First Glimpse of Iceland
3 August 2012 I have dreamt of going to Iceland for a very long time. If I hadn't been such a lame duck in physics in school my first choice of profession would have been volcanologist. That was many years ago. But Iceland still remained on the top of my list of travel destinations. Then I received an airline newsletter one night last November. Hamburg to Keflavík at an unbeatable budget price for the best travelling season: summer. Next morning I got the permission of my collegues and boss to be away for three weeks in August and booked the flight on the same day. The coming months I plagued all people around me with my enthusiasm for vacation. Then came the morning of departure. I hadn't slept during the night due to a bunch of butterflies in my stomach. At 5:30 am I closed the appartment door behind me.
The plane took flight in northern direction over Denmark. It seemed not much later when the coast of Norway could be spotted in the distance. Then we crossed the Athlantic and for a while the world below was blue dotted with little white foam heads and a few ships. I listened to music and zapped through the media system to busy myself. The flight took just three hours and sooner than expected I spotted Iceland before us with snowcapped mountains. Not long afterwards the vast expanse of the Vatnajökull was visible under the clouds, the biggest glacier on the European tectonic plate. I could even distinguish Jökulsárlón. The glacier lagoon was dotted with little white spots. Icebergs drifting into the open Atlantic. Further along the coast green pasture, rivers and desert like scenery stretched out. Houses appeared and a few minutes later we touched ground. A friendly goodby of the board staff, then everybody poured out into the terminal.
I picked my backpack from conveyor belt and headed for the foreign currency exchange and bought a bus ticket. The bus took us to a strange landscape. Lava covered with moss. Mountains in the distance. Heather or thyme was starting to add a touch of faint pink to the dominating brown, black and green grounds. Everybody was dropped off at their hotels. Mine proofed to be quite away from the center at a loud road in an industrial area. The place looked very unconvincing and after I saw the room and other facilities I decided I did not want to stay there. It was still morning. So I left the place and headed downtown to see, if the tourist information could help me to find a bus connection and a nice place to stay somewhere outside of Reykjavík.
The Vatnajökull with its glacier tongues Fjallsjökull to the left ending in Fjallsárlon and the huge Breiðamerkurjökull in the center ending in the glacier lagoon Jökulsárlon
Breiðamerkurjökull and the glacier lagoon Jökulsárlon. Jökull = glacier, á (-r, -r) = river, lon = lagoon
Öræfajökull volcano with Iceland's highest peak: Hvannadalshnjúkur, 2109.6 metres. Hnjúkur = mountain peak.
From back to front: Skaftafell (1126 m), Skaftfellsjökull, Hrútsfjall, Hrútsfjallstindar (1875 m), Svínafellsjökull, Hvannadalshnjúkur (2109.6 m), Virkisjökull, Falljökull
Skeiðarárjökull, Skaftafellsfjöll, Vatnajökull and the dark spot in the middle of the glacier might be the volcano Grímsvötn, which last broke out in May 2011.
Björninn
Síðujökull
Hekla (1491 m)
Þjórá (230 km) is the largest Icelandic river. This section lies in þjórárdalur west of Hekla.
Top: Hvítá (white river), whose most famous sight is the waterfall Gullfoss. Below: þjórá.
Above the Hvítá is the lake Hestvatn.
On the right hand side the rivers Sog and Hvítá are meeting and become the river Ölfusá, that soon afterwards flows through the town Sveitarfélagið Árborg
Where Ölfusá meets the Atlantic: Flói Nature Reserve
The curved road is þrengslavegur. The horizontal road below the houses Suðurstrandarvegur. The road leading southwest is þorákshafnarvegur.
Geitafell (509 m)
Stóra Eldborg ( = big fire castle)
Stóra Eldborg ( = big fire castle)
Lava falling down the cliffs at Suðurstrandarvegur (road 427) next to Geitahliðfjall east of Stóra Eldborg.
Along Reykjanesbraut (road no. 41) between Keflavík and Reykjavík