Waterfall day

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Iceland is famous for its waterfalls so we thought we’d give them a red hot (more on that later) go in one day (other than yesterday’s taster at Gulfoss). Packed up and bade our farewells to Depill and the pregnant mares before hitting the road headed to Seljalandsfoss, famous because of it’s beauty and because you can walk right underneath it, and get a little wet.

What the guidebooks fail to mention is that it’s also the ideal place to get stuck halfway up a wet, cold, muddy and slippery rock face because your 13 year old confidence exceeds your ability and foresight, which appeared to run out about half way up. Mother to the rescue! Dried out and warmed up (and calmed down) in the sun before caving at the continual demands for lunch. But not before we’d made our way to the next stop at Skogafoss.

Also very big and beautiful, this one has steps to the top, approx 440 of them…because when you’re counting steps, you can’t whinge. The view from the top was a little vertigo-inducing, but we used this as a start for the Waterfall way or Skoga trail, which follows the Skoga river all the way to the glacier.

Surprisingly, we didn’t make it that far - there’s only so many lemon sherbet lollies a person can carry - but the trail is dotted with beautiful waterfalls along the way. So we ambled along the path, avoided a vertigo-induced meltdown (just) and enjoyed the beautiful views. The torture could continue no longer so we headed back down those steps and my knees cried out for the easy days of netball once again.

Next stop was Vik on the south coast. Refilled our grocery supplies, remortgaged the house and wandered ‘downtown’ for the Lava Show. A fascinating and rather warm (red hot in fact!) display of how lava forms and flows, and some really informative info on the volcanos around the area. The whole thing was topped off by a delicious soup dinner, featuring the hot lava soup to really get the magma flowing.

Last stop of the day, enjoying the extended daylight hours, was the black sand beach. We had anticipated seeing the basalt columns you see in all the pictures, but they had obviously moved them, and instead we found a heap of seabirds, including the famous puffins who had just begun coming to shore to begin nesting. What a treat, as we had not expected that we would see any, let alone being able to watch them flap madly over our heads as they flew to shore and established their nests on the cliff face. Lots of fun observing them and playing in the black sand before bed called and we prepared for an epic day of glaciers the following day.

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