The itinerary

The trip
After 6 years dreaming about going to the mighty isle of Iceland, finally we did it. Every summer I was wishing more and more about it. People I knew had been to Iceland were always explaining me how impressive it was, and all had repeated the trip. Also, important for me was the fact about temperature. Summer in Barcelona is far to hot, so to start it was a good idea to leave to a colder place for the summer.

Unfortunately, we did not have much time to prepare for the trip due to work reasons, so we just decided on the plane which direction should we go. We had 4 hours to read and plan!.

Before leaving from Spain, we managed to rent a car. At first we thought about taking a 4WD, but the price was so expensive that we thought it was not really worth it (on the first day there we already regretted).

So, we arrived at Keflyavik airport. The first impression was that it looked pretty a small one to be the main international airport of the Isle... but mostly we were happy to breath fresh air... cold and wet, not humid like in Barcelona!. After picking up our luggage, we went to the counter to get the car, and the first thing we were surprised with was how calm the guy at the counter was. We had just landed, were full of questions, and he was completely not in a rush. He gave us a good map of Iceland, and little directions. We left the airport, at 10am. It was raining and cold.
Our budget was relatively low. A bit of a contradiction when are planning to go to one of the most expensive countries in Europe. It was our first trip based on camping overnight stay and camping prepared food!. But it was the only way to make it.

First thing we thought about doing after landing, was to pop in a supermarket and fill the boot with food for the next couple of days. So, we stopped at the first one … and we thought we were really lucky, there was plenty of space to park, and looked like no queues! But … it was closed. Shops in Iceland do not open until 11am!. We decided to stop at the next gas station. Here we got our first nice surprise: almost 10€ for a sandwich, and 2 soft-drinks!.

At around 11am we managed with the supermarket … I was really surprised with the refrigerator area, where all the fresh products like meat, cheese… are stored. In Spain and in all the places where I have been to, there are special “cupboards” refrigerators. In Iceland, they have rooms, where you actually walk inside, and pick up all the needed stuff; as you may imagine, they are really cold!. So I really recommend thinking well before going in. We bought plenty of dry sups, eggs, baked beans, some vegetables and fruits, and lamb (the best lamb we have ever tried so far). We only had one thing left to buy: Gas! That took us quite more time. We find out that you have to really look at the type of camping gas brand, since there are several ones and the burner we brought from Spain was exactly the least common!. When we found the place we bought several just in case we would not find more later on (this was a wise decision).

The golden circle
Our first stop was Þingvellir National Park, The Park is worth is visit. It is really amazing to see how the two tectonic plates collide in this area. The site of the ancient parliament.

From here we headed to the Geysir area. This was or first contact with hot springs and fumaroles. In a quite small area, you can see, all kinds of pools with hot water, ones are blue, others so transparent it seems they go directly to the centre of the earth. Some waters are still others popping up every 15- 30 min. Some are only steamy wholes. This was probably the first day when I realized I would have liked to have more knowledge about geology, to better understand what is really going on there!.

Please look at the next publication to see some images showing the different stages of the Geyser explosion.

Next stop was Gullfoss. The golden water falls. Impressive!

From Gullfoss we drove through Central land from where we headed to the following places during our 14 days: Akureyri, Husavik, the Myvatn lake area, Deittfoss waterfalls, Eastfiords, Eglisstadir, Skaftafell National Park, Vatnajokull, Jokulsarlon Lagoon, Vik, Skogar and back to Reykjavik.