Iceland photos continue

[tiggymalvern]

You thought I'd reached the end? Nope! I just had ten days or so when I spent a lot of time dealing with tax paperwork and planning permission and other things that you don't want to hear about, trust me on that (I will make a post summarising the planning permission head-desking at some point when it's all over, but that will be something else. In every sense of the phrase.)


Sunrise just east of Vik. It's much easier to get sunrise photos when sunrise is around 9am 😁


Also sunrise, but looking north along the river valley.


After the sunrise photography session, we made a hard and fast decision to drive to Reykjavik without stopping any more, so that we'd have more time in the city. This meant I just grabbed a few more shots of the scenery as we drove.




The sun disappeared as we got closer to Reykjavik.


Passing by one of the geothermal areas with steam rising from the ground here and there.


And a bigger one (that is steam in the mountain hollow there, not cloud).


We spent the afternoon in the capital, but as I stayed there for a couple more days after my family left, I'll do a post dedicated to Reykjavik later.

I'd booked a northern lights boat tour for the Sunday evening, but it was cloudy that night, so I rebooked it for Monday. Which made Monday a busy day, since that was also the day I was diving in Silfra, the no man's land between the European and North American continental plates.

So it was back to Thingvellir, this photo taken on the way.


It was another cloudy day at Thingvellir. It wasn't raining this time, but there was strong wind and it was cold!


The water for the dive was 2C/35.6F. It's that temperature all year round, since it's melted snow and ice. I didn't notice how cold the water was while I was in it - as soon as I got out, I discovered my lips were numb.

The water is incredibly clear, since no algae/plankton live in it.






It was snowing lightly when we got out of the water, and with that wind still blowing hard, getting out of the wet diving gear and back into clothes was by far the coldest part of the entire trip. Even with my heated diving vest on full, it was chilly!

Back in Reykjavik, I grabbed a meal at a shawarma-style place then got organised for the northern lights tour. I had realistic expectations - the odds of an impressive showing are always poor - which I why I booked the boat trip. I love boats and the ocean, I love seeing cities lit up at night from the water, so even if I didn't see the northern lights, I'd still enjoy the evening.

It was still a windy night, and the boat trip offered up thick overalls you could grab to wear over your clothes - they were very warm and totally windproof, if not glamorous.


Reykjavik from the sea.


The northern lights, as predicted, did not put on a great show. Technically they were there, but it was one of those cases where the human eye only saw some thin white haze. The phone cameras picked up hints of green.


If I'd booked a coach trip to see that, I would have considered it a waste of an evening. But out on the open sundeck of a boat, with the wind and sea air and cozy and warm despite it, I considered it delightful. And then as the boat headed back to the harbour, all adults were offered a free shot of brennivin. Highly recommended! 😁

Comments

[tiggymalvern]

The wide channels of the river estuaries flowing down to the ocean were glorious.

I do not do ice baths. I don't get into cold water without a dry suit and a heated vest. I'm a wimp and I admit it! The guide for our excursion does that dive every day and he doesn't have a heated vest, and I think he's insane...

You lived in Alaska for a while, I would hope you got to see a good show! I'll try again at some point, Alaska or northern Canada - they're definitely on my list to visit.

[tameiki]

Kodiak for two years, which is a little south of Anchorage. Adak for three years but that's way south near the end of the Aleutian chain (somewhat around the Vancouver area) so they were both way too far south to see the Northern Lights. Fairbanks, however, was north enough to enjoy them.

[tiggymalvern]

I hadn't realised the Aleutians curved that far south. The way maps of a round earth are drawn onto flat paper can be very misleading. Thank you for the education :-)

[tameiki]

Huh. I could be wrong about the Vancouver thing since I was also looking at a flat map. *laughs*

Thanks to Google, it says the latitude of Adak is 51.8668 degrees and Vancouver is 49.2827 degrees so not too far off. Hmm, I learned something, too. :)