tracklog: http://www.everytrail.com/view_trip.php?trip_id=1222482
pictures: http://www.panoramio.com/user/4350353/tags/day2
video: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4TcSQVYkAac
Early morning, looking out the window there was strong wind but no rain and I even saw sunshine eastwards, a promising start! Well pretty soon I learned that the current weather does not tell you anything about the weather in 20 minutes, but anyway…
At 9 we were ready to go and had our first stop at Hjalparfoss, a Siamese twin waterfall. While peacefully taking pictures a bus arrived and tourists started to flood the place, making us leave and go to Thjoldveldisbærinn, a replika of a middle age village. The tourist followed us but luckily they mixed the exit road so we could finish before they arrived. We continued on a really bumpy road towards Gjain, a valley with dozens of waterfalls and strange rock formations. Until this point in time, including day one the sun evaded us but after reaching Haifoss (meaning high waterfall) suddenly the weather got perfect. Light wind, sunshine, but visible clouds in the background, perfect scenery for taking photos. This was why I wanted to come to Iceland – we were there all alone in the middle of nowhere, no human noise could be heard, just a beautiful sight right in front of us.
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| Gjain |
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| Haifoss |
Going back southwest to Ring Road we encountered traces of civilization again but also worse weather. We skipped Seljalandsfoss as it was raining there but at Skogafoss it stopped. It is one massive waterfall with the best outlook around halfway climbing up on its right side with a rock similar to a human face serving as foreground. Next up we had Solheimajokull, a glacier tongue which melts at around 150m above sea level, it can be easily reached from the main road. You can easily walk on the glacier on the lowest part as it is pretty dirty but oing higher it get cleaner and slippery as… well, ice.  |
| Skogafoss |
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| Solheimajokull |
Continuing east we reached the famous rocks of Dyrhoaley at the seaside where we saw many puffins as well – first time I used my telephoto lens. The rain has now stopped but there was no sun in sight. At Reynsfjara we went straight down to the sea, UZ borrowed me his tripod, I started messing around with ND filters but got a clear signal that it’s not meant for me as a stronger wave came out further, overflowing my camera bag and leaving the tripod with the camera on it stranded in the water… luckily it didn’t fall and the bag resisted. The filter bag lying on the ground soaked but I was able to clean and dry it.
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| Rocks near and far |
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| Reynisfjara |
It was late late afternoon by now so we turned back westwards to reach our accommodation in Hella… in soaking rain again. Our host was Nonni, an exceptionally nice old fellow (he won’t mind me saying that) who had just jumped into the tourism sector, we kept talking while preparing our dinner.
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