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The Golden Circle (11 June)
Our first destination was the Þingvellir National Park (the "Þ" seems to be equivalent to "th"). This location is significant for a couple of reasons. Historically, this is the location where the island's original parliament met, when the tribal chieftains gathered here annually in the tenth century to discuss the law and resolve conflicts. This is also a site of significant geological interest, as it is a rift valley, formed by the movement of the North American tectonic plate away from the Eurasian tectonic plate. The opposite sides of this valley are moving away from each other at a rate of about an inch (2.5 cm) per year. This is a starkly visible reminder of the powerful forces that are at work inside the Earth.
From here, we continued to visit one of the most impressive waterfalls I've ever seen. Gullfoss (Golden Waterfall) is a two tiered waterfall that drops into a narrow canyon with steep sides. From the publicly accessible platforms, it is difficult to see the bottom of the waterfall, but it is dramatic and beautiful, set in the stark, empty Icelandic countryside. After gawking at the waterfall for a bit, and taking plenty of photos, we headed into the visitor's center for a quick lunch of traditional Icelandic lamb soup. Yum!
On our way to our final scheduled stop of the tour we made a brief, unscheduled stop to visit with a small paddock of Icelandic horses near the road. We grabbed handfuls of grass from the edge of the parking area, and when the horses saw that we had food to offer, they eagerly came over to visit with us. Icelandic horses are a small breed, with wild manes and spirited dispositions. They are beautiful to watch, and it was only with reluctance that we said farewell and reboarded our bus.
Our final official stop of the tour was at Geysir, an area of geothermal hot springs. The star attraction here is the Strokkur geyser, which erupts every 5-6 minutes, with varying magnitude. We lingered long enough to witness a couple of truly impressive eruptions. The walkways got surprisingly close to the geyser, so we got a really good look at the surface of the water as it prepared to erupt. It is hard to describe the way the water moves in advance of the eruption, but it was clear that significant amounts of energy were at work.
When we reboarded our bus for our return trip to Reykjavík, our tour guide applauded our promptness at all of our stops so far and indicated that we had time for one more "surprise" stop. This turned out to be one final waterfall, at Faxi. While not as tall or as powerful as Gullfoss, it was quite pretty, set all by itself in the middle of the empty countryside. After we took some pictures, we boarded the bus one final time. Our tour guide continued his narration as we returned to the city. Along the way, we took detours through the village of Hveragerði, which has dozens of hot springs scattered throughout the town, and past one of the newest geothermal power plants in the country (90% of the electricity here is generated geothermally, the rest comes from hydroelectric plants).
Along the tour, our guide noted that Iceland has a significant earthquake every 8 years or so and that one of the significant volcanoes erupts every 70-80 years. Both are now due or overdue. My wife looked at me, clearly thinking about all the emergency response we'd already witnessed on this trip, and started to say "Wouldn't it be funny if..." I quickly interrupted her with a definitive "NO". It's one thing to see the relatively small responses we'd already seen, but a major event in Iceland would have been something else altogether.