Keflavik Airport: 2am Tuesday
Iceland’s population is only half a million, yet 25% of these seem to be at the airport! ...and they’ve all got baggage carts except us! Groaning under the weight of shoulder slung accessories and heavy suitcases we made it to the arrivals hall. It’s raining, windy and cold, so thank goodness I arranged to pick up the hire car here! "ALP rental? - they have no desk - but the man usually stands just here". After 30 minutes of waiting we give up and decide to take the airport bus. .....but the buses are on strike since June 6th, so it has to be a taxi. Six stranded Brits in one large taxi = £120 for a journey of 25 miles to central Reykjavik ('Smoking bay' - presumably from the hot springs). The hotel receptionist is charm itself and promises to call the hire car company and remonstrate with them when they start work in the morning. Meanwhile, we retire (it’s now 03:15 IST, 04:15 BST) to room 221 and a much needed nightcap from the heavier suitcase. Its easy to tell that the hot water is geothermal, since it stinks of bad eggs. I don’t want any of that in my whisky and am glad the cold water out of the mixertap tastes fine.
After a few miles we take the turning for Thingvellir (ancient seat of government, historic place in Iceland’s history) and drive past it without realising that one small hotel, a flagpole and a chapel could mark this cultural pearl in Iceland’s crown. Eventually we realise, and go back to the site - looking for two crosses to mark the famous poets graves, finding them behind a closed up wooden house, and then discovering that these crosses were, in fact, more washing line supports than grave markers! Never mind. Next weekend 50,000 people will be here for the 1000th anniversary of Christianity in Iceland, and the carpenters, sound stage technicians and portaloo installers are extremely busy getting ready for what promises to be a great weekend, if it stops raining and blowing, which it shows no sign of doing.
Moving on, we take the 365 road towards Geysir and experience our first non-metalled road. ...would be great in a rally car but in a rather tall 4WD I’m not so sure and take things fairly steadily. The geysers are excellent - huge steam bubbles forcing their way past columns of water and ejecting them to great height! Strokkur does it every 4-5 minutes or so - the water in the pond goes down a few inches, then it wells up, then it goes down, then it wells up and there’s a huge bubble of steam just inside it which bursts through in a most spectacular way. What’s left of the water drains back into the shaft and the cycle repeats. There’s about 12 holes, some of which bubble, some of which spout a bit, and two of which spout a lot. A marvel of nature - and its a marvel of human nature that there’s noone issuing tickets to go and see it! It’s all free, folks!
Gulfoss (Golden Falls) is not just interesting but awesome! The upper part of the river Hvita (white river) is visible from the carpark, and so are the rapids leading to the 40ft high falls. A cloud of spray marks the falls through which you can clearly see the 50 cu m/second that is going over them. The parked car sways as the wind buffets it, and the wipers clear the screen for a few moments while we video the falls from the comfort of the car. But we can only see the first half of the drop, Rachael reads from the guidebook - the other 70ft drop is hidden in the ravine. Getting blown away and unsure if the water in the air is rising or falling, we visit the upper viewing platform (force 9, SE) and then the lower path at the side of the falls where a daring American dad takes his two 4-year olds out on a 3-ft wide ridge overhanging the thundering cataract. Mum is not impressed, and says so - but they are safely back anyway by then.