It must have been a dream surely ! I had some vague recollection this morning of us sitting on kitchen chairs in a field next to our isolated cabin at midnight with the temperature hovering around 1 degree celsius looking at an encore performance of the northern lights ! Surely not but when i checked my camera (yes I've finally worked out how to set up the camera for a night shoot) there were the images (slightly blurred but evidence none the less) of us having scored a 3rd night of this wonderous spectacle !t Nuts or what !!!
After what seemed like a short sleep (I wonder why!) we set off from our rustic cabin Keflavik bound (500 kms away) on our last full day in Iceland. After yesterdays late afternoon sun this morning looked decidedly ominous with threatening clouds soon turning into solid rain that lasted ALL the way to Keflavik ! This put a decidely wet rag on our plans to pick up on some of the sights we'd missed on our way up for the very same reason !
100 kms in & the spectacular Jokularson Lagoon once again appeared out of the gloom. We parked as close as we could to the ice flow to minimise the drenching we'd likely get and raced to take photos of the calved ice heading out to sea as soon as we opened the car doors ! This was "rush" tourism at its best !
With photos taken and heaters on full, our joy at missing out on a complete drenching soon turned to dismay as the rain gradually turned into a blizzard of icy slush / snow that made driving on the N1 road hazardous in our little Hyundai I20. Not only was grip an issue but also trying to work out where the middle and edges of the road were as we drove for what seemed like ages in the extreme conditions before fatigue forced me to pull over. A couple of pics taken in the freezing cold was all that was needed to reset my driving mechanism and on we went !
With planned walks and scenic photo shoots off the agenda, our stops were limited to Vik to take lunch and a power nap and Skogafoss (a beautiful Icelandic warefall) where we braved the rain to get close up and personal with the powerful warerfall. Monika even climbed the nearby stairs for a ring side view of the falls.
The route following took us to Selfoss and around the peninsular to Grindavik through a large volcanic national park complete with geo thermal pools that I briefly raced over to have a look at .. you can see a pattern emerging !
From Grindavick we drove past the famed Blue Lagoon. We'd briefly considered booking on line the previous evening ($80 each for a swim !!!) but found that all its hourly sessions were fully booked - amazing considering the cost and size of the lagoon !
Our hotel at Keflavick near the airport took a little finding but as a so called Hostel this was a gem with nice rooms and a lovely gerneral area with free tea and coffee. At one stop short of falling asleep we headed out to the nearby town to take dinner in a diner (2 burgers, 2soft drinks and some fries = $50 !!!) and then refuel in readiness for the early morning return of our hire car !
One leg of our 2017 OS adventure down and time to move on ! Aurevoir Nortern Lights !
Sent from Samsung tablet
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