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Othinn (this is a phonetic, not literal spelling as the Icelandic alphabet has 7
letters that we don’t have in English) picked us up at our gracious hotel promptly at 8:30 in his super jeep. Iceland
Excursion’s brochure promised a ten hour tour of the "Golden Circle," but we got a whole lot more.
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| A view of Reykjavik from outside the city. |
Othinn started out by driving us, off road, up a steep hill so we could view the
city of Reykjavik. While the bumps, turns and absence of a road seemed a little much at first, we quickly adopted the proper
adventure spirit.
In general, Othinn rocked our collective world. He was friendly, an excellent off
road driver and extremely knowledgeable about his country. Othinn explained, in detail, how Iceland relies on and produces
geothermal energy, why the water smells like rotten eggs and the better Icelandic beers and restaurants.
Next, Othinn took us to Pingvellir, Iceland’s first national park which sits
on the tectonic plates that separate Europe from North America. The park is also home to Iceland’s first parliament
site, the Althing. After a quick lunch of lamb stew – an Othinn recommendation – it was off to the top of a glacier
for some snowmobiling.
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| Carie & Dave on a snowmobile. |
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Although none of us had ever ridden a snowmobile before, and we’re not much
for cold weather, the word is still "wow!" Zipping around, James Bond style, seeing a glacier from a motorcycle on skis was
awesome! Gunnar, our instructor, would stop and point out the highlights and laughed while Carie and Morgan made snow angels
on the glacier. Brooksie was all into seeing how fast she could drive the snow mobile while keeping it under control (a bit
of a challenge at times, but she didn’t turn it over!). There’s just something about charging up the ridge of
a glacier at full throttle that is very exciting.
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| Morgan makes a snow angel on the glacier. |
And yet, our day was only half over! Next stop was the waterfall Gulfoss. The 105
foot waterfall was formed when a river carved a course following a fissure in a lava bed. One of the things we loved about
Iceland is they don’t care if you kill yourself. They let you walk up on top of the falls – there are no ropes
– to find your own personal best point of view.
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| Gulfoss |
The next stop was Geysir, the geyser for which all others are named and Strokkur,
a smaller geyser next to it. We didn’t get to see Geysir erupt, but we did see Strokkur blow several times.
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At this point, we’d seen the big three on the Golden Circle tour and thought
the trip was over. But not with Othinn. He said he still had a few surprises for us. Or as he liked to say, "that is mine
to know."
Othinn drove us over to Kerid, a volcanic explosion crater filled with blue-green
(a color very close to Morgan’s signature color) water. He also explained how in 1987, the somewhat world-famous Icelandic
pop band, the Sugar Cubes floated their equipment out on a raft and played a concert with killer acoustics from inside the
crater.
The next stop was Eden, one of Iceland’s famous hothouses where they grow vegetables
and flowers. Again, we’re thinking the tour must be over, but Othinn said that he had two more surprises for us.
The first surprise turned out to be an off-road river adventure. That’s right,
Othinn drove us through the river in the jeep. Again, it’s Iceland. They don't care if you take imprudent action in
the nature. After that, Othinn asked all of us to close our eyes and then he took us to a geothermal energy test site.
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