The Golden Circle

After months and months of anticipation, our trip to Iceland was finally upon us!! After a tiring 5.5 hour flight, we touched down in Reykjavik and immediately when shopping for booze in duty free. At 7am local time :) Why? Because it’s about 40-50% cheaper than buying it in a grocery store in the city. After groggily picking out some wine and beer (and a ~5lb bag of Haribo… because why not…), we caught the shuttle bus to the rental car lots. We were given a 2018 Toyota Yaris… so new that any blemish would be completely obvious. Because we have rental car insurance through our visa card, we turned down all insurance packages which is super scary because if something happens, you have to pay out of pocket and then deal with the claim through visa later. We’re very careful drivers but you just never know - especially with fast changing weather and occasional gravel roads…

We had intended on getting to the city and going for a swim at the local pool (geothermally heated all year round), but we got lucky and our room was ready when we got there at like 10:30am! After relaxing for a few hours, we decided to explore the city. Reykjavik has a population of only about 130,000 people… so basically the size of Aurora, IL :P It does have a small city feel for sure. It was very easy to drive into, find parking, etc. It lacks the intensity and hustle and bustle of major cities around the world. But nevertheless, it seemed lively enough, with coffee shops on every corner, lots of street art, and of course, what would a European capital be without a huge church. Hallgrímskirkja is a Lutheran church whose design is said to be based off of the rock formations (trap rocks) found around Iceland (we’ve since seen them at Reynisfjara, Litlanesfoss and Hengifoss, but more on that in later posts). I actually think the church is rather unattractive :P

We eventually made our way to the most famous hot dog stand in Iceland, Bæjarins Beztu Pylsur, and we ordered two hot dogs Icelandic style… toppings include fried onions (think like french’s french fried onions), raw red onion, ketchup, remoulade (don’t ask me what’s in this, it’s some sort of flavored mayo I think), and a very mild mustard. It was pretty good! Andy says Chicago style is better, though, he might be biased.

Nom nom nom

We completed our hot dog lunch with some ice cream from Valdis… soooo good. Loved the salted caramel flavor. After quite a bit more walking and browsing shops, we settled into a bar for a couple drinks before dinner. So… eating and drinking in Iceland is crazy expensive. Beer is around $11 for a normal draft, wine is around $12-$13 and cocktails are legit about $21. That’s why we shopped duty free! But of course that doesn’t mean we’re not going out at all…. After a couple of local Icelandic beers on draft, we headed to dinner at Snaps Bistro, which was recommended to us by a friend who came to Iceland for her honeymoon in June. Unfortunately, Snaps had a wait for a table… which is, once again, terrible for a wallets because now we’re going to drink at the bar while we wait. They had an entire menu of gin and tonics! Dinner was so tasty! Of course we wound up spending a fortune… but at least the food quality is excellent. We had our first Langoustine of the trip!

Okay moving on, we didn’t actually come to this country to see Reykjavik :P so the game plan for the rest of the trip was to spend the first day in the “Golden Circle” and then pick up Route 1 (the Ring Road) and drive all the way around the country. The next morning, we still had some jet lag weirdness going on, so we were super groggy in the morning. We had a really good skyr with fruit/oats/nuts breakfast with a pour over at Reykjavik Roasters and we didn’t actually hit the road until about 11. First stop was Geysir which was about an hour and 20 min out of the city on a nice drive through Thingvellir national park (definitely recommended to do some hiking there if time allows). Weather was pretty lousy… in the 50’s and raining. We prepared for less than ideal Iceland weather by buying waterproof EVERYTHING. Boots, pants and jackets.. And that was the best decision we’ve made. It rains so much here, the weather changes like the flip of a switch and waterfall mist is no joke :P After Geysir, we continued on for about 20 minutes to Gullfoss, a massive waterfall!

Boiling pots at Geysir!

We didn't get a picture of it, but this is where the geysir shoots up to 20m high!

Gullfoss!!

What not to do...

Our reservation log at Friðheimar :)

So Friðheimar is a really popular tour bus/tourist stop along the golden circle... but that doesn't make it any less wonderful in this case. It's one massive green house there they grow tons of tomatoes and put on the best tomato soup and bread buffet you've ever had. The bread was SO soft and delicious and Icelandic butter is creamier and better than any butter I've ever had! In this picture, Andy is demonstrating how to use the special basil scissors that have three blades and slice perfect strips of basil right into your soup! Yes there's a basil plant on every table! We also highly recommend the "Happy Mary" which is a bloody mary made with gin and green tomato juice. YUM.

This is flower pot filled with tomato ice cream!

So I think I had assumed we’d get an earlier start… or that everything would take less time… but we were running out of time to do everything I had planned that day. We had already cut some sights out from the Golden Circle and I was still worried that we wouldn’t make it to Reykadalur hot springs and back for our dinner reservations at 9:00 … lol. These were the only hot springs I had planned for this trip - we nixed Blue Lagoon because of cost ($60 pp … come on now) - so it was super important that we made it… unfortunately the hike was 3km up a mountain. Also the temperature had dropped… it was probably in the 40’s, raining, and foggy. This was by far one of the oddest things we’ve ever done… We managed the hike all the way up, which felt like forever. Seriously. I know from Yosemite how far 3km can feel when it’s so vertical…. Add nasty weather and lots of horse poop to the mix and it’s really a challenge. We finally got to the top… just to get nearly naked (yes it’s still raining, super windy at the top of the mountain and legit probably like 45 degrees) and jump in a hot spring. Okay not jump… the rocks hurt. Gently lower our freezing bodies into the warm water while asking ourselves, what are we doing…

First river crossing of this trip! If only I had known at this point how many more rivers I'd cross this week...

Trail into the foggy abyss... this path felt so mysterious!

Into the fog!

What seemed like forever later, we came across a boiling pot!

FINALLY!! Found the hot spring!!

Getting out of that spring, soaking wet and getting pummeled with cold wind and rain… while trying to get on our now soaking wet hiking clothes (and shoes and socks… I repeat, what were we doing?!)... was an experience all on it’s own. I’m fairly certain I exposed myself to a few people (no one cares) in a frenzy to get clothes off and then on as quickly as possible, lol. And now for the soaking wet, foggy, 3km hike back down the mountain! We were overall glad we did this. Soaking in a hot spring at the top of a mountain in Iceland… it was a really neat experience. I would absolutely recommend it to anyone, but preferably with better weather, less fog and earlier in the day (it does tend to be foggier at night). We were there from about 6-8:30pm, so that probably had something to do with it. Plus side? Not very crowded at all. Downside? See previous complaints. Haha. We hurried back to our guesthouse, changed really fast and drove to where we had reservations in Selfoss. We had dinner at a restaurant called Tryggvaskáli that I had researched beforehand and was really excited for! We had our first langoustine soup (YUM) and relearned that we still don’t really like lamb, haha. Which is really too bad because Iceland is a lamb-lover’s paradise. I kept thinking about how my brother would be so upset that I wasn’t eating more of it :P We slept like rocks that night, and the next morning I enjoyed myself in our own private hot spring at the guesthouse (it was a hot tub in the backyard lol) before starting on the next day's adventure...