Day 14 – Monday 5th March 2018
Technically last night but hey, if you’re one of the more than 41,500+ people reading my Blog, you may have already read yesterday’s.
So here we go from last night…
The appearance of the Aurora Borealis was very likely so we set off on a recce of locations, one that would have snow-capped mountains in the foreground. A great spot was located and then off to dinner at our little haunt in VIK.
A very tasty pork schnitzel with rhubarb sauce hit the spot.
The manager was kind enough to cut some limes and place in a plastic cup for our later use…
Well prepared, we drove to our spot on a long deserted, snow and ice covered road, parked the car and out with the tripod and D800 mounted upon it placed just in front to the car.
Now you have to use a bit of imagination to visualise our setup. Two glasses in the cup holders, filled with Beluga and freshly cut limes expertly done so by our dinner host 30 minutes earlier. Two bottles of soda were sitting on the car roof in -3 C being naturally chilled.
In fact is was so cold, that by the third (or was it fourth) drink?) reaching through the sunroof for a bottle of soda, I quickly found that it was frozen solid. Now that’s cold!
The D800 had an electronic remote shutter release and this was being triggered from within the Pajero. The “sun roof” was open and this was providing us with a great view in the event that the Aurora would appear. Triggering the shutter sporadically provided us with the view off the back of the camera in the relative warmth of the car.
Unfortunately clouds descended upon us and I managed to only get several images between the clouds before we called it a night just on midnight.
A tease at distance and too far away to drive to...
A good night’s sleep followed by a buffet brekkie and checkout from our Katla Hotel home for the past two days…
On the road to our first waterfall. Cold? Nah, bloody freezing with a capital F…
In all the time in Iceland, the -3 C this morning at the Seljalandsfoss Waterfall was just too cold. I managed to grab several images with the shutter finger almost frozen stuck to the shutter button.
In Summer you can actually walk between the waterfall and the land mass behind it. Almost like taking a shower. You would dare not do this in Winter as you would freeze in a matter of minutes.
The rope cordon preventing access too close to the waterfall was covered in icicles 100mm in length. That’s how cold it gets here!!
It was then back on the road to Gullfoss. This was to revisit the waterfall that ejected us in 120km/h+ winds, storms and tempest. What a beautiful waterfall but again so cold…
This time I was also armed with spikes and was able to walk around with full confidence of not slipping on the icy boardwalk. Gullfoss is truly amazing, loud, powerful and almost frozen. The wind was still relatively high but nowhere near the levels previously experienced.
I managed to take a few good images and one that stood out was a thick rope handrail that was frozen stiff with icicles hanging off.
The other surprise was seeing a young bride with a shoulder-less wedding gown posing in the near freezing temperatures. I’m not sure if she survived the experience…
On the road to Reykjavik arriving mid arvo to try and locate our Airbnb. Parked next door to this large building with concrete planter boxes surrounding the building. Later found out these were anti crash barriers disguised as planter boxes to protect the US Embassy.
We sat there for the best part of 10 minutes trying to decipher the location of our digs. This piqued the interest of Embassy Security who came out promptly, surveyed the two dodgy looking and unshaven characters and demanded that we “move on” fearing the drawing of a weapon, we quickly decamped our location.
Seljalandsfoss was absolutely gorgeous and no image can do it justice...
The heavy duty rope barrier was frozen solid...
The correct digs were located some 40 meters from the US Embassy and we now have them as our neighbours 🙂
What a super nice apartment. Two bedrooms, huge lounge and kitchen on street level right in the middle of the mix of downtown.
A nice walk through the burb taking pics of the local architecture and our final visit to our favourite caffeine establishment – Reykjavik Roasters.
The weather this time in RKV is sans rain, sleet, snow and yuk but still a tad cold.
Dinner at the Big Lebowski again, with several White Russians completing the evening. Walking back to our abode for the night we looked upward to survey the sky. No clouds, stars twinkling and a resounding decision to get some sleep and not venture out again.
The Adventure Continues…
Click -> Iceland Travel Blog Next Day
_______________________________________________________________________