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July 23 - August 1, 2016
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NEW YORK *** REYKJAVIK
ICELAND FLAG
Waiting for my Delta flight to Reykjavik, passing the time away with a Shackburger and a vanilla shake and playing Solitaire on my iPhone. Arrived at Keflavik Airport at 9 am and took the Flybus to Reykjavik and checked in at Radisson Blu Saga Hotel. Went out walking downtown. Passed beautiful park along the Tjörnin Lake with flowers and sculptures. I later ate at the Bæjarins Beztu Pylsur, famous for its hot dogs, and tourists and locals line up for them. Later, an excellent seafood buffet dinner was at Restaurant Reykjavik.
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July 25
Reykjavik***ON Geothermal Plant***Skálholt***Geysir*** Gullfoss***Seljalandsfoss***Skógafoss***Vík
This morning after leaving the hotel we had a group picture taken in a Reykjavik park. We stopped next at the Orka Náttúrunnar Geothermal plant which supplies hot water and electricity to the city. Next stop was and old church, Skálholt, then to Geysir (geyser) where we saw Strokkur shoot up every few minutes. The beautiful Gullfoss waterfalls was next after lunch. We stopped at two other waterfalls: Seljalandsfoss (I walked under the falls) and Skógafoss. Passed thru the fertile Mýrdal valley and in the vicinity of the Eyjafjallajokull volcano before we reached Vík. Checked in at the Icelandicair Hotel then walked in the black sand beach to see the sea stacks.
GROUP PICTURE AT HLJÓMSKÁLAGARÐUR PARK by the Tjörnin, a prominent small lake in central Reykjavík.
ORKA NÁTTÚRUNNAR GEOTHERMAL PLANT
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SKÁLHOLT This is the place where the country’s first bishop, Ísleifur Gissurarson (ordained in 1056), settled half a century after Iceland converted to Christianity. For centuries Skálholt served as the country’s actual capital, cultural and spiritual center.
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GEYSIR Geysir is almost dormant but has reached up to 170 meters in the past. Strokkur erupts frequently and there are other smaller geysers and pools in the area.
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GULLFOSS is a waterfall located in the canyon of the Hvítá river in southwest Iceland, and flows down into a wide curved three-step "staircase" and then abruptly plunges in two stages into a crevice.
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SELJALANDSFOSS one of the best known waterfalls in Iceland because one can walk behind it into a small cave. SKÓGAFOSS is one of the biggest waterfalls in the country with a width of 82 feet and a drop of 200 ft.
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VÍK We arrived in Vík in early evening and I went for a walk by the shore which is covered with black sand and rocks. From the distance the outcroppings from the sea can be seen and I would have wanted to see the vertical black basalt outcroppings but it was far and getting dark.
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Here are pictures of Vík from the Internet.
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July 26
Eldhraun***Skaftafellsjökull***Skeiðarárjökull***Svinafellsjökull***Jökulsárlón***Höfn
Today we walked on a lava field covered with thick moss in ELDHRAUN. We also stopped and viewed SKAFTAFELLSJÖKULL and SKEIÐARÁRJÖKULL, the two southern arms of Vatnajökull, a very large glacier. The twisted part of a bridge can be seen caused by a massive earthquake.
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We next drove to SVINAFELLSJÖKULL where we walked along the glacier with wildflowers growing on the sides.
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Then took a walk along the JÖKULSÁRLÓN, a glacier lagoon with floating pieces of the glacier before boarding an amphibian boat to get closer to the floating icebergs.
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After checking in and dinner at HOTEL HÖFN, walked along the water and saw black basalt outcroppings, a double rainbow and sunset.
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July 27
Merry Bay, Djupivogur***Foss***Egilsstadir
Today we drive through the eastern part of Iceland passing by several fjords.
MERRY BAY Stopped at a small fishing village for refreshments, saw huge egg sculptures representing the different bird species in the area.
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FOSS A little surprise attraction and the highlight of the day is the roaring waterfalls Foss.
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HÉRAD ICELANDAIR, EGILSSTADIR Checked in at hotel Hérad Icelandair. Saw some Icelandic horses in the field just next to the hotel.
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Dinner started with reindeer paté with rocket salad, blueberry jam, beet roots; rainbow trout with asparagus, almonds, baby potatoes, citron butter; ended with rhubarb crumble, blueberry ice cream, and coffee.
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July 28
Möðrudalur***Dettifoss***Selfoss***Namafjall Hverir***Godafoss***Akureyri
MÖÐRUDALUR Our first stop was at a little village, with a very small Lutheran church, sod houses and a coffee shop. Möðrudalur is a farm settlement in Norður-Múlasýsla in Eastern Iceland, and the highest inhabited place in the country, at 1,539 ft above sea level. A church was built in Möðrudalur in 1949 by Jón A. Stefánsson. The lowest temperature ever recorded in Iceland, -38.0 °C (-36.4 °F) was recorded concurrently in Möðrudalur and the neighboring Grímsstaðir on 21 January 1918.
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DETTIFOSS is a waterfall in Vatnajökull National Park in Northeast Iceland, and is the most powerful waterfall in Europe. The falls are 330 feet wide and have a drop of 150 feet down to the Jökulsárgljúfur canyon.
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SELFOSS is a waterfall on the river Jökulsá á Fjöllum in the north of Iceland. The river drops over a number of waterfalls over about 30 km before flowing into Öxarfjörður, a bay of the Arctic Sea.
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NÁMAFJALL HVERIR The Námafjall geothermal field is located in Northeast Iceland, on the east side of Lake Mývatn. At this area, also known as Hverir, there are many fumaroles and boiling mud pots, surrounded by sulfur crystals of many different colours.
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We had lunch at Jardbodin and then continued on to DIMMUBORGIR (dimmu "dark", borgir "cities" or "forts", "castle s"); is a large area of unusually shaped lava fields east of Mývatn. The area is composed of various volcanic caves and rock formations, a massive, collapsed lava tube formed by a lava lake flowing in from a large eruption about 2300 years ago.
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We stopped to look at the pseudo craters SKÚTUSTAÐGIGAR A rootless cone, also formerly called a pseudocrater, is a volcanic landform which resembles a true volcanic crater, but differs in that it is not an actual vent from which lava has erupted. They are formed by steam explosions as flowing hot lava crosses over a wet surface, such as a swamp, a lake, or a pond. The explosive gases break through the lava surface in a manner which can appear very similar to real volcanic craters.
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GOÐAFOSS The Goðafoss (Icelandic: waterfall of the gods or waterfall of the goði) is one of the most spectacular waterfalls in Iceland. It is located in the Bárðardalur district of North-Central Iceland. The water of the river Skjálfandafljót falls from a height of 12 meters over a width of 30 meters.
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AKUREYRI Checked in at the Akureyri Icelandair Hotel. Had some beer with my fellow travelers then went out to dinner at Akureyri Fish (delicious fish and chips and local beer).
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AKUREYRI DOWNTOWN Passed by the Akureyri Lutheran Church on our way to the pier.
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WHALE WATCHING We boarded the Ambassador boat for some whale watching in the Akureyri fjords. Saw some amazing whales feeding and diving and saw them fluke.
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Walked back to the hotel and passed some art along the street.
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July 29
Lystigarðurinn***Varmahlíð***Blönduós***Kolufossar***Hvammstangi***Borgarnes
LYSTIGARÐURINN After breakfast we walked in the Lystigardur Akureyrar (Public park and botanic gardens) with beautiful flowers and plants from all over the world.
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BLÖNDUÓS Then we stopped for lunch and later went to a beautiful modern Lutheran church designed by Dr. Maggi Jónsson.
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KOLUGJÚFUR We stopped next at another beautiful waterfalls: Kolugljúfur, so named after a troll, Kola.
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HVAMMSSTANGI We later stopped at a seaside village in the Selasetur Islands famous for its Seal Center Museum. We also saw some fish hanging to dry.
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BORGARNES Then we checked in at Icelandair Hotel Hamar in Borgarnes. Dinner started with cauliflower soup, followed by long (baked fish) with txatziki and noisette, and ended with skyr mousse with strawberries and coffee.
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July 30
Ytri Tunga***Arnarstapi***Hellnar***Kirkjufell***Borgarnes
Our first stop was at Ytri Tunga beach for seal watching. Next stop was at scenic Arnarstapi, a small fishing village in the Stenæsfellsnes peninsula where we hiked along the cliffs and lava fields to Hellnar where we had lunch. Next was a stop to view Kirkjufell mountain before we drove back to the hotel for our farewell dinner.
YTRI TUNGA Seal watching
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ARNARSTAPI Walked along the cliffs in the Snaefellsnes peninsula where Axlar-Björn, Iceland's only serial killer, killed 18 travelers who had the misfortune of passing by his farm.
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SNÆFELLSJÖKULL is a 700,000-year-old stratovolcano with a glacier covering its summit in western Iceland. The mountain is one of the most famous sites of Iceland, primarily due to the novel Journey to the Center of the Earth (1864) by Jules Verne, in which the protagonists find the entrance to a passage leading to the center of the earth on Snæfellsjökull.
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KIRKJUFELL is Grundarfjörður's beautiful landmark, the most photographed mountain in Iceland.
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FAREWELL DINNER at Icelandair Hotel Hamar in Borgarnes.
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July 31
Horse Farm***Þingvellir***Reykjavik
First stop was a visit to a horse farm then to the Þingvellir (Thingvellir) National Park. Checked in later at the Icelandair Hotel Natura. Dinner was at Ostabudin in downtown Reykjavik.
HORSE FARM The Icelandic horse is a breed of horse developed from ponies taken to Iceland by Norse settlers in the 9th and 10th centuries. Although the horses are small, at times pony-sized, most registries for the Icelandic refer to it as a horse. Icelandic horses are long-lived and hardy.
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ÞINGVELLIR is a national park in Iceland, a site of historical, cultural and geological importance. It lies in a rift valley that marks the crest of the Mid-Atlantic Ridge and the boundary of the North American and Eurasian tectonic plates. The Althing, the national parliament of Iceland, was established at Þhingvellir in 930 and held its sessions there until 1798. The park was later expanded to protect natural phenomena in the surrounding area and became a World Heritage Site in 2004.
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DINNER at OSTABÚÐIN in REYKJAVIK Walked to the center of town and went to dinner at Ostabúðin. Had a local beer and for appetizer I had Villibráðarpaté, wild game paté with wild goose confit and onion jam. For my main course I ordered Svínasída Og Steinbítur, pork belly and fried ocean catfish with pickeled red cabbage, fennel and chicken jus. DELICIOUS!
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STROLL BACK TO HOTEL NATURA Passed the imposing Lutheran Church Hallgrímskirkja and a statue of Leif Ericson.
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August 1
Reykjavik***New York
Marvellous week!
Flight back to New York.
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