop and along the top of the beach towards the famous stacks (cave, arch, stack, stump, gone!). I was under instruction to collect a sand/pebble sample and had a container with me in preparation. The puffins and fulmars flew overhead, to and from the cliffs, but the arctic skuas were nowhere to be seen. The waves felt bigger today, but we only had one moment where we had to step backwards sharpish to avoid the encroaching water. It was interesting to see the wave get slightly closer today as it was pushing the tiny pebbles up the beach on the front of the wave.

Photos taken, the weather started to come in again. So we fled back to the car and went back to the apartment to hang up the  wet gear while we grazed at the breakfast buffet. No surprises this morning, just tasty food.

We needed petrol, so we headed there before we set off. There is another beach (or possibly a continuation of the one we were on yesterday) behind the shopping area, so went for a wander while the children rested after their early start. The waves weren’t quite as terrifying because of the breakwater taking much of their force. I found some very curious, unidentifiable, brown rocks. I crouched right down to have a good look. Then I noticed the scraps of straw on the beach and the big signs offering horseback rides. I quietly left the brown rocks alone. There were similar numbers of tourists and flies, so we didn’t stay long.

Our first official stop of the day was Hjorleifshofio: a 200m high ex-island that has been surrounded by glacial gravel when eruptions caused floods careying enormous amounts of sediment causing the coastline to expand by 15km. We drove round the base to a sea cave on the south face. Our dose of surreal for the day was the pair setting up for a wedding inside the dark, drippy cave. Good job it is too cold for bats! Keith managed to get a photo of the sillouette of the cave mouth, famous for resembling a film character (answers on a postcard please!) and we carried on along the track. We were not convinced it was actually a road as the gravel was pretty deep, but it was marked on the map and Keith had confidence in the power of the Santa Fe.

All around the cliffs, we could see birds perching (fulmars mostly) and I guessed puffins had used it in the past as well, but it was too far from the shoreline now. Mila had her best wildlife searching eyes on and got Keith to stop so we could all see the arctic fox desperately trying to hide itself from us in a bush. It still had quite a lot of white in its fur so was easy to spot whilst moving. Needless to say, we got very excited and Keith sent Danny into the boot to retrieve the long telephoto lens and take photos. It travelled up the vegetation covered scree slope at the base of the cliff and settled in a dip that looked like a familiar resting place. Such a treat and not one I expected to be honest. Another thing to tick off the wish list! Normally stopping on a road without a designated stopping place for any reason is breaking the law in Iceland but in such circumstances, on a road that might not be a road, with no humans in sight, it felt justified!

The “road” did continue, but as it was across an unknown river, we decided discretion was the better part of valour and went the long way round back to the tarmac and eventually route 1. The ring road took us through some really strange features today: an enormous glacial outwash; Alftaversgigar – rootless cones (pseudo-craters); and breath taking views of Katla and Kotlujokull. The pseudo-craters really do look like miniature volcanos and were apparently formed by lava flowing over water. The weird thing is that you drive along and there aren’t any, then there are loads, then there are none. They aren’t scattered haphazardly, but formed only where conditions are perfect. It makes sense geologically, but feels like a museum exhibition as you drive from one area (complete with explanatory sign in the parking area) to another.

We kept driving along route 1 and stopped wherever the fancy took us. The next place was a viewing point for Skeioararjokull – yet another tongue of the enormous Vatnajokull. It was a privately owned service station, with toilets you had to pay for with a credit card. I had to teach an American lady how to use them. I literally had to translate the ENGLISH on the instuction board for her. Perhaps I am being unkind and she couldn’t read. I saw a strange coloured skua and had to refer to Uncle Google, (no Dad, Kate or Phil with me…) who kindly explained that arctic skuas can be light phase or dark phase. Who knew? Anyway, this one was light phase and the ones at the beach trying to catch arctic terns had been dark phase.

There was a motorbike tour and support vehicle stopped at the services – apparently from New Zealand with a Swedish tour guide who was very chatty at the information sign. They were off road bikes and Keith and Danny got all misty eyed.

Our next stop was in an area completely covered by mossy rocks. Obviously, the Finnett family are very structure and rule oriented. We have seen SO many signs telling us not to step off paths and trample the local and delicate flora, that we couldnt have avoided learning that lesson. There was much self-satisfied tutting in the car as we drove past tourists pulled over at the side of the road (tut tut), standing on mossy rocks (tut tut) for their photo opportunity. The tutting chorus was very loud. We smugly drove about 2km further on and pulled into a designated parking area with noticeboards showing the damage people do by standing on the moss. Today’s surreal was a white-booted lady flying a drone over the moss covered rocks. She had an astonishing bottom encased in white leatherette leggings. Really very distracting when the surface you are walking on is so uneven. A bit of an irresponsible outfit in my opinion. I think I saw some snipe. Another one to tick off!!

Our last unscheduled stop was to work out what a metal sculpture was at the side of the road. When we pulled over (safely in a designated area obviously) and read the information, it became apparent that they were horizontal bridge supports ripped out of place by flood water off the glacier. Truly impressive evidence of the strength of nature.

We managed to find the entrance to the National Park and the kids and headed to the toilets. I went into the tourist information to find out where the glacier tour left from. The helpful lady told me to head for the wooden huts. I did. They were locked. I started to panic that we were in wrong place, but then I looked behind a large off-road bus thingy and found the hut and a friendly guide. Phew. We collected all our collective stuff into a rucksack, put harnesses and helmets on and got measured for crampons. They found some to fit Keith!! I was slightly terrified when they gave us all an ice axe, but we did get a lesson on how to carry it. Gulp.

We got on a bus with low ratio gearbox driven by an Icelandic farmer, who had an important phonecall to make as he drove, with Sylvia – our Italian guide. I took a while to warm to Sylvia as she was a bit passive aggressive with her instructions, but she calmed down once we started asking questions.

We had to hike over the terminal morraine and walk across two bridges one at a time to get to the ice. Sylvia led the way and when she turned around to collect everyone together, she said “OK, so on the way back, we will go one at a time”. As I said, passive aggressive!! Putting on the crampons with a rucksack on was tricky, but then we all started our John Wayne walks onto the glacier. Ok? Nice.

It was pretty sunny, but still not warm and it transpired that I did not have enough clothes on. I was too busy trying to stay upright to worry too much about it and just pulled my hood up over my helmet. Sylvia took us up steps chipped into the ice, showed us how to walk up (like a duck: axe, step, step) and down (feet straight down the slope: axe, step, step? The sides of the crevasses. To be honest they were not as extreme as the name makes them sound, but they were quite steep. There were loads of small holes in the ice, mostly full of water and some with small stones in.

Sylvia had chilled out under the positice influence of the children doing what they were asked and hanging on her every word. The adults of the group were less well behaved. She took us to a big hole – moulin – in the ice with water flowing down it. She said it has a maximum depth of 300m “… because of physics” – unclear science behind this statement. Then she used her ice axe to chip off the summer crust and an ice drill with a loop on the end to attach a rope to. She measured the length of the rope required and then asked for a volunteer. Mila went first (so brave!)  and leant over the hole with the rope attached to her harness. Most people looked down the hole – she told us that the ice anchor could hold 2,000kg, so it seemed pretty safe! It was at this point Danny discovered the joy of the ice axe. Sylvia demonstrated the correct technique to get the axe to stick into the ice and the children lined up in a row to whack at the ice. Eveyone else stepped back while the chips flew!! While everyone else was having their turn, she sent Mila to fetch some stones. When everyone had finished she dropped the stones down the hole and we counted three seconds until it reached the bottom. That made the rope look like a good idea!

Sylvia then took us to a crevasse to walk on that wasn’t stable two weeks before. Mila spotted an ice fall from a black area and the sound rung an echo against the opposite wall of the valley. Sylvia said we were lucky to see an ice fall – normally you hear it but don’t see it. We walked past another tour group doing press ups on their ice axe over a stream. Another tour was doing ice climbing on a vertical crevasse wall. It was about this time I noticed I was properly cold and got my puffer jacket out of the bag (EDIT Keith – she refused to, I made her….which turned out to be the right plan). Then we did the crampons process in reverse and walked back across the morraine and the bridges, this time Mila had been promoted to guide and she led the way while Sylvia attempted to get the non-English speaking members of the group to cross the bridges one at a time!

Walking in crampons was a lot more tiring than it looked and Danny’s ankles were givng way on the way back. None of us managed to catch our trousers in the 10 spikes though, so that was a win!

Our return bus journey was completed by a very cheerful Icelandic man who ate chocolate with Sylvia and chatted with the children at the front of the bus. The excitement for the day complete, we made our way to our hotel for the next two nights.

It took about 25 minutes to get to the hotel, where we checked in; had a rest; had a shower and had some dinner. It was a slow process so by the time we had finished it was nearly 10pm (an 8pm table…) and we were all ready for bed!

Breakfast today was a HUGE improvement on yesterday: donutty pastries, good eggs, proper natural yoghurt and black bread. I will let Mila tell you about the jam that wasn’t jam….

As we had a nice quiet day planned, were staying literally opposite a Kronen and had foul weather, we bought ingredients and made lunch to take with us. I do love a foreign supermarket, but could have done with slightly more German to navigate the cold meat and cheese! The lettuce looked a bit hydroponic to me. Opinions gratefully received! I couldn’t work out how so many of the yoghurts were lactose free, but we went for the brand we had on our tour so we knew what to expect. The time of rain stoppage kept moving, but we set out on our adventures anyway: first stop Solheimajokull.

We visited this car park on the way to Vik yesterday, but it was chucking it down and the visibility was terrible, so we decided to come back. It is under 30 minutes from Vik so not too extreme a backtrack. Today we braved the mobile parking register (all done online but a bit complicated!), parked and started our hike towards the glacier. At the base of the glacier is a lagoon that grows as the glacier shrinks and is littered with icebergs that look like mini glaciers – blue-white with black gravel/ash making them look dirty. By the time they get close to the shore, they look like ice sculptures – transparent and with filigree parts. See if you can identify the spirit animal of our favourite.

The signage is very clear – don’t go onto the glacier without training or a guide. Fair enough. I had no intention of disobeying this instruction. The bit that wasn’t clear was where the glacier started. Turned out we were standing on it – there was just a lot of gravel between us and the ice, so it wasn’t immediately obvious. It made Danny and I nervous, so we waited while Keith snapped some close ups of the ice peeking through and then retreated a bit. Keith and Mila were much braver.

The glacier and the water of the lagoon are almost exactly the same temperature, so the change of state is fairly gradual everywhere except where water is rushing past ice eroding it quite quickly.

We were very lucky and as we turned back, the low cloud rolled away and revealed the beautiful green walls of the valley and let the sun glint off the water. It didn’t last long and the walls were hidden again before we got back to the car.

It was four whole hours since breakfast by now so Mila was hungry again. She started on the sandwiches, while we planned our next move. We were going to see the puffin colony but someone (naming no names) had forgotten the lens he needed. We headed back to Vik instead and most of us used the bathroom while the lens was collected.

As there seemed to be another break in the weather, we headed up to the red-roofed church for Keith to take pictures. I saw and heard a murder of ravens wheeling above us. The church was closed, so it was a brief stop, but instead of immediately heading off to the puffins, we had to go back to the appartment as the person who didn’t use the bathroom last time now needed to go. Sigh.

After a short journey west again along the ring road, we turned down route 218 to navigate around to Dyrholaey Cliffs. They are the opposite side of the bay from Vik so you drive a long way to end up almost where you started, but a bit higher! We started on the left of the peninsular and immediately saw some puffins on the far cliff, taking flight and heading out to sea. As I followed the path of their flight, I spotted a pair of Skuas chasing a Fulmar. All very exciting but they didn’t catch it. I looked down onto the black beach and saw three Eider ducks snoozing. One woke up, shuffled and excreted an enormous amount of guano. Then it shuffled back to the depression in the beach, tucked its head under its wing and went back to sleep.

As we walked around, we saw a few tourists taking photos and then looked past them to the puffins sitting on the grass at the edge of the cliff just the other side of the chain keeping tourists out of the nesting grounds. They were totally relaxed about our presence and some were sleeping with their heads tucked under theeir wings. As we walked around the cliff, we saw more skuas, arctic terns, fulmar and black backed guls. It was a bird watcher’s paradise!

From the other side of the promontory  we could see the beach through a gap in the cliffs. The waves were enormous and crashing really close to the base of the cliffs. The children explained to us that they were destructive waves with a very short swash and very long and strong backwash.

We went back to the car and drove around to the other viewing point – there was a path so we could have walked but the weather was closing in again. We didn’t have great hopes for the other viewpoint  as we had such success at the first, but it was heaving with cars and coaches and as soon as we got out the car we could see puffins flying about and more skuas and fulmar. The view over the cliff as the clouds rolled back again was spectacular – Keith thought it was one of the best panoramas he has tried to photograph. You can judge for yourselves.

Our next and last stop of the day was Reynisfjara; a black sand beach with sneaker waves. These were new to us and we had to read the sign at the edge of the beach to learn about them. I gave the kids the hard word about staying well away. Last time we took them to a black sand beach (in Madeira), Mila made a break for it before we had even got them undressed and I had to wade in to prevent her from being swept out. This time, they were much more sensible, but sadly their behaviour was not mirrored by other tourists, some of whom had taken off shoes and socks to paddle in killer waves. Ridiculous. We watched at least 5 people get wet to the knee as they weren’t watching and keeping their distance when the sneaker waves appeared. I have never seen waves like them on a beach with the tide going out. Truly dangerous. The information on the board, on the tourist map and given to us by Audley all says that there have been multiple fatal accidents on the beach in recent years.  It is an amazing beach, but the weather was rolling in again and we decided to leave for the day and try again tomorrow when the weather should have improved.

Getting in the car we realised it was nearly 4pm and we had a booking at the Lava show at 5pm. We rushed back to Vik, got changed and headed off to the show. All I can say is: wow. What a fascinating experience. We learnt even more about volcanos, lava and Iceland from a French vulcanologist. The heat from the lava was unbelievable as it came down the lava slide and turned gradually from red to black. I felt slightly sorry for the vulcanologist as he tried to answer a six year old’s question: why does the lava change from red to black. He tried to talk about how fast the molecules move and that they emit energy on the visible spectrum when the lava is above 300°C. I don’t think the six year old got it! We all got a bit of lava glass at the end (not obsidian as it is only 40% silica and it would have to be over 70% silica) although not the stuff still cooling on the slope as that was still very hot.

The vulcanologist told us about the practicalities of Katla erupting while we are in Vik. The thing that everyone is worried about is the flash flood that would occur because of the glacier melting so fast. Residents have a meeting point in the town and keep an evacuation bag ready at all times. When they leave their homes, they have to fill in an orange poster with details of the people who have left. They put the poster in the window so that emergency services know that the house has been evacuated. Tourists will be requested by text message to meet at the church and wait until the experts know which way the flood is travelling so they can escape the other way!

After the standard show we got to go into the furnace room and see how they make the lava. They collect sand from the nearby beach to make the lava. It is not really sand but vaporised lava from the 1918 eruption of Katla. There is plenty so they are unlikely to run out even if they change their current policy of re-melting the lava again. Interestingly, when the lava melts, the metal component is heavier and sinks to the bottom of the crucible. That means that the lava poured out from the top has a higher percentage of silica which makes it more viscous. If they don’t continue to add more “sand” then the lava will stop flowing. It was very, very hot when they opened the furnace and used a mirror to show us the inside. Quite a few of the guests had to step away from the heat but I liked it. I am a fan of warm and dry!!

Our final adventure for the day was black crust pizza. It was delicious, but I will let Mila describe it. The only thing of note in the restaurant was the rescue vehicle with the emergency information poster in the window. We can only assume that it has been retired as there didn’t seem to be any doors big enough to get it out of.

We had a more relaxed start today as we had a whole day to do as we wished with the only constraint being where we got to by bed time. Sadly this resulted in a substandard breakfast as three coaches worth of locusts had already eaten. No plates, no cups, no glasses, no fruit juice, no pastries, no milk and egg that could have masqueraded as rubber. Added to that, almost every table was covered in dirty plates. We managed to scrape the bottom of the porridge urn and gain scraps off nourishment from crumbs (and mountains of bacon that had apparently improved with time). Then Keith and Mila found the waffle maker and everyone was happy again – especially as there was Nutella.

We were planning to start with the Lava Centre, but as the weather was set to deteriorate during the day, skipped the inside activity and headed to Gluggafoss – which means window waterfall. It wasn’t particularly busy and when we arrived, it wasn’t raining. We walked up to the pool at the base of the falls and watched a white wagtail wandering about. The waterfall has cut it’s way into the rock, so that in places you have to look through a “window” of rock to see the water. On our way back to the bridge to climb up to the observation point above the waterfall, we saw a few angelica flowers covered in dead, green caterpillars. No idea why. The climb was slippery grass and half way up the rain started again. The view from the top would have been spectacular, but the low cloud and heavy rain made us inclined to rush back down after a few photos. After getting so wet yesterday we were not keen to start the day soaked again!

After a quick check of the weather, we decided to head back to the first indoor activity of the day: the Lava Centre. We are starting to get used to the eye watering cost of everything here, so didn’t feel the entry fee was too bad. It is a fascinating space with an exhibition in the foyer with live data from the Icelandic meteorological office. It shows the number of earthquakes that have happened in the last 48 hours, 3 months and 3 years. The wall panels show the 6 active volcanoes in Iceland and have data and graphics for each: earthquake data in each place and how much each of the GPS recording points are moving vertically. The last of these was a bit scary – most of them are measured in millimetres, but one of them had moved by half a metre in the last year. You cannot escape the very real and present danger that is here! After the data exhibition, we watched a film composed of footage from every eruption in Iceland that they have recorded (obviously just the most recent ones, there was no-one around for the one in the 10th century!). There was no voice over, but someone still got credit for the script. I like that! I didn’t consider before the noise that a lava flow would make – imagine nails down a blackboard and you are close. After the film we went around the interactive exhibition, which required us to spin an enormous wheel around a hemisphere that showed the tectonic plates moving from 65 million years ago to now. It showed how the “hot spot” was stationary and how the plate with Greenland on moved away from it and the land now called Iceland was born. Then we got to wave our arms and stand on vibrating plates while we learned (although the children already knew!) about the three different types of plate interaction: conservative, constructive and destructive. The next area was an earthquake corridor that simulated how a mild earthquake would feel, then we went into a large room with a 3 storey model of a lava plume. The next corridor showed mud springs and explained that hot springs only occur outside of volcanic areas. That one led into a room explaining different types of lava and how they are formed – tomorrow we are going to the lava show were they are going to show us how that works! The last exhibition was another arm waving one. I enjoyed watching tourists try and wave in the right place to activate the display so that I could read the information about each volcano’s last eruption.

I was feeling smug at this point as there wasn’t much enthusiasm for the museum but everyone was impressed by it. Well done Mummy! Even better, lunch was ready and waiting in the car. Our leftover pizza from the night before was delicious and followed by leftover yoghurt from our packed lunches. Very efficient and reassuringly cheap!

Keith wanted a slightly more interesting route to our next stop, so we went back round the smaller gravel roads, past the window waterfall and across the centre of the enormous glacial valley, past fields of lupins and flocks of oyster catchers and a skua! Back on road 1 – the ring road – we saw a small door in the side of the hill, with a parking area in front of it. We managed to stop in time to turn in and investigate. It turned out to be a very old dwelling with the outer area still being used by sheep fed up of being soggy all the time. The inner area was full of gnomes and a battery powered candle and a request for child specified donations. We saw a drumstick sweet and an apple among the Krona notes.

Our next planned stop was Skogar to visit the waterfall – Skogarfoss and the museum. It was STILL raining, so we put back on all of our wet weather gear and left the car to visit yet another waterfall. This one was quite wide and quite busy as it has a cafe and toilets and caters for coaches. It reminded us that we don’t really like people. The waterfall was nice though!

A short distance from the waterfall was the museum recommended us by Audley. It was made up of three parts: some turf-roofed homes with historically accurate fixtures and fittings (and weirdly small beds!); a transport and technology section; and a local craft museum. Mila and I did all three parts, particularly enjoying the kitchen gadgets and stoves in the old houses. Keith and Danny had a little rest while we did the outside part, and joined in for most of the rest.

We were all exhausted again by this point – I am not even sure why, but it was definitely time for a rest. We headed along the ring road again to our next hotel in Vik. Another shopping adventure to get more snacks and plan a budget lunch for tomorrow and a delicious supper in a brewery brought the day to a close.

[EDIT: Keith – this burger was probably the best I’ve ever eaten, and I’ve eaten a lot! The patty was so soft that it just melted. Incredible]

I have decided that breakfast buffets are the best way to get two teenage children up and out for an 8.30am departure! It was nice not have to repack everything this morning as we were staying in Hella for two nights. We decided that we would have to leave the waffle machine for today and instead availed ourselves of bacon, eggs, croissant, yoghurt (disappointingly sweet in my opinion) and porridge. No fear of us starving while there is a buffet breakfast in the morning!!

We set off almost on time to the Super Jeep base camp in Hvolsvollur. The weather was already a bit biblical, but we were confident that with two coats each, waterproof trousers, fleece, hat, gloves etc, we were ready for anything. The base camp was an homage to a youth hostel and clearly caters for customers significantly trendier than us! The waiting area had sofas made from crates, tables from off-road jeep tyres and a swing! We took a seat (or swing) and waited for the other customers to arrive. After a few minutes they invited us to climb into the Super Jeep (off-road minibus) and the chaos began – no less than two families had joined our tour when they had paid for another excursion and had to be politely removed before we could set off. Our party consisted of Thor (Þór) – the guide, the four of us, an older German couple and a Swiss couple with their 11 year old boy. Thor (his middle name for tourists as his first name was unpronounceable!) explained the rough plan and warned us that the Super Jeep would roll and dip a bit, but that was normal and shouldn’t worry anyone. Suitably apprehensive, we set off.

We were gently lulled into a false sense of security as Thor drove sensibly and in silence along the tarmac in the direction of Vik. He stayed within the speed limit and even slowed down to pass some cyclists safely. Then we got to the end of the tarmac, the pneumatics removed air from the massive tyres and we started our gravel adventure.

We found ourselves in an enormous U-shaped valley with a vast web of shallow streams called Markarfljot. There were two massive bolders near the entrance to the valley and we saw oyster catchers and arctic terns feeding and performing aerial acrobatics above the water. The sides of the valley are so far apart that, in the low cloud, I could only see the right hand wall most of the time. We drove straight past a tumbling waterfall with many tourists already in attendance and headed off into the wilds. We were travelling a lot slower than we had been on tarmac and we had to cross a number of small, shallow, gravel-bedded streams. We saw a lot of normal 4×4s and a few standard cars but felt suitably smug in our tank.

Our first stop and first chance to get to know Thor was Merkurker – otherwise known as the sheep tipping cave. The cave we visited is navigable to the upper levels of the plateau and the sheep use it to get down but they don’t like getting back up. Did I mention the sheep are stupid? Quite often in November, the sheep fall over and don’t have the core strength to get back up. The sheep (and land they are on) are owned by Thor’s uncle and so Thor helps round them up ready for the winter. They have to check the cave to make sure there aren’t any sheep flailing about with their feet in the air. Stupid sheep. Thor decided to put on all of his waterproof gear. That was my first inkling that we might be under equipped. Thor put on wader-height Rab waterproof trousers with gaiter bottoms that stopped water going into the top of his boots. He topped this with a Rab jacket that was still dry inside at the end of the day. The trek to the cave was not too tricky and not too far, but the entrance was somewhat intimidating. We had to bend sideways to squeeze around a bolder and into the cave. It was exactly the type of cave you would NOT let adventurous children inside, but Thor promised there were no trolls so we went in for a look. I am worried by water in underground spaces, but the stream was relatively calm and small and I coped with the excitement admirably.

By the time we got back to the Super Jeep, the wind had picked up a bit and the rain was getting a bit heavier. Another little stream to cross and another 15 minutes or so of the gravel road took us to Gígjökull – a tributary glacier of Eyjafjallajökull. Thor parked up in a little car park with other off-road coaches and turned round to talk to us with an impish grin. The Super Jeep rocked impressively in the wind and the man trying to get into a vehicle next to us couldn’t even open the door. Thor told us that when he visited the area as a child, the glacier extended to almost where the cars were parked and below it was the glacier moraine and a 70m deep lake enclosed in walls of stone. The glacier had begun to shrink in recent years, but when the volcano under the glacier erupted in 2010 and badly affected worldwide air travel, enormous volumes of water were released from the glacier, pouring down and carrying unfathomable amounts of debris. By the time the flood ceased, the stone walls had been breached, the lake was gone and the 70m deep chasm was filled up to a level 20m higher than the previous ground level with gravel and boulders. When the volcano erupted, all Icelandic citizens received a text message and within less than an hour and a half, they had evacuated a 70km circle around the area.

After our history lesson, Thor opened the door and leant on it with all his bodyweight so that we could all get out. I think he would have liked us to be quicker… Apparently the wind travels vertically down the face of the glacier, so even if you get quite close there is no respite. It was strong enough to lean back into and the gusts knocked you sideways. There was no way to look at the glacier as the wind was full of nasty bits of rain that got flung into your face if you were foolish enough to look up. Thor took us to the information point and showed us the photos of what he had explained in the nice, warm, dry Super Jeep. I asked if we could get a bit closer as I was intrigued by the crack down the cliff on the right hand side of the gap the glacier had used to fill. He wasn’t at all sure, but allowed himself to be convinced and lead us towards the face. This was the point the older German lady started to struggle a bit. I can’t imagine she weighed more than about 7 stone and was being buffeted terribly. I was quite surprised Danny was able to keep his feet.

Thor told us that the cliff had cracked during the earthquake that preceded the eruption and that previously, the meltwater had run down the far right hand side – now blocked by the broken rock. He didn’t take us too close to the face and explained that as the glacier melted, chunks of ice and rock could fall at any time, so people were warned not to get too close. The way back across the gravel was much easier and jumping doubled the distance you could achieve in a step.

It was astonishing to see plants flowering in such extreme environments, but flower they did – some very close to the ground and some that looked very much like angelica, with tall pompom seed heads. It was an enormous relief to have Thor hold the door again so we could climb back out of the wind and into the Super Jeep. Thor’s final piece of good news was that the other volcano (Katya) under the glacier hasn’t erupted for 104 years and the rule is normally every 100 years plus or minus 8 years. He said with complete calm conviction that the flooding and ash clouds would be worse than 2010 and that Iceland’s tourists would also have to answer the call to evacuate the 100km exclusion zone – but wouldn’t be leaving the country anytime soon!

I think Mila was the most comfortable at this point as she had a brand new waterproof coat and brand new waterproof trousers. Keith and Danny both had a combination of old coat and new trousers. I had old coat and old trousers. It was at this point that I starter revaluating the definition of waterproof. None of my clothing resisted the windblown rain and I was already pretty wet. Fortunately the wind had dropped by the time we came to our next stop. It was starting to be obvious even to the tourists that the water level was rising, and we watched countless off-road vehicles leaving the valley rather rapidly, but Thor still picked his route across the streambeds with confidence and it didn’t feel sketchy. Thor suggested we have something to eat from our paper bag packed lunches before we completed our hour and a half hike to a chimney cave at the head of the Stakkholtsgja canyon. Thor had a discrete chat with the older German couple and then we all set off. Both Keith and I had a wild wee while the others went on ahead. I did not take a picture of him crouching behind a rock. Just saying.

The canyon was like a textbook example of a tiny U-shaped valley, with entirely vertical and ice-smoothed walls. We learnt that the rock was very young (26 million years or so) and so completely useless for climbing. Where it has broken away and not been ground by ice, it looks sedimentary – made up of thousands of jagged pebbles stuck together in a haphazard way. The route was rocky but not particularly challenging until we came to the river crossing. It was still raining and Thor took a moment to navigate both branches of the river to check he could get us all across safely. We were very jealous of the complete confidence he had in his equipment. He held each of our hands as we balanced on rocks just visible through the torrent. It felt safe with him, but would have been extremely foolhardy to do by ourselves. It goes without saying that now my feet were wet too! The older German gentleman made us all laugh by ignoring the stepping stones completely and just wading through the calf high water. I suppose if you are going to get wet anyway, there is not much point putting yourself in danger of falling over as well!

Round the corner from the river was the entrance to a cave with a tumble-down piles of boulders in the entrance. Thor gestured at use to climb up and the 11 year old goat – sorry boy – scrambled up and immediately out of his mother’s line of sight! The rest of us followed more gingerly, but the rocks are so rough that even though they were wet, they did not feel at all slippery. The view from the top rewarded us with a waterfall inside a chimney that twisted and turned as it went up.

Both Mila and I slipped on the way down and ended up with a banged knee (Mila) and a banged elbow (me). We consoled each other and put on brave faces for everyone else. As we walked back, Thor told us a bit more about life in Iceland in tourism and about working with the crew of Game of Thrones for 3 weeks to produce a 15 second clip. He said he was excited to meet some famous people, but they used a green-screen and no-one apart from camera men and directors actually stood in the canyon. Poor Thor! But he did add that apart from transporting equipment and people too and from the filming location, he was also tasked with entertaining the stunt-men (people?) and had 3 weeks playing with snowmobiles, ice-climbing and other probably quite dangerous activities if you’re not a stuntman or Thor.

For those interested, the canyon is used in the Wight Ambush scene in Season 7 – Episode 6 and you can see more pictures here.

Now I was properly wet. My waterproof trousers had kindly allowed my leggings to get in on the action, and they were sharing kindly with my socks, so my feet squelched as I walked and trench foot was imminent. None of us had brought any spare clothing, so the next trip in the Super Jeep was a bit miserable. Thor’s good humour was undiminshed – mostly because he was still dry – and he took us across slightly fuller streams to Thorsmork, where he gave us the option to hike or drive to the next camp. The idea of camping in such a remote location and such brutal weather did not appeal to me, but most of the people at the site were smiling through their sogginess. The German couple and then 11 year old stayed on the Super Jeep and the Swiss couple joined Keith and I on the hike to volcano lodge. It was still raining, but we would have called it light drizzle in the UK. It took about 45 minutes and was an interesting introduction to Icelandic trails. Thor had to drive around so we went by ourselves, but he was right – it would have been difficult to get lost. I had a nice chat with the Swiss lady and learnt that they had not booked any accommodation before they left Switzerland and had bought a tent for the rest of their holidays. Gulp. The German couple were staying in Þórsmörk for a couple of nights, so Thor got them settled and was ready to leave when we finished our hike.

Back in the Super Jeep, we made good time back down the valley. The water levels were definitely higher by this point and Thor humoured Keith by driving three times through the deepest river. You could feel the current tugging at the back and it made me squeak. We had already seen a regular 4×4 (a regular Jeep) abandoned near the glacier (we think they went “off-roading” in deep sand and got stuck) and now we saw a Range Rover on the back of a low-loader. This environment is brutal to machines. Sitting in wet clothes is not pleasant at the best of times, but there was a noticeable lack of moaning on the way back down the valley. Thor gave us one more optional stop at the waterfall we had zoomed past in the morning and gluttons for punishment as we are, we agreed. Again, my suspicions should have been raised by the fact that Thor got himself a hot dog and stayed in the Super Jeep!!

Seljalandsfoss waterfall is on private land and access granted by the landowner. Thor told us that all land in Iceland is accessible no matter who owns it, but landowners are allowed to charge for parking etc. This is the first waterfall that we have been able to walk behind. If we hadn’t already been pretty much soaked to the skin before we arrived, the spray would have ensured we were by the time we left. We were amused by the number of tourists in totally inappropriate clothing and box fresh trainers! It was a stunning waterfall from in front, behind it the view through the water was amazing.

It was a relief to learn that we had completed out last stop – even though it was only 2.30pm – as we were all starting to get cold. It wasn’t until I had taken all the wet things off that I realised how cold I was. We said goodbye and thank you to Thor and his amazing vehicle and went back to the hotel. An hour, a shower and a coffee later I felt almost normal! One last thought for the day: it is rude to eat other people’s babies. Thanks Thor!

Breakfast was unexpectedly competitive – Italians again – but delicious and varied. Half the hotel was queued outside the restaurant by 7.30am when it opened. The yoghurt and rye bread were my highlights, but the others seemed to appreciate the bacon and pancakes.

Sadly, the sky was not the blue Keith was hoping for to get the ultimate geysir photo, but it still wasn’t raining and that is good enough for me!

Our first stop today was Gullfoss – meaning gold waterfall. Mila spotted a marmite caterpillar and I found more lupins, geraniums for days and loads of the plants Granny gave me gone to seed.

Gullfoss is spectacular and very peaceful at 8.30am on a Saturday morning! Amelia is right that the water does look very angry as it boils (figuratively – this is glacial meltwater not geothermally heated!) and rages over multiple steps down into the ravine. The children are now completely onboard with shouting geological features out when they see them and Danny spotted the “bowls” where previous incarnations of the waterfall must have been. I was not encouraged to visit the shop where I could see some lovely Icelandic jumpers. I am now biding my time and waiting for a moment of weakness…

As ever, unexpected things are often found in car parks (more on that to follow) and in the Gullfoss car park were two types of vehicle of note: dirt buggies and their grinning, returning passengers and off-road coaches. We all fancied the dirt buggies and accompanying overalls more than the off-road coach (or any other type of coach to be honest) but the photos of them going through water were pretty impressive!

Our next stop was back the way we had come in Pingvellir National Park.  Oxarafoss is much smaller than Gullfoss but interesting because it falls off the edge of the North American tectonic plate into a corridor-like crater. Unsubstantiated Internet rumours state that this waterfall was man-made to supply the Alping assembly with drinking water. The fun surprise in the car park was the flies. It takes Keith about 3 minutes to put his walking boots on when we stop – not fun to drive in obviously – and by the time he had done this, I was stood in a cloud of flies trying to drink from my eyes. Nice. The flies left us behind where the coachload of tourists joined us. I am not sure which were worse. Early and quiet is our preferred mode of touristing.

It was a relief to get away from the crowds and the flies and get back on the road. We didn’t get stuck behind the cycling sportive taking place on the main road of the region, got the windscreen safely through the gravel section (for the third time) and made it to Faxi waterfall. This one is wide rather than deep (80m) and, when the sun shines through the spray, spectacular. I was fascinated by the concrete fish ladder and the Icelandic gentlemen standing up to waist deep in fast flowing, freezing water. I did see one catch a fish but he didn’t seem impressed with it and he let it go.

Faxi had a café that we were planning to use, but they only served main courses so we continued our food search into Fluoir where we were due to visit the Secret Lagoon, which ironically appears on both physical signposts and TripAdvisor. Food was found and consumed and then we had a lovely time relaxing in the warm water. Obviously that is not the whole story. There were woggles. Danny had 9. Horseplay and canoodling were both banned on the sign but both were evident. I liked the safety video that threatened to sell unaccompanied children to the trolls. It also reminded visitors that there is only one swimming pool… and quite a few geysirs that are 100 degrees Celcius. We are starting to get that message. The changing rooms were very European and meant the poor gentleman who accidentally wandered into the ladies changing room paid for his eyeful with much naked lady laughter.

The children and I were hot and lethargic after our float but the itinerary had no mercy and drove us onwards to Bruarhloo. I had a lot of respect for the older couple who carried their picnic lunch down from the car park to the only table and munched quietly while a whole coachful of Scottish and Irish pensioners wandered past! Amelia and I were the only ones who fancied rafting down the canyon on the most beautiful milky blue river. It winds it’s way through black rock walls buffeting the boats like corks. The guides seemed to know what they were doing but Keith and Danny didn’t fancy it. I did my good turn of the day for a group of Asian men who wanted their photo taking and managed not to get annoyed with the man who didn’t know how to queue and walked into everyone’s shot.

We were running out of enthusiasm (and time) by now, but I had spotted a single sentence in our “optional activities for the day” about a 3,000 year old volcanic cauldera in Kerio. It was well worth the detour and pleasingly cheap for the entrance. A walk along a red basalt gravel path took us up to the rim with an immediate view down to the blue water in the crater. We didn’t really understand the significance of the two children blowing bubbles half way around the rim and I will be amazed if one hasn’t snuck into Keith’s photos. I made myself a liar telling the children that there couldn’t be fish in a water source that wasn’t connected to anything else, then we walked down the steps to the lake and immediately saw a small fish. Sigh. It was pretty brave too and didn’t swim away when I wiggled my fingers at it. The walk back up took the rest of the children’s energy and the journey to the hotel in Hella was very quiet. Poor Amelia has slept on every journey over 10 minutes we have had today. Hopefully a good night’s sleep will restore her for tomorrow’s adventure.

Hella was fortunately easy to navigate as Keith was as exhausted as everyone else and we were allocated a parking space right by our apartment, so emptying the car wasn’t too painful. We had a lovely chat with the lady at reception about what time it would be best to have dinner… and ended up deciding to get pizza from a van in the car park over the road. I cannot tell you how much it pains us to have spent £16 each on pizza. Iceland is pricey. It was good though! Our last adventure of the day was at Mila’s insistence – she wanted to walk down the glass corridor the hotel has installed to allow guests to view the Northern lights from inside. Half way along, we met Freja. Freja has a tag in her collar explaining (in English!) that she does NOT belong to the hotel, so please do not feed her or keep her in your room!! Apparently she belongs to a neighbour and comes in through any open window or door to receive her adulation from ignorant travellers. She was very petable.

Well, that felt almost like a normal pre-covid journey… barely any masks, no hand sanitiser in sight and an aeroplane.

It wasn’t until we were moving down the runway that I realised I had never actually expected to go- so many of our plans have been cancelled that I suppose I hadn’t got my hopes up!

A slight delay in the airport, a rearrangement of children (other people seemed to want to sit near theirs- no accounting for taste) before we took off and a turbulence free flight all resulted in landing in Iceland only a few minutes after we were scheduled to. I had no idea how many people used Iceland as a stop on the way to the US, I think half the passengers hsd connecting flights.

My favourite passenger backstory was the Icelandic man who told everyone who would listen in a variety of languages and volumes that he had just spent a month in Morocco with a woman he met on the internet and had got engaged! Queuing is very dull, so you have to get your entertainment where you can!

We were sad that dense cloud cover gave us no chance of seeing the volcano, but unsurprised, we will have to save that treat for later. The pilot apologised, so I think he was sad too.

Collecting the hire car (Hyundai Santa Fe) was very straightforward, although the number of chips in the paint and windscreen should have given us a hint as to the likely road surface, and we set off to the bridge between continents. Keith terrified another tourist by rolling the car foward slowly whilst in electric mode without realising she was leaning on the car. She jumped a bit!

We were immediately distracted (third junction from the airport) by an Icelandic supermarket and went in to buy snacks and a map. Forgot the map and just bought biscuits that we didn’t recognise- the rule while travelling is no familiar brands!

We did make it to the bridge- it is surreal standing in the gap between two tectonic plates moving apart at a rate of 2cm a year, but we didn’t linger as it was chilly.

Keith was doing a great job on the wrong side of the road in an unfamiliar car and we made it through Reykjavik and up to Geysir. There is literally nothing here except a hotel (review to follow), a restaurant, a tourist information area and the hot springs.

The journey here was epic, every twist in the road revealed the next geographical treat- glacial valleys, meandering rivers, alluvial flood plains, crevasses created by water, peaks carved by wind, enormous lakes, snow-capped mountains. Some things we are going back to visit tomorrow.

We didn’t quite make our 8pm table, but with little fuss they found us somewhere to sit and something to eat. We went for the tasting platter for 2 and some chicken wings as a starter. Absolutely amazing but I am glad we didn’t order more! The goat pate and reindeer slice in bread were my favourite, Danny ate the jam with a spoon and Mila struggled with her conscience while chowing down on Rudolf! Keith tried a local beer and I had the Artic Char- which looked like salmon but wasn’t as fishy. We were way too full for pudding and it was already 10.30pm, so we changed back into walking boots and went up to the geysir.

We watched Strokkur erupt from every conceivable angle, but the sky behind it was the same white as the steam, so it made photos tricky. The bigger geysir (imaginatively named: Geysir) has been dormant for years which has the advantsge that you can look into the clear pool and see the tunnel down to the centre of the world… We all liked the pool that looked like it was a pan of water on a rolling boil. Right at the entrance is a sign for stupid tourists that we all scoffed at, but I have to admit it was strangely tempting to see how hot the water was. I managed to resist and so avoided the 63K drive it might have resulted in!

Our first day in Iceland was done and we were all ready to collapse and take advantage of the excellent black out curtains that kept back the very late dusk followed almost immediately by a very early dawn!