Beyond Reykjavik (Part 1)

Saturday 31 March 2012

After a quick breakfast at the Kornig bakery, we met up with John, our ex-patriot Canadian tour guide to see the sites outside of the city. Seven other tourists and we were on the road by 8:30, and it did not take long to see just how fantastic and non-Maryland like this country was.

After stops at an Icelandic Quickie Mart for candy and snacks, a black sand beach, and then a place where buildings were built into the volcanic rock of a hillside, we visited Skógafoss. This was an amazingly tall and powerful waterfall and since this was Iceland you could go right up to where the water crashed into the water, if you wanted to get dead. Alex went right near that spot because he only wanted to get soaked. There were also steps cut into the hillside so you could climb to the top. I discovered a side trail about 2/3 of the way up that led to an outcropping right by the falls. This was my favorite part of this stop and perhaps of the entire day.

Next up was the town of Vik. The small road to black sand beach  was covered over with black sand (Ella now tells me it was ash, and she might be right). I encouraged the driver to give it a go and told him I would push him out if he got stuck. After he got stuck and I could not push him out, we walked the rest of the way to the beach while he stayed behind to enjoy the scenery and await a tow truck.

The beach was quite a thing to see. In the ocean were several "drepcaslen" which are rock formations born of lava and shaped by the sea. The weather continued to cooperate so Shelley and I went picture crazy while the kids went play in black sand crazy.

We then walked to the nearby woolen outlet which our driver claimed was the best place to buy this kind of stuff. Maybe he only told that to hosers that get him stuck in sand (or is it ash?), or maybe it was that any store a tour bus takes you to will be overpriced, but this one was so we did not buy anything. Next door was the only restaurant available for lunch, so at least that was an easy decision. I had a little lamb and an Apelsin, the kids ordered fish and chips because who knows when they will have another chance for that, and Shelley probably had some kind of salad.

Tune in next time for the rest of this tour.