Brrrrr!!

Yesterday we drove from the Cotswolds to Gatwick Airport. We weren’t sure what time to leave as part of the route involved the M25 motorway. This ring road around London is often referred to as the largest car park in the UK. I guess we were lucky, we had about a 5 minute slow down where the M3 and M25 motorways meet and that was it. We arrived too early and we had to wait about 90 minutes for check-in to open.

Arriving in Keflavik, we got the airport shuttle to the hotel, the first thing we noticed was the temperature…. cold at 12C. We later found out that 12C is the normal temperature for June! In July you expect 15C. 18C is a rare heat wave.

We’re back in the land of late sunsets and early sunrises. On the solstice last weekend the sun set around 30 minutes after midnight and rose about 2:30 AM.

This morning we took a tour of a few tourist spots inland from Reykjavik.

First stop was the UNESCO site of Thingvellier National Park. This was an area that used to be the capital of Iceland back in the 8th century soon after the country was settled. On the way we passed hundreds of lupins along the road side.

The park sits on two tectonic plates, the North American and the Eurasian plates. This accounts for the volcanic, earthquake and thermal activity here. Evidently there are 600 minor earthquakes a day here, most go unnoticed. These 2 plates move apart by approximately 2cm per year. Below are some general views.

Next stop was Geysir, from which the word geyser was derived. This wan an area where boiling water comes to the surface. In most cases it just showed as steam vents and puddles, but there was one active vent that would blow every 7 minutes sending hot water about 40m into the air.

Above is the steam blowing away after Strokkur had done its thing. Below are some general views.

Apart from the steamy activity we also saw a white wagtail!!

Iceland has put all the geothermal activity to good use, it is used to run electric power plants and most houses are heated by hot water piped in from the active areas. The water is also used to heat large green houses in the winter, which together with artificial light allows vegetables to be grown all year around.

After lunch we headed off to the Golden Waterfall. Never did find out why they were called golden. Just pictures.

Not as big as Naigara, but still impressive.

We headed back to Reykjavik and the hotel. Below is a street in Reykjavik city

Tomorrow is hop on hop off day, and for us a rare museum visit.