Explosions!

Day 11

My one entire day in Iceland is promising to be a full one!  I'm starting the morning with a city sightseeing tour and an afternoon Golden Circle tour.  One thing that I've noticed in Reykjavik is that they have a lot of graffiti.  Maybe it's just because it's a small city and the artists don't have far to go.  Other than that it is a very clean and tidy city.  

President's Home

My guess was good and it was indeed a busy and exciting day.  My Iceland package included the city tour.  It wasn't a traditional tour where we drove in circles seeing the same things I ended up walking past.  We started by driving out to the President's home.  I was highly amused that you can walk right up ot the house as it is right beside a public church.  They do have a small sign indicating the forbidden area.  But that's all.  No fence or anything.  I suppose it is out of the way so it's not like you could sneak up on the place.  

Iceland is a small island.  But one of the larger in Europe.  It's half the size of Great Britain but that still puts it in the top 5.  But it's only about 1/6th the size of Alberta.  And a small population of 320,000, 2/3 of whom live in Reykjavik.  Amusingly the tour was done in English and French by a Japanese lady.  She does stand out, as she herself pointed out.  

Perlan outlook, it's the silver dome in the center

One treat was the Perlan outlook.  I had been wondering what the shiny dome above my hotel was.  Much of the heating and hot water comes directly from the underground thermal pools.  They built several large tanks to hold the extras.  And they were unattractive.  The new owners built a dome on top with a fancy restaurant and a viewing platform.  What a great idea.

View of Reykjavik

Hallgrimur Church

The final stop was Hallgrimskirkja, the church of Hallgrimur.  It is 75 m high to represent the height of the geyser (more on that later).  It is quite an imposing structure and by far the tallest and most unique building in the area.  I went to the top for some views and was highly amused to spot a waffle truck.  Hello lovely views of Reykjavik and lunch!

Thingvellir National Park

After a bit of time for a lunch break- which included a hot dog from the famous hot dog stand Beajarins Betzu, which was good and reminded me of the Ikea style hot dogs- I headed off on the afternoon tour.  Which was fabulous.  I did the Golden Circle afternoon tour as I had no time to do the full day one without sacrificing the city tour.  The tour included Thingvellir National Park, Gullfoss waterfall and the Geyser.  

The national park was spectacular.  It's where they used to hold their parliament centuries ago.  They would all gather here and meet for 2 weeks and then head back to their areas to share what they decided and learned.  

Gullfoss Waterfall

Gullfoss waterfall is really impressive.  It is very similar to Niagara Falls.  Only they have multiple levels where it drops off instead of one giant drop.  But the sheer volume of water flowing is amazing.  And you can get fairly close to it.  Which is good and bad.  I did get a bit damp but it was worth the view.

Strokker Geyser

The last stop was at the Geyser.  It's just called geyser because it is where the word geyser comes from actually.  The original one would shoot 75m high, like the church.  Now it is Stokker that is erupting.  It's still fairly impressive despite the fact that it isn't mature enough to erupt as high as Geyser.  It goes off around every 8 minutes or so.  I've never actually seen a geyser in real life before and it was really incredible to see the water bubble and boil and finally build the pressure and explode.  

Rift between North America and Europe

It was a great chance to get out of the city and get to see more of Iceland.  It looks really dead and desolate as the plane lands but I've since learned that it's because the whole island is still covered with hardened lava.  And that it's the moss and lichens that grow first.  With willows, blueberries and blackberries filling in the areas.  So it doesn't look very lush because it isn't.  I enjoyed how the willows gave off this interesing purple hue.  

I was also amused to see all the farmsteads that our guide said looked like they were on fire.  But it is the steam from the excess heat from the thermal heat sources.  They even use thermal heat to keep the greenhouses warm enough to grow vegetables to keep prices down.  

One curious thing about Iceland is that part of it is in Europe and part in North America.  And there are actually huge cracks in the ground showing where the 2 are being literally ripped apart by the tectonic plates.  

Now back to the hotel after some dinner, Mexican food is really big here too, and time to pack up and get ready to head home in the afternoon after a few last bits of excitement!

me in Reykjavik