Every country has it's version of Iceland's Golden circle - A group of must see attractions close enough to a major city that makes visiting them relatively easy. The upside is that seeing the sights is easy, the downside is that they can be crowded. Like really crowded. The parking lots at the sites we visited were jam packed with tourbuses, cars and campervans, and there were so many people, we spent the whole day trying to take pictures without other people in them. The Golden circle consists of Thingvellir National Park, the Geysir geyser (it's the geyser that gave us the word geyser to describe all geysers) and Gulfoss waterfall. Colleen checked on the volcano, and it looked like the area was closed for the day, so Thursday was our Golden Circle day.
We started off the day with a drive from Bogarnes. Once again, the GPS sent us on a "shortcut" (we really have to get that map). Another bumpy dirt road. Uncomfortable ride yes, but stunning views and we had the road pretty much to ourselves (I suppose the tour busses prefer paved roads). Our first stop was Þingvellir (pronounced Thingvellir). Thingvellir has two things going for it. First, it is historically and culturally important as the location of Iceland's original parliament dating back to 930AD. Iceland was colonized by people from Norway (and their mostly Irish slaves) unhappy in one way or another with their lot there. When they settled, they left kings behind and settled on a democratic assembly to settle disputes and make laws (all 700 years before the United States declared independence from their king). Standing on the very spot where a bunch of midievil vikings hashed out their differences was evocative. The second thing that makes Thingvellir worth visiting is that it is geologically important. Iceland sits atop the mid Atlantic ridge where the European and North American tectonic plates meet, drifting apart at just under one inch per year (which means Iceland is growing). This tectonic activity accounts for Iceland's amazing geology. The rift itself passes right through Thingvellir, giving rise to some pretty neat rock formations. There is a walking path through a rift valley with America on one side and Europe on the other. you are standing literally on the boundary between continents. Pretty cool.
Next stop Geysir. Geysir itself is in a period of dormancy, but the adjacent Strokkur geyser erupts on a pretty regular 5-10 minute cycle. Watching water that has been heated by subterranean lava explode 50 meters into the air is pretty spectacular. The anticipation is fun too. You can get fairly close to the the geyser pool (15 meters), so you can see it go from relatively calm to slight movement to churning to finally erupting. The cycle is not exact, so you never know when the eruption will come. In other words, it is always a surprise.
Next stop Gulfoss waterfall. We've seen a lot of waterfalls on this trip, and they've all been beautiful. However, they've all been moderate to small in size. Gulfoss was a big one. It has two stages, the first, an 11 meter drop followed by the second 21 meter drop. During the summer, 140 cubic meters per second flow over the waterfall. Getting close to something that raw and powerful is impressive.
Final stop Reykjavik.We stayed at the Reykjavik Campsite, basically a big parking lot with a building with showers toilets and cooking facilities a bit of a ways out from the center of town. We didn't make it in to town, but we did take a walk through the neighbourhood the camp was in and ended up getting a nice dinner at a restaurant (I think it was our first restaurant food for the whole trip). We couldn't stay out late though, Friday was a big day - up early for the 10 mile hike to the volcano.
