Going up the country

When I last wrote you all, I was recovering from an intense but fortunately brief illness. Saturday morning we packed up, took yet another shuttle to the car rental place, and left Reykjavik for the Golden Circle.

I'm not sure why they call it that; I think the name was created to give tourists the impression that it was a useful and compete day trip if they were just laying over in Reykjavik on their way between Europe and North America.

The first stop, Þingvellir (Thingvellir in our alphabet), is the rift point between the Eurasian and North American plates, so it is marked by giant cracks in the surface and the largest natural lake in Iceland. It's also of historical importance, as the first Icelandic national assembly (the Althingi) met here in 930. While I took some pictures, they are eminantly forgettable.

We then moved on to Geysir. Geysir is, no surprise, a geyser. It's why all the geysers in Yellowstone are called geysers. And, sadly, Geysir no longer erupts regularly.

Strokkur blows, June 2016

However, there's another geyser in the same field called Strokkur which erupts every five minutes or so, to everyone's delight. While this was definitely an enjoyable stop, it really doesn't measure up to Yellowstone.

The third major stop of the Circle is Gullfoss, which is an impressive waterfall (foss means waterfall). Unfortunately, the picture is very misty. But you can take my word for it - it's cool.

A misty Gullfoss, June 2016

From there we headed on the Ring Road (Iceland's main artery) to the Hotel Ranga, where I was seriously looking forward to a hot shower now that I was feeling better. This is what I found.

Have a good soak, June 2016 (credit: Sally)

Not exactly what I had in mind. But I did enjoy getting clean.

 

Life is what happens when you're busy making other plans