We washed our underwear overnight on the coldest night, 7C, since we have been here ?it was still a long way from dry this morning so we brought it along with us. Have it laid out in the car and the heater cranked up ?won’t take long to dry.
It is raining this morning, the low pressure system followed us inland from the east. But the north looks dry, so we headed out there around 9am. We are going to drive the diamond loop today.
First stop Krafla, a crater lake. Was off-road so we gave this a miss, as it is raining heavy.
So we headed to Dettifoss a waterfall. By the time we got here it had stopped raining. ?Dettifoss is 45 metres high and 100 metres across. 193m cubed of water cascades onto Dettifoss gorge every second. It is the most impressive waterfall we have seen so far in Iceland. It is also the most powerful in Europe. We walked a little further up the river to the Selfoss waterfall which is in the shape of a horseshoe.
It was on the road again, to Ásbyrgi Canyon, it is a glacial canyon, the horseshoe-shaped depression is part of the Vatnajökull National Park and measures approximately 3.5 km in length and over 1 km wide. It is estimated that the Canyon was formed eight to ten million years ago, after the Ice Age, after the flooding of the Jökulsá á Fjöllum river. We went for a walk into the canyon, was a delightful walk through trees and wildflowers with the canyon all around us. This walk was the highlight of the day for me. I love the beauty and grandeur of nature, it reminds me how insignificant we all are, in comparison.
Next we visited the Hringsbjarg cliff on the Tjornes Peninsula. We saw hundreds of puffins in the sea and also some in the cliff nesting. They weren’t close enough for a photo with our phones, but we got a good view through the binoculars. Then we did a nice walk along the cliff tops. Great views.
It was 1.45pm by now and we were getting hungry. We drove to Húsavík for some lunch. They claim it is the whale watching capital of Europe. We had a lovely seafood lunch overlooking the fishing harbour. Afterwards we had a wander around the harbour. We decided we wouldn’t have dinner tonight after having a late lunch, so we bought a cake each from the bakery for later.
As we got closer to our hotel the rain started again. No rain is forecast for tomorrow and 10C. We arrived back at the hotel around 4.30pm and made a plan for tomorrow’s adventures. We only have two full days left in Iceland, sad it is going so quickly.
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