So this is a little overdue but I am finally going to write about my road trip up to norður Ísland (northern Iceland). We left on Sunday 10/9, the original plan was to leave on Saturday but the weather was so bad in the morning we decided to leave on Sunday instead. Because we left on Sunday our friend Jake from Vancouver could come with us, so it was my friend Emily who was awesome and drove the whole way, Jake, and these two other exchange students Riitta (Finland) and Erin (Australia). We put out a message on our exchange student facebook group to see if anyone wanted to join us and Riitta and Erin responded and I am glad they did because they are awesome and really nice! We rented a Hyundai Sante Fe and left Reykjavik around 10am. The cabin we stayed at was probably 3.5 hours away but we took our time enjoying the sights and having picture stops probably every 30 minutes. We ended up getting to the cabin I think around 5:30. We stopped at Borgarnes a town about an hour away, although I think we got there in 3 hours with all our stops. We did a little grocery shopping at Bónus and then ate lunch in a café overlooking gorgeous mountains and the shore. Along the way to the cabin we drove around a fjord (this was before Borgarnes), there is a tunnel under the water you can take that is 5km long (we did it on the way back) but we wanted to see the fjord and I am glad we did. It took a lot longer but it was beautiful. We also stopped along the side of the road at this place that had houses for elves/dwarfs. Apparently some farmer just built these little houses and put little figurines in them. Our friend Jake had seen it before and sure enough we were driving along and spotted the little guys so we turned around and stopped.
We also were driving and our friend Riitta (who has worked at a guesthouse by the waterfall Goðafoss for two summers) told us we could climb this hill coming up. We were driving up to it and it looked steep and rocky and we were all secretly thinking how are we going to climb that? But then there was a sign that side drive to the other side and on that side there was stairs and paths to climb up to the top. It was a short little hike and really awesome views. We were looking at it and Emily, who studies geology, realized it was a crater and when we looked out we could see a lava field. We figured out that we had just climbed a volcano! How cool is that!
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| Look Mom, I'm on a volcano! L-R: Jake, Riitta, Erin, Me, and Emily |
Then we drove for a bit till Emily wanted to stop to look at cool rocks. There was a tiny waterfall with these blue colored rocks, we suspected they were blue from copper. Emily got out her rock hammer and was hammering away at some rocks to get them to open. We each grabbed a few rocks from this place.
We then kept driving till we saw our first snow and of course had to get out and take a group picture.
We drove some more till we got to Skagaströnd where our cabin was. We explored the tiny town of 530 for a little bit (not much to see), there is the only country bar in Iceland here but it was closed on Sundays. We then went to the cabin ate spaghetti and drank tea and hot cocoa while we played card games all night. It was cozy and real fun!
Thanks to Jake for all the group photos, and since I had some serious issues uploading this post I will write part 2 after I eat lunch!
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