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Sunday, August 19, 2007
Friday, August 10, 2007
Day 14 - Reykjavik - Text by Anna
Today was our last day and as we didn't have the car and hadn't really explored the capital, we decided we would do this today. We woke to heavy rain which was a bit disappointing, but didn't deter us. After a lovely breakfast we chilled in the hotel room for a little while, then took the free hotel shuttle bus into town. We had seen that you could do whale watching from Reykjavik and loved it so much the first time, we wanted to try again. We wondered down to the harbour and booked ourselves two places on the boat 'Edding' for 1pm. As we had a little time before we left, we took a little look in the local whale museum (not sure if it should be called a museum - its the hull of a boat, kitted out to show a few bones and a few films of whales swimming at sea) after the wonderful museum in Vik, we promptly made our exit for a wonder round the part of town we were in. We had a look in a couple of shops and took in a few sights, before returning to the boat. The boat was much bigger than in Husavik and we realised once again, how lucky we were to have had chance to see a whale in Husavik with a lot less people about. We set sail with a very helpful and pleasant guide to tell us about the area. After about 30 minutes we heard a voice on his walkie-talkie that an earlier boat had found a humpback whale so we promptly headed off in that direction. It seems the tour operators in the bay work together and let each other know when they find one. We were over the moon. We had fully prepared ourselves we might not see anything as we had been so lucky the first time but this was wonderful. And to make things even better, the rain had stopped and the sea was very calm. Then we saw the spray from its blow hole in the distance shooting up into the air. Our guide explained, that since April there had only been 5 humpback whales feeding in the bay and this one had been here only a few days. The usual o'clock system sprung into action as we watched it surface, break the water and dive over and over. A third ship now had arrived and all three ships were surrounding the whale (at a distance but still quite close) and then we had a real treat. The whale began to swim along the surface, sweeping its tail from side to side like a fish and then it turned on its side, showing its fin and kind of waving at us before rolling back onto its front, swimming a bit more then diving again. It was absolutely magical. If you zoom in on the photos here, you can see the distinct markings and scars on its fin. These are how scientists and experts tell each animal apart from one another as they are unique like finger prints. After a little while longer, our captain decided we should leave this whale alone and try and find some Minke whales that also feed in the bay. Our guide described to us, that the behaviour we had seen was either because the whale was relaxed and playing or that it felt a little threatened by the three boats and was letting us know. Probably the latter, so although it was a shame to leave it, it was nice to think the captain and tour company was being responsible. We then headed further out of the bay towards the whale gorge where we found a smaller Minke whale. We had seen one earlier, but were in pursuit of the humpback so had left it to feeding. The Minke whale was more agile as it was smaller, and the spray from the blow whole wasn’t as visible. It was also a lot faster so once it dived, it normally surfaced along way from the boat and changed directions a lot. We followed this whale for a little while then headed back towards an Island that had a colony of Puffins on it. We had a pleasant surprise on the way back – the humpback whale was swimming across the water in front of the boat so stopped to watch it swim and dive again. After a few dives, we ventured on and spent a little while with the puffins. There were hundreds of them like at Vik. Lots of them were flying in circles around the island, while the others were either happily perched on the rocks on the island or bobbing about in the sea before heading out to sea to catch some fish. We sailed back to the harbour and took a short walk up to the church which sits proudly on top of the hill that Reykjavik is built on. Like most of the modern architecture in Iceland, the building had a very quirky look to it but still maintaining a very Icelandic feel. Inside was beautiful and the organ was very impressive. We were lucky to hear it being played as a local festival was taking place over the following few days and they were in the church practicing. By now we were getting quite hungry so decided to head back to the main area to get some dinner. We ate again at Café Victor as we knew the food was relatively cheap and good. It was such a treat and we both enjoyed every mouthful! The last thing to see on our trip was the Ice Bar. It was one of the first things we had heard about so were very keen to see what all the fuss was about. We entered the main warm bar, was guided to an area where we were given quilted blanket/throws and led into a small room lined with blocks of ice and a huge air con unit pumping out freezing cold air. There was a little bar in the corner, where a tray of glasses, each filled with ice, and two seats made out of ice blocks with some animal skin draped over them. We were given our cocktail (gin and lemonade) and left to it. I soon began to feel the cold, shivering so much I nearly spilt by drink while Leigh tried to take a few pictures. We didn’t stay here too long. We both thought the whole thing was over priced and quite hyped up. It wasn’t as good as we had hoped it would be but we had to see what all the fuss was about. After a little stroll, we caught the shuttle bus back to the hotel, to get packed ready for our early morning flight.
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Thursday, August 9, 2007
Wednesday, August 8, 2007
Day 12 - Puffins and the Golden Circle - By Leigh
After spending a couple hours taking advantage of the free wireless access in the reception area updating the blog we visited a waterfall which was a few hundred meters from the hotel. It was a nice waterfall but we probably visited the waterfalls in the wrong order, as Dettifoss was so amazing it makes most of the other smaller falls seem less impressive. However this one was pretty cool because you could get so close to it. I was glad to have my waterproof jacket on!:
We took a few photos and didn't stay for long and decided not to walk to the top as it was now quite late in the day for us to start our journey and we wanted to go back east 30km to Vik and see the puffins again.
Unfortuatly the wheather was much worse than yesterday but we were pleased to see there were just as many puffins about once we'd arrived. Even though the cliffs were much more slippery today, in my infinite wisdom I decided to scramble up and get some closer pictures of the puffins. Anna decided agaist it as the weather was so bad which was a shame as Im sure she'd have come up if it was dryer.
Here I am just before I go out of view from Anna. I did actually go quite a bit higher than this:
It was so amazing hanging out with the puffins up on the cliff. They were stupid things though, they trusted me and didn't seem to care no matter how close I got. I easily got within 5 meters. Infact the only thing stopping me getting closer was my nerve as it was so slippery up there. Here's a selection of the better pictures I took (out of the hundred or so!).
Unfortuanly the conditions were so bad and water\mud kept going on the lens so the pictures ar not as good as they could have been on a better day. But regardless the experience was unforgetable.
A couple of other tourists noticed me up the cliff and decided to join me. We didn't really speak much but we did smile a lot!
The mission down the cliff was much harder than going up. It was basically a controlled slide by grabbing onto the many plants to slow myself down as I decended.
I think Anna was starting to get worried. To me i'd only been up there for a few minutes but it transpired to be about an hour!
After the scramble and slide I was properly wet and muddy.
After getting changed and cleaning my camera we headed off west again past last nights hotal and the waterfall onward north west towards our final Edda hotal.
In this area you can find the Golden Circle which includes the orignal Geyser called 'Geysir' the waterfall Golifoss and the Thingviller national park. On the way we drove through lava fields covered in moss that we dubbed the 'brain fields'. We stopped off here to get some moss for Tanya. I have no idea why she wanted some moss but there was plently around so we were happy to oblige!
And we also passed lots of smaller waterfalls, this one I thought was paticulary interesting:
As we drove up to the Geysers we saw 'Strokker' errupt in the distance. Strokker is Geysir's little sister and is still active unlike 'Geysir' which has been blocked over the last hundred years by tourists throwing stones into it. Strokker will blow up every 5 - 10 minutes and is the most frequent errupting Geyser in the world. Now I have to admit I wasn't expecting too much from this visit but standing about 5 meters from the thing as it errupted upto 40ft was a real highlight of the holiday. We kept staying for 'just one more' eruption!
Heres Videos and Pictures of the Geysers.
Our first erruption up close:
Here is I in front of the original (which used to errupt to 90 foot!):
The scale of Geysir's. Starting with the biggest!
Next on the agenda was Golifoss which was only a few KM up the road from the geysers. Golifoss was a stunning waterfall, while overall not as impressive as Dettifoss but still VERY powerful and it crashed down into valley in an unusual kind of sideways fashion.
Some more crazys close to the edge:
I could tell Anna had seen one too many waterfalls and I didn't blame here because it was cold and miserable so we headed off to find our last Edda hotel and have dinner. For a change we thought we'd have pasta :o(
We took a few photos and didn't stay for long and decided not to walk to the top as it was now quite late in the day for us to start our journey and we wanted to go back east 30km to Vik and see the puffins again.
Unfortuatly the wheather was much worse than yesterday but we were pleased to see there were just as many puffins about once we'd arrived. Even though the cliffs were much more slippery today, in my infinite wisdom I decided to scramble up and get some closer pictures of the puffins. Anna decided agaist it as the weather was so bad which was a shame as Im sure she'd have come up if it was dryer.
Here I am just before I go out of view from Anna. I did actually go quite a bit higher than this:
It was so amazing hanging out with the puffins up on the cliff. They were stupid things though, they trusted me and didn't seem to care no matter how close I got. I easily got within 5 meters. Infact the only thing stopping me getting closer was my nerve as it was so slippery up there. Here's a selection of the better pictures I took (out of the hundred or so!).
Unfortuanly the conditions were so bad and water\mud kept going on the lens so the pictures ar not as good as they could have been on a better day. But regardless the experience was unforgetable.
A couple of other tourists noticed me up the cliff and decided to join me. We didn't really speak much but we did smile a lot!
The mission down the cliff was much harder than going up. It was basically a controlled slide by grabbing onto the many plants to slow myself down as I decended.
I think Anna was starting to get worried. To me i'd only been up there for a few minutes but it transpired to be about an hour!
After the scramble and slide I was properly wet and muddy.
After getting changed and cleaning my camera we headed off west again past last nights hotal and the waterfall onward north west towards our final Edda hotal.
In this area you can find the Golden Circle which includes the orignal Geyser called 'Geysir' the waterfall Golifoss and the Thingviller national park. On the way we drove through lava fields covered in moss that we dubbed the 'brain fields'. We stopped off here to get some moss for Tanya. I have no idea why she wanted some moss but there was plently around so we were happy to oblige!
And we also passed lots of smaller waterfalls, this one I thought was paticulary interesting:
As we drove up to the Geysers we saw 'Strokker' errupt in the distance. Strokker is Geysir's little sister and is still active unlike 'Geysir' which has been blocked over the last hundred years by tourists throwing stones into it. Strokker will blow up every 5 - 10 minutes and is the most frequent errupting Geyser in the world. Now I have to admit I wasn't expecting too much from this visit but standing about 5 meters from the thing as it errupted upto 40ft was a real highlight of the holiday. We kept staying for 'just one more' eruption!
Heres Videos and Pictures of the Geysers.
Our first erruption up close:
Here is I in front of the original (which used to errupt to 90 foot!):
The scale of Geysir's. Starting with the biggest!
Next on the agenda was Golifoss which was only a few KM up the road from the geysers. Golifoss was a stunning waterfall, while overall not as impressive as Dettifoss but still VERY powerful and it crashed down into valley in an unusual kind of sideways fashion.
Some more crazys close to the edge:
I could tell Anna had seen one too many waterfalls and I didn't blame here because it was cold and miserable so we headed off to find our last Edda hotel and have dinner. For a change we thought we'd have pasta :o(
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