Blogs from Iceland, Europe - page 26

Temperatures were projected to be falling as we head north to Iceland. And the weather could best be described as “iffy” for our arrival on the northeastern coast of Iceland. As we cruised into the fjord that formed the harbor at Djupivogur we reached our tender position. Don’t struggle too much with the name, pronounce the “J” as a “Y” and just let it roll off your tongue. We grabbed our typical quick-breakfast in the Lido, got our stuff together, and headed to the Showroom. We got our Pink-10 stickers for the Rural East Iceland Tour and waited for our time to board the tenders. It was a ten-minute tender ride to the shore. First the tender headed to the channel marker and then followed the channel straight to the pier. Upon entering the channel, our ... read more

Up earlier this morning as tour starts at 8am, so I was downstairs for breakfast at 7. Today's tour will have a lot my traveling time, as we cover a fair distance heading down the south coast. Our first destination was Reynisfjara, the Black Sand beach. At either end of the beach are the enormous basalt stacks. According to local Icelandic folklore, these columns were once trolls trying to pull ships from the ocean to shore, however they were dim and went out too late in the night so when dawn broke on the horizon they were turned into solid stone. So mesmerizing are these features, they were featured in Game of Thrones; they are in some of the scenes 'North of the Wall'. The sea stacks are home to thousands of nesting seabirds, including the ... read more

7pm wake up. Breakfast downstairs (porridge juice fruit) 9am pick up for tour, drive around the city picking up others. Only a small group - 16 people. Our first stop was Pingvellir (Thingvellir) National Park - this is where the tetonic plates of Europe and America are visible and you can stand with one foot in each continent! Absolutely stunning landscape and I will let the photos do the talking. Of course I did manage to shimmy into a crevice and can now say I was in two continents at the same time! This is also where the largest freshwater lake in Europe is - Thingvallavatn Lake. It is 83 square kms and 114 m deep. You can also dive here along the split between the 2 continents. Our next stop was in the Geyser Hot ... read more

Ordered in breakfast again today, as I needed to be ready to leave for my Sudureyri Food Trail tour this morning at 8:15am. At 6:30 this morning the ship docked in Ísafjödur so that tends to be your wake up call - if you do manage to sleep through this then usually Skulk will be on the loudspeaker around 7am to announce we have docked and to get everyone up and moving. Ísafjödur Is the largest town in the Westfjords peninsula, with some 2,600 inhabitants. The old town has wooden houses with corrugated tin roofs, built by fishing merchants in the 18th and 19th centuries. The growth of the town was triggered by salt fish production and ever since then the fishing industry has been vital for the community. The town is surrounded by rugged and ... read more

Plan byl jednoduchy. Sbalit se, cestou nakoupit v nakupaku darky domu, zajit do centra nakoupit vyhlidnute suvenýry, dat si fish&chips, mozna se podivat na plachetnici, vrátit auto a odletet do teplych kraju. To by ale mistnaci nesmeli naplánovat na dnesek svatek. Takze nakupak byl zcela zavreny a trochu nam tim zmenil plany. A když myslim trochu, tak myslim fakt trochu, protože v centru jsme nasli jiny nakupak, který byl otevreny. Ale ten pocit nebyl prijemny, takze se v ramci terapie z toho tady vypisuju. No a aby toho nebylo dost, tak plachetnice během noci nekam odletla, protože v pristavu uz nebyla. Zrada. Nastesti ale ostatní věci klaply – suvenýry jsme koupili, ryba s cipy byla vyborna, auto jsme v pohode vratili (a lituju další zakazniky, az zjisti – stejne jako my – co všechno uplne nefunguje), ... read more