We got up and headed to Netto for pastries because we stayed at an Airbnb. Somehow this Netto was even busier than the one in Höfn. Yes, this place is bigger, but we sort of assumed that there would be more places offering breakfast here. Then we got gas and this is actually the stop where we managed to temporarily get our tire pressure alarm to turn off. Then, we headed out of town.
We started out heading south, on the east side of Lagarfljót, to drive through some of the largest forest in Iceland. It was indeed forest, and very Canada-like at times, but was also not very large in comparison to, you know, basically any forest tract in North America. (Both in terms of hectarage and height.) As I noted in the previous post, this area is sort of like Iceland’s equivalent of one of New York’s Finger Lakes. It’s the only part of the country that would even remotely seem like that.
We then crossed a bridge near the southern end and headed over to Hengifoss. Hengifoss is at the top of a long trail with another, smaller waterfall part way up. You can see Hengifoss from the parking lot but not good enough to get a good picture. The walk up Hengifoss is long and we knew there would be a lot of stuff to do once we got closer to Mývatn so we once again decided not to hike up to it. This was the third time we made that decision – though the first time we did we could walk to the bottom of the waterfall and did – and I think it just illustrates all the tradeoffs you make when you drive the Ring Road, especially if, like me, you follow the speed limit. There is so much to see in Iceland that even taking as long as we did to drive around the country doesn’t give you enough time. Unless of course you are able to get out of your accommodation earlier and you don’t stop until sunset. That’s something I might have been able to do in my 20s but not now. So we decided to go see a bigger, more easily accessible waterfall.
Back on the Ring Road the terrain changed very quickly, as we ascended out of the valley to the plateau we would be on for the next day and a half. As we drove up and up we passed a rather large waterfall on private property that didn’t appear to have a name. That’s the way it is in Iceland – they have so many waterfalls that if a particular waterfall doesn’t stand out enough or is on private property it doesn’t find its way onto the circuit. But that doesn’t make it unpretty.
A little bit later we arrived at Rjúkandafoss, a waterfall that does get a name and can be visited. And, once again, despite there being an awful lot of cars in its small parking lot, it felt relatively uncrowded given how impressive it was.
We soon got to the plateau. This part of the Ring Road is actually on the same Highlands we visited on our second day only this part is much more accessible. But, having driven mostly near sea level for much of our trip so far, we weren’t really prepared for how much wilder the weather would be. And I once again have no words for the strange landscape we found ourselves in. If I hadn’t already experienced multiple parts of Iceland that felt like the Moon or Mars, I would tell you that this area felt like another planet. Because it did. But in a different way than the other places did because that’s just the nature of Icelandic terrain – some of it is extremely bleak and strange but it’s always uniquely so.
The above picture actually has way more plant life in it than some of the area around it. We drove through some areas where it felt like we couldn’t even see any grass or moss.
However, somewhere in all of this is a farm. Our hosts the previous night suggested we go there. Fjalladýrð is apparently one of the highest and most isolated farms in Iceland at a place called Möðrudalur. To get there you have to drive on this gravel road surrounded by bleak landscape nearly devoid of vegetation. And then there’s just…this village.
We ate lunch there and I tried moss soup. It was really sweet and reminded me of a much runnier rice pudding. Outside there were traditional turf houses (see above) and rabbits and a beet patch. It was kind of surreal to be at a place that was seemingly a working farm when so much around it was just a bleak wasteland. But they’re clearly successful as they have jeep and helicopter tools of a volcano available.
After lunch we headed towards a pair of waterfalls out in the middle of the barrens. But, along the way, we saw all sorts of weird changes in terrain. At one point the moss on one side of the road was green and on the other side it was red. At other points, there seemed to be cracks in the ground, almost as if we were seeing the fissures left over from earthquakes. Eventually we crossed the Jökulsá á Fjöllum which actually comes from Vatnajökull – yes, the glacier from the other side of the country. This is not a large place. Anyway, a little bit after we crossed the river we turned off the Ring Road to head for the waterfalls.
As usual, there were few cars on the road but then an absolute ton of cars in the parking lot. The walk to the falls was over a track through a lava field (but of course) that occasionally disappeared into rocks. I wanted to go to the smaller, upper falls first. Weirdly, they have the same name as the 8th largest town in the country.
And then we walked down river to the bigger waterfall, allegedly among the most “powerful” in Europe. But powerful it is. Can you spot the people?
Now this is a waterfall. We saw many pretty waterfalls on our drive along the Ring Road, and plenty we barely noticed, but we never saw anything else this immense and, yes, powerful. It’s not Niagara. I’m not even sure it’s Kakabeka (as it’s been nearly 20 years since I’ve been there) but it’s a pretty incredible amount of water and noise.
It was getting later and we had to make a choice between two competing geothermal areas before we found our hotel, had dinner and went to the baths. It was a spur of the moment thing and we decided to drive to Krafla, the northern of the two. I had read about both earlier but I wasn’t really sure which one we should go to. What I didn’t mention earlier is that it was pretty windy at the waterfalls, especially in the parking lot. When we first got up on the plateau it wasn’t that bad and it wasn’t super windy at the farm, with someone even remarking how calm it was. But as we drove through the powerplant at Kafla it was pretty evident it was even windier than at the waterfalls. And in order to see anything at Kafla we had to climb a small hill. There we stopped at the information panel (they are all over the country). When I got out to look at the map I absolutely couldn’t believe how windy it was. It was absolutely insane. There are a few things to do here but most of them are exposed. So we decided to go to Leirhnjúkur which seemed, from where we were, to be the most protected.
But it was not. The walk over to it was insanely windy. It’s really hard to put into words how windy it was given we were just on a plain and not on a hill. (Well, technically, we were on a bit of a hill above the plateau, but on a few sides of us, there were higher hills.) We walked with the wind but were still very aware of how bad it was. A few km later we got to where we were going.
That’s a bubbling mud pit in ground that could be the Badlands. At Leirhnjúkur Iceland’s hilarious lack of concern for people’s safety reached its apogee as the boardwalk to this place was full of holes, as was the observation deck.
Though the mud pit looked like the Badlands, the rest of it, as you can see behind me, was a typical Iceland lava field, with a few notable exceptions: steam vents and multi-coloured rocks.
It was insanely windy. Even when we were sheltered by some of the lava field we still felt the wind. So we decided to abort the hike and head back the way we came, instead of walking around the loop, which, on a good day, takes people at least an hour. But this is one of those trails in Iceland where the footing is hard so it likely takes longer and, also, that wind…
Anyway, we walked back into the wind and it was something else. I had only worn a windbreaker because it really hadn’t been that cold at the waterfalls, and I had my lightest hoody on underneath. I was basically as cold as I ever got on the trip here, which is a good time to mention how great our weather was. Yes, we had rain here and there but it almost always stopped before we got to our destination. I brought my late fall/early spring jacket with me and I wore it once maybe. Now, I should have worn it here but I didn’t and so I was freezing. Fortunately, I would be able to solve that later.
Anyway, given the time, we decided the other geothermal area would have to wait to tomorrow. We drove by it and the pass and headed along the south side of Mývatn, the big lake in the region, to our hotel. It felt like it took forever because, for some reason, the road on the south side never goes over 70 and it went down to 25 at one point. We found our hotel in the middle of nowhere, on a hill with no vegetation. Getting out of the car was difficult due to the wind.
We checked into our relatively high-end hotel and entered our room. It was like a sauna. It was the hottest room we entered, aside from actual saunas and steam rooms, on the entire trip. I quickly turned the heat down hoping it would make a difference by the time we got back.
We found somewhere to heat and headed around the other side of the lake to a “pub” in Reykjahlíð. They had an interesting smoked fish dish but it turned out it was tiny (and nearly $30) so I opted for a burger, which was fine, while Jenn had a fantastic salad.
Then we headed out to the Nature Baths. This was our substitute for the Blue Lagoon. This one isn’t as elaborate as some of the others in the north, which have plunge pools and saunas, but it does have a better view than most, I suppose.
I was worried it would be freezing running to and from the change rooms but it was actually not bad going back given how warm we were. There’s the main pool, a hot tub and the above warm pool (which felt freezing). It costs nearly $70 to go to this one, which is pretty standard for the tourist baths. (I believe the Blue Lagoon is significantly worse, if memory serves.) There are a whole set of baths that serve Icelanders that are cheaper, by the way.
After soaking for a while we got changed and drove back to the hotel. At the hotel we had a drink at the bar and tried whiskey smoked with sheep dung. Jenn didn’t mind but I found it a little hot/burny. When we got back to the room it felt like I had never turned the heat off.