Fire and Ice-land - Practical informations

Hello, everyone! Any New Year Resolutions for 2016? I know I have, and the first one is to explore more of my new home country, the United Kingdom, and that includes exploring Wales, Ireland, and Scotland.

This is the 50th post! Yay! To celebrate, I will not describe another trip I've made, but give you the input I have gathered during my three trips to Iceland. Let's start with the first one:

5 reasons to travel with Icelandair:

Icelandair is the national airline for Iceland, obviously. And as any national airline, it is your first feel of the country, and I cannot think of any one better than this, to introduce you to the gentle way of Iceland.

1. They name their planes
Seriously, isn't that thoughtful? It's usually named after a volcano, or a glacier (the difference between the two is sometimes non existent in Iceland). I don't know why, but it feels good to be in a plane that has been named, instead of another B747 or A340

2. The booklet is full of nice information about Iceland
Of course, you have the usual advertisement, but you mostly have stories about people - usually foreigners - discovering Iceland, or helpful advice (especially the one about holding your car door when you open it, as Iceland is a very windy country. As they say, "your car rental company will thank you")

3. Their entertainment system is full of fun trivia about Iceland
They have this show that concentrate on every part of Iceland, which is obviously sponsored, but still gives you a good feeling about each region. And when the screen is idle, they have these "did you know?" fun facts

4. The safety information is told as a hiking narrative
This one I think is great, and very well thought! Fastening your seat belt becomes tying up your backpack belt, cases of emergencies are jumps in fresh pools. I won't describe it more, but it is seriously a pleasure to look at and listen to, which for me is a first.

5. Their first class is called Saga class                                 

Just for that, it makes you consider the possibility of being part of it. Imagine: you are part of a Saga!

And finally, bonus reason, they welcome you into their home, Iceland.

Whether you are on a stopover or you are going specifically to visit the country, this is, in my humble opinion, the best airline choice. Compared to the low cost airline WOW that my travel companion chose, the difference in price was minimum and Icelandair so much less of a hassle. Remember this next time you travel from Europe to the USA or Canada, or from North America to Western Europe.

The second practical input comes from my own bad luck with the winter weather in Iceland. Once again, Dangerous Business wrote an article to warn you about bad weather in Iceland, but I prefer to concentrate on what you can do if you are stuck in Reykjavik.

5 Things to do in Reykjavik in case of bad weather

1. Thermal pools
Thermal pools, even outside ones, are available all year long. And I must say, swimming outside in warm water while it is snowing is one of the weirdest experience of my life. You don't get to do this often, so I would definitely recommend it.

2. Downtown cafes
Reykjavik is very well known as a barista paradise. If you want to get warm in the bad weather, there are plenty of great options. My personal favorite is the Laundromat: 

But the Reykjavik Roaster is apparently very good as well, and you even have one themed after The Big Lebowski

3. Museum
More than cafes, Reykjavik is packed with museums: Apart from the National Museum, you have the Saga Museum, the Aurora Museum, the settlement museum called 871 +/-2 (which you will have to visit if you want to know why it is called like that). You even have a Volcano House, which is not a "real" museum, but has an exhibition about the tremendous geology of the country.

4. Concerts
During the holiday season, you obviously have a lot of Christmas concerts, in one of the many churches of Reykjavik, but if you're not religious, you still have plenty of options to listen to Icelandic music in different concert venues. Ask your hotel reception for details!

5. Golden Circle tour
Golden Circle Tour is the most popular tour all year round, so you are sure that the road will stay practical, and I personally think Geysir, with the smoking water rising from the snow, is a vision to behold. Probably wait for the snow storm to be over, though, because you want that little bit of sunshine for good pictures.

And finally, bonus reason, wake up your inner child and... Play in the snow! Snow angels, snowmen, the possibilities are endless, the only limit is your imagination!

Fire and Ice-land - New Year's Eve

Happy New Year, everyone! Okay, let's not lose time with celebrations, and keep our schedule for blogging!

So, after Snaefellnes and the Golden Circle, spending NYE in Reykjavik was my next goal for Iceland, and discovering the Winter Wonderland that becomes Iceland during the winter time.

But first I must warn you: BE PREPARED FOR ICELAND IN WINTER

Dangerous Business and other travel blogs are good at describing the ups and downs of Iceland in winter.

I hate generalizing, but I have seen too many Asians coming to Iceland in winter, and not prepared at all. As my guide put it, they come to experience "real" winter, but have no idea how cold it is going to be... I even saw 3 Chinese girls, attempting to walk on a Glacier with no gloves on! So please, if you consider going to Iceland in winter, be ready to cover yourselves with warm layers. The temperature will probably never drop down to -20 or so, thanks to the Gulf Stream, but snow storms and hail are fearful.

If I had to classify this trip between failure and success, I wouldn't put it as a sucess. The conditions are quite hard and ever changing during the winter season, even more so than the summer season, and of course, you only have few hours of light... Also, I wouldn't advise a road trip at this season, unless you are very experienced driving with strong gales, snow and ice. But I will explain everything in this article (and the next one).

Jokulsarlon and NYE

So, apart from the NYE in Reykjavik, another goal of mine for this winter holiday was Jokulsarlon, with this idea that I could maybe, if conditions permit, have a picture of the Northern lights above it (spoiler alert: deception follows... Remember when you travel to never expect anything, you'll never get disappointed).

So I arrived on the 26th of December, and checked in at the Reykjavik City Hostel, a bit out of Downtown Reykjavik. Once comfortably settled, I received an email saying that my ice climbing session of the next day was cancelled due to bad weather, so I spent the evening trying to figure out things to do in Reykjavik in case of bad weather. I decided to go for a dip in the nearby thermal pool, and booked several other excursions for the next days, as my only plan was the 2-day trip to Jokulsarlon. I also booked the Bonfire and Fireworks tours for NYE.

The next day was therefore quite empty, except for the short walk on icy sidewalks to go to the public pool. This particular pool, so close to the hostel, offers a variety of heated options. The outside pool is heated at a comfortable 30-ish degree Celsius, there is a great slide, and different hot pots heated at different temperatures ranging from 37°C to 40°C.

On Monday, I had the Whale watching tour planned. You're going to say "But whale watching in Iceland is mostly in Summer!", and you would be right, but when you have run out of options, it could be a good half day out. Actually, the tours go all year round, and even if you don't spot whales in winter, as they have already migrated, if you are lucky enough, you can spot some dolphins. We were lucky enough, as the weather was more or less clement (except at the end), good for spotting wildlife apparently, as there was no glare from the sun.

Plus, a boat trip is always cool

Tuesday was the Game of Thrones tour with Reykjavik Excursions, with our very talkative guide Didi, who gave us a lot of fun facts about Iceland and Game of Thrones, and Lord of the Rings, and Vikings...... It was particularly nice, because the snow was fresh and stopped for a while, which made for good pictures with this amazing winter light you have up north, between dawn and dusk.

Our guide, Didi

Wednesday was the start of the 2-day tour to Jokulsarlon with Extreme Iceland. We were quite lucky because the storm hit the previous day, so our tour wasn't cancelled, but we had bad weather all along, with snow storms and hail in between quiet moments.

Try driving under this kind of weather...

The good point of this windy weather was that while enjoying the coastline, you could see huge waves crashing on rocks, with great effects.

On the road to Vik

We stopped just before Vik, taking road 215, to see the famous basalt marches, again, with powerful waves crashing on the rocks

On the Vik side of the cliffs

After a couple of hours driving in complete darkness, with snow and hail still on to us, we arrived at our lodges, where a warm dinner was waiting for us. We did try to see the Northern Lights, as there were some holes in the cloud cover, but to no avail.

The next day, we drove back to Jokulsarlon, and guess what? the storm had pushed all the icebergs to the sea, so the very famous picturesque lagoon was just... flat out boring... It was still quite interesting to play with the camera on the ice:

On the black beach next to the lagoon, however, there were ice pieces galore. It's always fun to imagine a creature carved in the ice

what do you see?

The afternoon was planned for a walk on a nearby glacier, Skaftafell, the one featured in Interstellar, and really, even though hail was once again among us, it was a vision out of this world!

Due to the bad conditions, we arrived quite late in Reykjavik, and missed the bonfires activities, but were more than early enough to see the fireworks. Actually, we arrived in Reykjavik at around 20:30, and the fireworks had already started.

Reykjavik's NYE is absolutely amazing. The principle is that anyone - and I mean absolutely anyone - can buy fireworks from the Rescue Volonteers, and launch them absolutely anywhere, anytime during the night, except of course between 22h30 and 23h30, where the famous Sarcastic show Áramótaskaupið. Then, everyone goes out again and continues to launch fireworks. Our group stayed on the plaza in front of Hallgrímskirkja, which I thought would be crowded, but I forgot that this was Iceland we were talking about, so the standard of "crowds" are a bit lowered compared to London, for instance.

From 23h30 and for at least an hour, you are surrounded with fireworks, exploding everywhere, climaxing into lights and noise at midnight. I cannot describe it better, you have to be there. Everyone that has been there will say the same thing, but let me tell you one thing: it is better than anything you can read on it!

What other New Year's Eve would you recommend? Stay tune for some practical information on Iceland!

Fire and Ice-land - Golden Circle

For my second trip to Iceland, since I was going on my own, I decided to settle at the Reykjavik City Hostel, with one day trips. The main event was a one day PADI dry suit course in Silfra, but we'll see that soon enough.

Golden Circle
So after retrieving my PADI Dry Suit Course book at the PADI centre, I checked in at the hostel... and missed an apparently amazing Aurora display. Yes, at around 11 PM, at the end of August, the Northern Lights decided to make an appearance, and here I was, lying on my bed. Let that be a lesson for later...
So the next day, my first tour was a Super Jeep tour around Eyjafjallajokull. The tour started with a 4WD track up to the glacier, then a 4 km trail around the new land formed after the eruption

As the day was clear, we were blessed with views up to Landmannalaugar. It was such an eerie feeling to know that we were walking on land that did not exist a few years ago. The desolate lava field, with patches of snow, was really a vision from out of this world.

Lunch break

After the walk back, we were left on the top of the Skogarfoss, an impressive straight and powerful waterfall

Then on our way back, we also walked around Seljalandsfoss, where you can litteraly walk around the waterfall, as the power carved a path behind it.

The next day, as I missed the pick up for my excursion to Landmannalaugar, I took a shot at a Golden Circle excursion. We first went back to Hraunfossar and Barnafoss before heading to the brand new excursion called Into the Glacier (which opened on June 1st, 2015), which takes you inside a Glacier, with some lights inside the ice to show off awesome features

After that, the bus took us to Thingvellir, to see the continental plaques rift, and read about the history of the first parliament.

Then, while one part of the group went back to Reykjavik, we continued on to the Golden Circle, to see Geysir and Gullfoss. No need to present you with these 2 icons of Iceland, one having given its name to all geysers, and the other being one of the most powerful waterfall in Europe.

And that was it for this tour, which made for quite a long day, and I needed the rest to be in shape for the next day with DIVE.is, which was bound to be hard.
And it definitely was. After a first training in the pool with the dry suit instructors, which drained almost all my forces, as it is incredibly difficult to stand still with the equipment, we took the route to Thingvellir, and specifically the Silfra rift. This is the best known spot for scuba diving in Iceland, but the water is so cold that you cannot dive without a dry suit, hence the course. It is however quite annoying that it is so well known, as you can see armies of snorkellers above you.
I'll have to admit, after the first actual dive, I wanted to quit. I started with a panic attack, then it was so hard to balance yourself in the water, and the final drop was that my fins didn't fit. So even though it was pristine and beautiful, I enjoyed like 30 seconds of it. But then, the instructor told us that the next dive was going to be only a fun dive, nothing to worry about to pass the course except at the very end, so I yielded (the hot chocolate did help). And I did not regret it.
As previously stated, the water is pristine, and as it is filtered by the volcanic rocks, there is nothing but water there, no mineral, no nutrition, so no life. Absolutely no life. But the other face of the coin is that the vision is clear for several dozens of meters.

Entrance to the Cathedral

At the end of the day, we all passed the course, and with beautiful colours in our heads.

And that was it for my second time in Iceland!

Fire and Ice-land - Snaefellsnes peninsula

Fire and Ice: two forces of Nature that have always fascinated us, from GRRMartin's Song of Ice and Fire to a French Roleplaying campaign called Fire and Ice. From Viking legends to Game of Thrones locations, via Journey at the Center of the Earth, Iceland has it all.

Iceland is only a 3h flight away from London, so this year, I simply decided to go there three times:
- once during my birthday weekend, with one of the few bank holidays in the UK at the end of May/beg of June, concentrating on the Snaefellsnes peninsula, called the Little Iceland for reasons we will see below
- the second time in August, with the final bank holiday of the year, based in Reykjavik, with an amazing dive and some great day tours
- the third (and last, for now) in December, not for the "Real Winter Experience" seeked out by a lot of Asians at this period, but "simply for the Northern Lights, and the Jokulsarlon.

Snaefellsnes
As it was my first time in Iceland, and my roommate had already done the Golden Circle, we decided to tour the Snaefellsnes, which has so much to offer. So we arrived on a Friday, rented a car at Keflavik, and drove to Borgarnes, our first hostel stop before the real start of the road trip.

We started off on Saturday in the direction of Husafell, for great views of the Glacier in the area, and some of the famous icelandic horses along the way.

Then, on the road back to the peninsula, we stopped at the Hraunfossar and Barnafoss waterfalls

All the roads around are very scenic, with horses grazing in the fields, and hill protected houses, volcanic fields and waterfalls. I would highly recommend to stop at any viewpoint, because each and every one of them has the postcard effect.

There is also a Geothermal power plant on the way that explains quite well how Iceland is using the volcanic activity under their feet to heat their houses and water - which also explains why Borgarnes hot water smells like sulfur.
We then decided to start the Snaefellsnes peninsula trip from the Northern side, starting with Stykkisholmur, which is very nice harbour town with a cute lighthouse and balsamic columns

Right outside the city, there is a beautiful viewpoint that you have to climb to see the whole islands around the harbour.

As the Lonely Planet points out, the road from Stykkisholmur to Grundarfjordur is very scenic, with legends and myths all around, especially the Berserkers' lava field.

And then we finally arrived at Grundarfjordur, with the legendary Kirkjufell. From the hostel, it is a 45 min walk to the viewpoint, at the top of the waterfall

And that was it for Saturday, which was more than enough for a full day.
The next day, we continued on road 574, with black sand beaches and spectacular waterfalls, especially from the area around Rif and Hellissandur, before officially entering the Snaefellsjokull National Park.
Before route 574 turns south, take the direction of Ondverdarnes, where a track (manageable for a 2WD) takes you to the middle of lava fields right next to the deep blue sea

Until it finishes at one of the western lighthouses, which strikes a bright orange beam in the middle of the deserted black land

The wind is as strong as advertised, so hold your car door when you open it, and if you're brave enough, there is a viewpoint of the lava cliffs with white waves crashing at their feet. Unmissable.
Continuing on to the Southern part of the peninsula, there is a volcano you can climb, and beautiful sights of the Snaefellsjokull

Lunch break

Route 572 then leads you to Djupalonssandur, a black sand beach with lifting stones used to measure men's strength, and linked to Dritvik, covered in rusted wreck pieces, which adds to the already dramatic volcanic features

Continuing on the road, you will see the rock pillars of Londrangar, that will make you think of the Troll legends. Then the highlight of the day will definitely be the scenic trail between Hellnar and Arnarstapi. It follows the shore with dramatic volcanic sceneries

It really is a must-see, and if you only have one thing to do in Snaefellsnes, make it this. It will take one half day of your schedule, and will enchant your eyes.
After the trail, we decided to stop with the hostels and plurge in one of Lysuholl's little lodges.

view from our chalet

Lysuholl is a horse farm which offers half day hacks in the middle of lava fields, so of course for my birthday, I had to get on a horse, and try the famous icelandic horse tolt. Best present to myself!

And that was it for the Snaefellsnes peninsula. After a shower, we drove straight to Reykjavik, with a first stop at the outlandish church

Then a stop at the Reykjavik 871 +/-2 and its settlement exhibition, before a hot drink at the Laundromat Cafe, before heading to one of the amazing restaurants in Downtown Reykjavik, for some traditional Icelandic meals.

And that concludes the first trip to Iceland!

The next one will follow shortly, with another long weekend break based in Reykjavik, with day tours to the Golden Circle. Stay tuned!