The Golden Circle

 

 We woke up to another sunny day!  It is still windy, but they tell us that we can only wish for one thing when it comes to the weather in Iceland! 🤷‍♀️  We made a quick stop along the shore in Reykjavik to take a picture of the Sun Voyager sculpture, which depicts a Viking ship.  Then we headed out of the city, into the highlands to take in the Golden Circle.  The drive through the countryside was so picturesque that I couldn’t stop taking pictures out of the bus window!  I deleted many of them but actually managed to capture a few good ones.  The Alaskan Lupines are everywhere, lending a beautiful purple hue to the lush, green landscape.  This is my first time in Iceland at this time of the year and it is beautiful!!

Our first stop was at Thingvellir National Park.  This is the site of the Althing, an open-air governmental assembly that was established in 930 and continued to meet until 1798.  This is also where you can see where the North American and Eurasian continental plates are separating.  We actually walked through the canyon that was created by this geological wonder! Another highlight occurred when we spotted a man about to raise the 🇮🇸 Icelandic flag.  As he raised the flag, our lovely Tour Director, Perla, sang the national anthem.  Wow! She is not only as cute as a button but she has a beautiful voice! 😍

Further up the road we stopped at Fridheimar Farm. They grow produce and most of the tomatoes for the entire island in greenhouses that are heated using geothermal energy.  We were given a short presentation and then sat down to a delicious lunch of their famous tomato soup and homemade bread! 😋. Some people even tried tomato ice cream! After lunch we got to meet some lovely Icelandic horses and hear all about their breed.  Then we were treated to a demonstration of the various gates of Icelandic horses, two of which are unique to these horses.

Next we travelled to the geyser geothermal area where we saw water that was 80-100 degrees C bubbling out of the ground.  Then we waited patiently for the geyser to erupt.  It happened pretty fast!

Our last stop was at the Gullfoss waterfall.  This waterfall is jaw dropping beautiful!  We walked along a long, slippery trail to get right up beside the waterfall so that we could really feel the force of the raging water.

That wrapped up the Golden Circle. We travelled another hour to Selfoss, our stop for the night.  We got settled into our rooms and then everyone split up into small groups to find a place to have dinner.  It’s now 9:00 pm and, looking outside, it feels like the middle of the afternoon!

Goodnight!









































































Comments

Post a Comment

Popular posts from this blog

From North to West

Image
 This morning we said goodbye to that picturesque little fishing village, it was hard to leave.   We were at the northern end of the fjord so we continued around the north end.  We climbed quite high and were driving through thick fog.  I’m thinking it may have been a good thing that we couldn’t see the drop off over the side of the road! Eventually we broke through the fog and found the sunshine!!!  Another beautiful, sunny day in Iceland! Every day our Tour Director reminds us of how lucky we have been with the weather! Our first stop was in another quaint little village called Hofsos.  This village has an emigration Centre ( we didn’t go in) and it also has the only flag factory in Iceland! We just stopped long enough to stretch our legs and take some pictures. We had a lovely drive from the north, over the mountains and into the west of Iceland.  The sun was shining and the scenery was spectacular!  Perla played a variety of Icelandic music fo...
Read more

We are ready for a new adventure!

Image
 Hi! In 8 days we will be once again setting off on another adventure!!  We have had to stay at home for long enough, it is time to hit the road! This time, we are embarking on a 10 day tour of Iceland!!  After Iceland, 6 ladies from our group will continue on to do a 3 day extension to Bergen, Norway.  Unfortunately, I won’t be covering that in my blog, as four of us will be embarking on a 14 day cruise over to and around Greenland!  I will continue to write about those adventures in this blog!!! I hope you enjoy hearing about our travels!!
Read more

And Away We Go!!!

Image
  Technically, our trip didn’t start until today, June 22.  However, four people flew to Reykjavik on June 20 to get rested up before the tour.  Aside from a delayed departure from Toronto, it sounds like their trip went smoothly.  However, Jane didn’t get her luggage and she has her fingers crossed that we have it with us when we arrive in the morning! My Wednesday morning started off with an email from Air Canada, informing me that our flight from Saskatoon to Toronto had been cancelled!  Excuse me??? 🤷‍♀️😫. That was followed by an email saying that we have been booked on another flight to Toronto, departing five minutes later. Phew!  I quickly reached out to the rest of my group, just to find out that no one else had been notified that they had been rebooked.  As Carl drove, I got on the computer and checked all of the bookings, to make sure that we were all on the same flight.  Yes! We were in business! We all gathered at the airport, which ...
Read more