Hidden treasures in a lava crust

Day Two of Iceland had the three of us (Libby, my sorority sister Andrea, and me) set out on a driving adventure.  Andrea had already been in Iceland since 6:30 am the previous morning and taken an adventure drive of her own-she had this down desPite the road signs (or lack of them), the additional letters in the Icelandic alphabet, and a rather pushy British voice on the 10 year old GARMIN GPS device.  We were going to drive what is known as the golden circle.  I'm not quite sure why they call it that, because in reality the best things (and really the only things) to see are in a "straight" line up to the northeast.  

None then less, we did drive in a circle and tried to see some more off the beaten path type of areas.  Andrea surmised we may have been a couple of weeks early for the real landscape beauty of Iceland because not much was green yet.  I have my doubts, but she has studied the country since childhood.

 We drove highway 1 through a small village of Snellfoss which highlights included a KFC and an Olis.  KFC is LOVED in Europe which must explain why it is still in business.  I saw them everywhere and the college kids especially love to it and subway.  An Olis is a gas station and little convenience store which also has free wifi.  The allowed us to check in to the safety mechanism established by Iceland because a lot of extremist and not so smart tourist go do some crazy things on some dangerous glaciers and interior mountains.  We were lame by comparison.   

After turning off the pushy gps, and relying on the map above, we drove up through various lavas fields and around volcanos until we reached skálholt, an old Catholic Cathedral area which is on the interior of the country but was once a thriving and important part of the government and civilization.  In order to have built this area, the people of the time would have had to wait until the winter when they could have drug building materials, including wood tree trunks, from the shorelines over frozen lakes and such to get it to the location.  The land does not appear conducive to farming or even raising of livestock, so how they managed to live is a mystery to me. The area has now been excavated and several building foundations have been located. It is a simple, stark building that stands there now.  And not much else, frankly.  A few houses scattered about, and everything is on the honor system-visiting the old crypts in the church basement-200 Isk, using the toilets-donation, lighting a candle-donation. 

From here we drove on to the Geysir.  Libby was absolutely famished so we first ate at a lovely restaurant onsite.  Food is very expensive is Iceland; for example Libby's pizza and my meatball panini was $30 USD.  So we'd been eating a lot of sandwiches at the apartment.  Libby was ready for food! 

Geysir is a, you guessed it, a geyser.  It's the oldest one in Iceland I think. And it's what all other's are generically called-or named after.  There is a very active one here that erupts about every 4 to 5 minutes with varying force. There are several that bubble like a boiling pot of water.  I was wearing my winter coat and there are pots of water bubbling in the earth.  It was weird to think about and look at.  And they all smell.  Like rotten eggs.  In fact, sadly, the whole country smells like rotten eggs. I smelled like rotten eggs when I got out of the shower that morning. I may never want another egg again. 

 

After seeing the eruption several times and watching the new people stand on the wrong side of it for fun, we headed north again to a huge water fall called Gullföss.  This was really amazing to see and the 2D pictures don't do it justice in the least.  Furthermore, the light was remarkably flat that day so the pictures are even more "meh!" than they should be. It is truly a sight to see.  Interestingly, the Icelandic government could use a robust education in marketing their national parks.  At the top of this amazing feature there was little more than an outdoor shack that housed a high end gift store or at least had window display for it.   The buildings reminded me of the temporary class rooms schools use while they are building an addition. There was no educational feature, no museum, no docent, no--nothing. 

From here we circled (see what I did here) back down the road and stopped to pet the Icelandic horses we'd seen on the trip up.  They are so friendly! As we walked up to them, they did not run away, they loved to be scratched, and in fact one was scratching his backside on the barbed wire fence.  They are short and stocky and look like they are built for working.  These were fun guys. 

We finished the circle in Thingviller national park which is where the parliament of Icelandic people began in 900 and something AD.  They still hold major festivals and governmental events here.  It's also where the North American and Eurasian tectonic plates come together but are slowly drifting apart (at like 2 mm a year or something).  We walked around this lava field and saw the plates, the amazing clear water, the weird plant growth, and even some birds. 

After 7 hours, I concluded that Iceland is like Cilantro-you either love it or you don't like it all that much.  I think I fall in the second category-the sites we saw were amazing, but there were so many hours of seeing the same things-barren, mad max, moon crust landscape-that I was just over it. We were weary and headed home for more sandwiches and wine. Especially wine.