Of course the next morning Pokin wanted to get up for sunrise photos.
At least since it was October, sunrise was later and breakfast was already open.
They had a pretty good breakfast spread. Best one I’d seen in Iceland, in fact.
I actually enjoyed myself over breakfast, watching the sunrise.
A little while later, Anna and Adam joined my bud and Pokin for breakfast. Then they went into the Retreat Lagoon while I went back up to the room to chillax.
The Retreat Lagoon side is much more cozy, I’m told. The pools are nestled between chasms in the natural lava, and there are many more private nooks. For a while, my bud and Pokin had the waters all to themselves, before they were joined by one more person and then Anna and Adam. This is a much more secluded place to be. They said it was a nice juxtaposition to the main large lagoon.
There was one rude couple they said who disregarded the rules and walked around with a camera, but everyone else respected the rules.
After a quick dip, it was already time for checkout.
Too bad, I liked it here. I guess we’ll just have to come back.
My bud explained to me that, even though we were done with waterfalls, we’d be going somewhere very wet.
We were to spend the day with my bud’s sister Anna and her boyfriend Adam, and they had planned the day to be at the Blue Lagoon.
And since they booked a night there, we did too.
So here we are, going to The Retreat Spa at the Blue Lagoon for almost a day. I say almost a day because you don’t get to spend a full day there. You are only allowed to check in at 3pm and you have to check out by 11am the next day.
The origins of Blue Lagoon stemmed from 1976, when the Svartsengi geothermal plant was built. The plant needed a place to deposit its runoff, and decided the nearby 800+ year old lava field would suit. Instead of draining away though, the muddy runoff formed a large lagoon.
Some soul at some point in 1981 decided to try bathing in it, and discovered, oh! It helps with skin conditions! And behold, in 1992, the Blue Lagoon company was formed.
The Blue Lagoon today has 3 parts. The Blue Lagoon which is the large public lagoon that you can visit during the day, the Silica Hotel which features its own swimming area a little away from the Blue Lagoon, and then in 2014, they started work on the ultra luxury Retreat Spa.
The Retreat Spa was conceived by Sigríður Sigþórsdóttir founding partner of Basalt Architects and Design Group Italia. The designers apparently scoured the fields to find just the right spot to construct the retreat, and the whole construction process took over 3 years as they had to find the right fields with the right characteristics.
The Retreat Hotel at the Blue Lagoon
As you look around the retreat, you can see the full integration with the environment. The retreat was built right into and around the lava fields, and every lookout appears as though it’s a picture.
I was impressed. This is fit for me to stay at. In fact I want this for my bear home! Nicholas, take note!
On arrival, we were greeted at reception with a welcome drink. My bud opted for sparkling tea.
After a few minutes, we were presented with an agreement we had to read and sign. Among the terms were that there was no photography allowed in the Retreat Spa.
The Retreat Spa entrance. No photos beyond this door.
Once that was signed, we were given a tour of the retreat before being shown our rooms. Since most of the place is no photography allowed, well, I had no photos.
But here’s my room! It was pretty nice. I only wish I got a ground floor unit. Pokin was worried about privacy, but it turns out the waters in front of the suites are only for looks. Next time!
The bathroom areaBed, bar, and closetThe tub and lookout
Ahh, this is the life.
While I stayed behind to enjoy my suite, my bud and Pokin went out to explore the rest of the faciliites.
At 4pm, they served tea in the lounge. Bathrobe lounge attire encouraged.
The main lagoon can be accessed at the end of the Retreat Lagoon, and is only open till 8pm whereas the Retreat Lagoon was open until 10pm, so everyone decided to go into the Blue Lagoon first.
This was the entrance from the Retreat Lagoon into the main lagoon.
The Retreat entrance
My bud and the gang stayed out in the main lagoon through sunset.
While I enjoyed the sunset from the room.
They had 8pm reservations at the Lava Restaurant after which they meant to go into the Retreat Lagoon, but apparently everyone was too tired and went to sleep right after dinner.
Apparently Pokin wasn’t happy with feeding my bud cold cinnamon buns on his first day here, so we decided to head back to Reykjavík and to Braud again. This time we were hoping to land some fresh hot cinnamon buns.
We were also going to meet up with Anna and Adam, my bud’s sister and her boyfriend who were just getting into town.
We parked right by Hallgrimskirkja, Iceland’s largest church because of the free parking, or as my bud said instead so we could “abuse the good will of the holy house.”
Hallgrímskirkja is one of Iceland’s tallest structures, at 74.5m or 244 feet tall. The church is named after Icelandic poet and clergyman Hallgrímur Pétursson. Construction of the church started in 1945 and ended in 1986, meaning it took 41 years. Hallgrímskirkja is a Lutheran church, which explains the austerity of the church’s interior and exterior.
Ok enough of the church.
To cinnamon buns. There was a line. Good sign.
Pokin and Adam went inside the store, where they tried to tell her they didn’t have hot cinnamon buns. All the while Pokin said she was staring at an oven full of baking cinnamon buns.
“How long till those are ready?” She asked, pointing to the buns in the oven.
“About a minute.” Was the response.
“I’ll wait,” said Pokin.
“Me too, can I change my order?” said the person right in front of her that had settled for cold cinnamon buns.
So they waited less than a minute and were shortly rewarded with hot cinnamon buns.
I took a sniff. Not bad, but I’m holding up for cocoa.
“What do you think?” Pokin asks eagerly. “Better than before?”
“I guess,” was all my bud would declare.
Then we started wandering through town. We started down the main road from Hallgrímskirkja, which was painted in rainbow colours in honour of Iceland’s annual Gay Pride festival.
We next wove our way past the Prime Minister’s house and the Parliament building before ending up here. Pokin wanted to take my bud and I to a hotdog stand.
Bæjarins Beztu Pylsur, meaning “The City’s Best Hotdog” is a popular tourist destination. The stand has been there since 1937, and the recommended way to eat it is eina með öllu, or one with everything.
The “everything” is a lamb sausage, a kind of remoulade, ketchup, mustard, raw onions, and fried onions. Even Bill Clinton has gotten hot dogs from this stand but apparently he only got his with mustard. Blasphemy!
Seljalandsfoss, AKA the most photographed waterfall in Iceland was our last stop. It means “selling the land of waterfalls.” This is where most southern Iceland tours make at a stop; it’s overall one of the most popular places in all of Iceland. Based on its positioning facing west behind a cliff, it’s also most beautiful viewed at sunset because that’s when the light hits the waterfalls. Most of the rest of the day, it’s behind shadows.
Naturally Pokin wanted to head there for sunset.
“You realize every single photographer in Iceland is going to have the same idea right?” Nicholas said.
“Yes,” Pokin answered. And that’s why we are going to go early to camp out a spot.
So, despite the sun setting at 6:55pm, we were there by a little after 5. My bud and I decided to wait in the car. Pokin hauled off with her gear.
A little while after, she came back with her gear, looking a lot damper.
“I don’t have a wide enough camera lens to capture the photos. I’m better off with my iPhone,” was the answer.
We all head back out together. My curiousity was piqued from this “most beautiful waterfall” claim. From here it looks ok.
The sun starts to fall as we get closer and the view gets better.
And of course it gets wetter.
The place wasn’t as busy as it could be as most of the tour busses have to leave before sunset, but there were a decent number of Instagrammers on site and photographers. I can only assume they are Instagrammers based on the props and poses.
At one point Nicholas says “you’re going to regret not having your camera here.” And they go back to get their camera. But the iPhone photo still won out in the end.
Here it is during the full sunset glow.
The cool thing about this waterfall is that you can walk all the way around it. I recommend the counterclockwise route so you are scrambling up slippery rocks instead of down. The cave behind the waterfall was formed by gradual erosion of rock from the waterfall spray. Makes sense, this waterfall sure sprays over the course of its 60m drop! The Seljalandsfoss flows from the Seljalandsá river which is fed by the Eyjafjallajökull glacier.
And with that, we’re done with waterfalling in Iceland this trip. Can’t say I’m sad, but this is a nice one to end with.
Pokin wasn’t done with waterfalls for the day. She next mapped us to Gljúfrafoss. Apparently it’s known as one of the wettest hikes in Iceland. You go through a canyon hiking basically right in the river.
“I’m definitely sitting this one out guys,” I say.
To my surprise, they readily agreed and left me in the car.
The trail starts out like this –
After which you get into a canyon and stay there.
And you get to hike right in the water.
For this waterfall.
My bud said he had fun scrambling. Glad he did!
And I’m just glad I got to stay in the car for this one.
This morning Pokin actually read up on the Aurora Borealis in Iceland.
Turns out, while September and March are supposed to be the best times to see them in Iceland (September due to the Autumnal Equinox), Iceland isn’t actually the best place to see them in general. (Alert: because it’s often cloudy and rainy!!!) If aurora is your main purpose then you’re better off heading to places like Finland, Sweden, and Alaska. You can definitely see them in Iceland, and many people have taken great photos, but it is very much up to luck and timing. There are forecast apps and forecast sites that tell you the chances of seeing aurora, though apparently for Iceland they are not too reliable. Your best bet is to check out the live cams or follow one of the many Facebook groups that share sightings.
Well we were here supposedly to see the still resting Fagradalsfjall volcano, so I guess not seeing aurora is ok. From here on out the forecast doesn’t look great for aurora sightings.
Given it was raining this morning and given we were up a lot of the night waiting for the aurora to reappear, we decided to make it a rest day and take it easy.
Which lasted until about 11am.
“It’s nice out,” Nicholas said. “We should probably taken advantage.”
So again we bundled up and headed out. We considered a few options that we couldn’t do because of the rain yesterday, and in the ended decided to head back to Skógafoss.
Skógafoss also happened to be the starting point of the Fimmvörðuháls trailhead, apparently one of the top hikes in Iceland because you’re walking alongside a river dotted with waterfalls for the initial stretch. The whole trail is a 25km (16 mile) hike one way that ends in Þörsmock (Thórsmörk). Given that we were starting out at 11am and needed to drive 25 minutes to get to the starting point, we definitely weren’t doing the full hike, but we figured we’d get as far as we possibly could before turning around.
Back to the crowded parking lot and back up many flights of stairs we went.
My bud decided to film it on his GoPro.
Which was just like 10 minutes of walking up stairs. Longer for Pokin.
It didn’t take much going on the trail to lose most people. We didn’t lose the sheep though, which I didn’t mind. Sheep are fun.
We spent about 2 hours walking the trail.
Eventually we got to High Peak Falls, and decided we’d better turn around. Pokin had sunset plans and didn’t want to miss them.
Night came and I was actually tired enough to fall asleep, being creeped out about Hotel Ranga notwithstanding.
Before we slept though, we put in a Northern Lights wakeup call, where reception calls you if they see the lights.
A little after midnight, they actually called. My bud and I were passed out. Pokin was still up. Who knows why.
We hurriedly got dressed in a lot of layers and went outside.
Only for the aurora to have disappeared from the naked eye in that time.
For a place that specializes in the aurora we didn’t get a lot of directions. They just had us file out to the front of the hotel where tonnes of parking lot lights were still blaring.
Since we didn’t have any direction, different guests started staring in different directions. Eventually we figured out Northern lights meant we should look north. And some time after that we actually figured out which direction was actually north.
I still didn’t see anything, but Pokin remembered that the camera can capture light where the naked eye cannot, so she started setting up long exposure shots.
Her camera picked this up.
My bud and I didn’t see a thing ourselves.
“Doesn’t count if we can’t see it with our own eyes,” my bud said.
I agreed.
“Does this mean we should go, like to Finland or Sweden later this year?” Pokin asked hopefully.
My bud and I give her a look. We’re cold, it’s windy, we got up for imaginary lights.
Skógafoss was the next waterfall on our list. It’s also one of two waterfalls on basically every single tour to the South Coast of Iceland. In other words, it was plenty crowded. Skógafoss is known to be one of the most powerful waterfalls in terms of water volume, and on a sunny day, it’s supposed to throw the most rainbows. Naturally we went on a cloudy day.
The other cool thing is that you can walk right up to the falls. Less cool thing is that it basically means a gazillion other tourists are doing exactly that — loitering for eternity in FRONT of the waterfall and all your waterfall photos.
Like this.
Whatever. We went for a photo op anyway.
We looked around, noticed a viewpoint about 9 minutes of stair climbing up, and decided to head there.
View point is ok. I’ve seen better waterfalls. Pokin tells me to stop being a waterfall snob. I take the opportunity to remind her I didn’t even want to be seeing waterfalls anyway.
I’m secretly a little glad we went, but I’m also ready to head to our hotel. My bud and I are tired.
Tonight we’re headed for Hotel Rangá, where we’re staying for two nights. I saw it on the drive in and it looked like it there wasn’t around that seemed special.
Pokin said it was rated one of the top destinations for watching Aurora Borealis. To see the Aurora Borealis, you need to be around a lot of nothingness and darkness so you can look out into the sky. Aurora sounds cool. I’m down with that. The being around nothing doesn’t. Seems like good marketing spin to me, on the part of the hotel.
Annnnd…yup, I’m underwhelmed on arrival.
There’s something about this place that made me feel like I’m on the set of some sort of horror movie? I can’t explain why.
Maybe it’s this bear.
Maybe it’s this horrible decor for what’s supposed to be a nice place?
Maybe it’s the wood panelling. There’s wood panelling and then there’s this wood panelling.
There’s a lot of wood panelling.
I’m creeped out Nicholas. I’m not sure I want the sun to set here.
I later learned more about that creepy bear. His name is Hrammur (meaning “paw” in Icelandic). He’s 13 ft tall and originally from Greenland. He was featured in a sporting goods store that opened in Reykjavik in 1999 and went bankrupt in 2002. The bear then got stashed in a warehouse. The owner of Hotel Ranga, Friðrik Pálsson saw his photo, tracked down the warehouse where he was stashed, and pleaded with the owners to let the hotel have the bear. The bear didn’t fit the original hotel and a ceiling light had to be removed to get him in.
I guess knowing his name makes him a little less creepy. I approve of the bear-rescue efforts.
The next morning I was dragged up again at what I think was nearly sunrise.
I think it was nearly sunrise because it was pouring rain…so visibility wasn’t exactly there for me to tell much of anything.
One unwilling driver, one grumpy bear, and one hopeful photographer packed into a car and headed for Reynisfjara, the sunrise edition.
We parked at the beach, Pokin bundled up and went out —
and promptly came back. Not only was it rainy, but strong winds were blowing her backwards. Combine that with dangerous waves and even this crazy person found her limits.
So we sat in the car to see if weather conditions would improve. While sitting in the car I spent my time watching the wet sheep.
There, in the pouring rain, in windy conditions were the sheep, calmly munching away as though nothing was amiss. IT’S SO WET OUT THERE YOU CRAZY SHEEP!!
Due to the geographic isolation, the Icelandic sheep are considered one of the purest breeds in the world. They originate from the Northern European Short tailed stock of sheep, introduced to the country in the late 9th or 10th century by the vikings.
The fleece is apparently double coated, making them highly resistant to cold. There are apparently over 800,000 icelandic sheep to a population of ~390K Icelandic people.
I guess that makes them tolerant this dampness better? I don’t know. Give me hot cocoa by a toasty fire any day.
After I watched sheep for long enough, and after Pokin waited for long enough to know sunrise had most definitely already certainly happened, we drove back to the hotel to get ready for our day.
Today’s agenda? Waterfalls!
Wasn’t it wet enough already?
It was still raining a little when we set out, so we decided to first swing by to the Dyrhólaey Lighthouse because at least that was visible from the car. The rain was nice enough to stop by the time we got there, so we got out.
And immediately regretted it because it was so windy. I clung on to Nicholas tightly, I was that worried about being blown away.
Dyrhólaey Lighthouse marks the southernmost point in Iceland. The light station was first built in 1910, and the actual lighthouse built in 1927. The lighthouse was prefabricated in Sweden. Dyrhólaey stands for Door Hole Isle, named for this rock structure that sat below:
Nice peninsula. Nice lighthouse. Too cold! Back in the car.
Our next stop was Kvernufoss, which is located a short drive away from the more famous and touristy Skógafoss. Pokin picked this place because she thought there would be less crowds. There were, but it was made up for with more drones, which she shortly discovered from all the buzzing she heard.
I saw more sheep. Naturally.
The waterfall was wet and sprayed water everywhere. Naturally.
I helped out where I could, while doing my best to stay dry.
And was overall glad when we were done and hiking away from this waterfall.
Even though I knew it was unlikely, I still hoped Kvernufoss would be a one and done waterfall for the day.
“Next stop, Skógafoss,” announces Pokin. “It’s only a couple minutes away.”
By the time we got to Vík, my bud and I were exhausted. We’d gotten up for sunrise and then climbed around 3 different glaciers. Tonight we were staying at Hotel Kria, which is centrally located in the small town of Vík. I was getting ready to have a good dinner and tuck in for the day.
Pokin, however, decided it was time for sunset photos.
“It’s nice out,” she said. “Who knows when it’ll be nice out again.”
My bud and I groan. We weren’t winning this battle. In the car we go again!
Our sunset destination was Reynisdrangar, about a 15 minute drive west of Vík. Reynisdrangar was voted one of the best beaches in the world, and It was also one of filming locations for Game of Thrones (beach at Eastwatch by the sea.) It’s considered a very dangerous beach as amidst seemingly calm and predictable waves will come sudden powerful sneaker waves. In recent years, the waves have dragged several travellers out into the ocean where they drowned in the undertow. <gulp> The major landmarks are 3 basalt columns. Legend has it these columns were formed when three trolls unsuccessfully tried to pull a ship to shore when sunrise hit.
Not learning her lesson from this morning, Pokin was determined to get some photos in the surf break. “Further up the shore though,” she promises. Sigh.
Along the way we passed fields like this with sheep. I considered trying to ride one but given how wet it’d been, thought better of it.
Once we got to Reynisdrangar, Pokin discovered her plans would be foiled. A giant wedding photoshoot appeared to be taking place and people were everywhere, all over the basalt columns, on the beach, near the waves. It was work to sneak a person free view of the place. I didn’t care. Pokin minded. I reminded her she was a tourist too, then got out of the way of smack zone.
Eventually the other tourists left and she got a few shots in.
Which was about time! It’s cold and windy out here!
