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Iceland Photo Gallery - 2. Golden Circle and Landmannalaugar

In July and August 2006, we traveled to Dubai, Mount Kailash and Guge Kingdom in Tibet, Muscat, Iceland and a brief stop in London.

Iceland 04 02 Kerio Created by an explosion followed by implosion of its cone, Kerio is 55m deep with a green lake at the bottom. Peter scrambled down to throw rocks in the lake.

Iceland 04 02 Kerio

Iceland 04 03 Litli-Geysir The region immediately east of Reykjavik is popularly known as the Golden Circle, containing the Geysir geyser, Gullfoss waterfall, and Dingvellir, the original Icelandic parliament. Geysir (the Gusher, pronounced GAY-zeer) was the original spouting hot spring, giving its name to all the others around the world, but became inactive in the 1960s.

Iceland 04 03 Litli-Geysir

Iceland 04 04 Geysir Strokkur Geyser The Strokkur (the Churn) is next to Geysir and spouts up to 35m every 10 minutes. Geysers are formed when geothermally heated water becomes trapped in narrow fissures. The water at the surface cools while the water below the ground becomes superheated, eventually turning into steam and blasting out the cooler water above it.

Iceland 04 04 Geysir Strokkur Geyser

Iceland 04 05 Geysir Strokkur Geyser With Bjarnfell Behind The Strokkur spouts again, with the small hill Bjarnfell behind.

Iceland 04 05 Geysir Strokkur Geyser With Bjarnfell Behind

Iceland 04 06 Geysir Hot Springs Geysir and Strokkur are surrounded by smaller hot springs.

Iceland 04 06 Geysir Hot Springs

Iceland 04 07 Geysir Hot Springs Blesi Blue Pool Blesi is a beautiful blue pool painted by algae and mineral deposits.

Iceland 04 07 Geysir Hot Springs Blesi Blue Pool

Iceland 04 08 Langjokuill Langjokuill is the second largest glacier in Iceland, seen on our drive from Geysir to Gullfoss.

Iceland 04 08 Langjokuill

Iceland 04 09 Gullfoss Full View On the river Hvita, Gullfoss is Iceland’s most famous waterfall, tumbling in a pair of broad cataracts, the first 10m in full view, then the river bends a sharp 90 degrees and falls a further 20m into the gorge’s spray-filled shadow.

Iceland 04 09 Gullfoss Full View

Iceland 04 10 Gullfoss Upper Falls Gullfoss is Iceland’s most famous waterfall, tumbling in a pair of broad cataracts. Here is the first 10m fall.

Iceland 04 10 Gullfoss Upper Falls

Iceland 04 11 Gullfoss Lower Gorge Gullfoss is Iceland’s most famous waterfall, tumbling in a pair of broad cataracts. Here is the second 20m fall into the gorge’s spray-filled shadow.

Iceland 04 11 Gullfoss Lower Gorge

Iceland 04 12 Pingvellir From Lookout The river Oxara snakes past the Pingvallakirkja church and the Hotel Valholl, seen from the Pingvellir lookout where Route 36 grazes the top of Almannagja. The pretty wooden church in the centre was one of the first churches built in Iceland, with the one we see today built in 1859.

Iceland 04 12 Pingvellir From Lookout

Iceland 04 13 Pingvellir Rift Pingvellir sits on the rift between the North American and European plates, just 23km east of Reykjavik. Although this rift stretches right across Iceland, nowhere else is it so expansively evident – a 4km wide, 40m deep slash in the landscape, sided in basalt columns and extending for 16km from Iceland’s largest lake Pingvallavatn to the low, rounded cone of Skjaldbreider volcano in the northeast.

Iceland 04 13 Pingvellir Rift

Iceland 04 14 Pingvellir Logberg Flag The parliament of Iceland met for the first time at Pingvellir in 930AD. From the lookout at Pingvellir, a 100m track descends into Almannagja and down to the flagpole, which marks the presumed site of Logberg (Law Rock), the rock where important speeches were made and the Law Speaker recited Iceland’s law to the assembled parliament each year. It was also at Logberg that the Icelanders adopted the Christian religion around 1000AD.

Iceland 04 14 Pingvellir Logberg Flag

Iceland 05 01 Stong Longhouse Long View We did a bus tour from Reykjavik to the geothermal area Landmannalaugar. Our first stop was at the excavations of a medieval farmhouse called Stong. We viewed the red-roofed shelter shed protecting the site, set on a small stream below the dark slopes of Stangarfjall,

Iceland 05 01 Stong Longhouse Long View

Iceland 05 02 Stong Longhouse Excavation Stong was the home of a chieftain named Gaukur Trandilsson until Mount Hekla erupted in 1104, smothering much of the Pjorsardalur valley under ash and pumice. Stong was excavated in 1939 and illustrates a typical Viking homestead, a longhouse forming the main hall.

Iceland 05 02 Stong Longhouse Excavation

Iceland 05 03 Stong Longhouse Reconstruction Outside We stopped nearby to see a reconstruction of a homestead based on the excavation at Stong, roofed with turf and authentically built with hand-cut timber.

Iceland 05 03 Stong Longhouse Reconstruction Outside

Iceland 05 04 Stong Longhouse Reconstruction Inside Bed Closet The longhouse was divided into several rooms, one of which was a bed closet where the farmer and his wife slept snuggled under sheepskin.

Iceland 05 04 Stong Longhouse Reconstruction Inside Bed Closet

Iceland 05 05 Hjalparfoss We took a brief detour to Hjalparfoss, a parallel pair of short foaming falls dropping into a round pool, surrounded by thick basalt columns.

Iceland 05 05 Hjalparfoss

Iceland 05 06 Hekla Hekla (1491m) is Iceland’s most active volcano, which during the Middle Ages was believed to be the gate to Hell. It sits along a 40km long snow-covered mountain ridge, almost always shrouded in cloud. The volcano has had frequent eruptions in the past years (1980, 1981, 1991 and 2000) and has left thick layers of ash and pumice over the landscape. Hekla is supposedly where the term “what the heck” came from.

Iceland 05 06 Hekla

Iceland 05 07 Interior View On The Way To Landmannalaugar As we turned off the F26 Sprengisandur onto the fairly good F208 dirt road, we had a view of the stark interior of Iceland stretching into the horizon. In the late 1960s, when NASA was hunting for a moon-landing practice location, the closest equivalent to lunar territory was found in Iceland. We drove out on the F225, a much worse dirt road.

Iceland 05 07 Interior View On The Way To Landmannalaugar

Iceland 05 08 Interior View Near Landmannalaugar Here’s another view of the interior as we got closer to Landmannalaugar on route F208.

Iceland 05 08 Interior View Near Landmannalaugar

Iceland 05 09 Landmannalaugar lake Frostastadavatn Lake Frostastadavatn lies behind the rhyolite ridge immediately north of the Landmannalaugar hut, with moss-covered lava flows flanking the lake.

Iceland 05 09 Landmannalaugar lake Frostastadavatn

Iceland 05 10 Landmannalaugar Hill Next To Lake Frostastadavatn Just across from Lake Frostastadavatn is a beautiful multi-coloured moss-covered hill.

Iceland 05 10 Landmannalaugar Hill Next To Lake Frostastadavatn

Iceland 05 11 Landmannalaugar Landmannalaugar is a hot springs area set in a flat gravel plain between a glacial river and the front of 15C lava flow, all hemmed in by sharp-peaked obsidian and rhyolite mountains, brightly streaked in orange, grey, and green.

Iceland 05 11 Landmannalaugar

Iceland 05 12 Landmannalaugar Hot Springs Just 200m from the hut, The Landmannalaugar hot springs are set in a patch of green at the end of a boardwalk up against the lava front. Both hot and cold water flow out from beneath Laugahraun and combine in a natural pool to form the most ideal bath imaginable.

Iceland 05 12 Landmannalaugar Hot Springs

Iceland 05 13 Landmannalaugar Barmur Rhyolite Ridge Landmannalaugar’s colourful mountains are due to centuries of volcanic activity in the area. Barmur is the rhyolite ridge across from the hut.

Iceland 05 13 Landmannalaugar Barmur Rhyolite Ridge

Iceland 05 14 Landmannalaugar Blahnukur As I neared the start of the hike down Brandsgil, I had a great view of the colourful Bláhnúkur (943m, the Blue Peak).

Iceland 05 14 Landmannalaugar Blahnukur

Iceland 05 15 Landmannalaugar Brandsgil Here is the entrance to the Brandsgil canyon.

Iceland 05 15 Landmannalaugar Brandsgil

Iceland 05 16 Landmannalaugar Brandsgil I hiked for awhile in the rain down Brandsgil, a tight, colourful canyon full of shallow streamlets, and stared at the moss-covered hill across the stream.

Iceland 05 16 Landmannalaugar Brandsgil

Iceland 05 17 Landmannalaugar Brennisteinsal and Laugahraun Lava Field From Brandsgil, I hiked up to the Laugahraun lava field to catch a distant view of the rainbow-streaked mountain Brennisteinsalda (855m, sulfur wave), punctuated by steaming vents and sulphur deposits.

Iceland 05 17 Landmannalaugar Brennisteinsal and Laugahraun Lava Field


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