Iceland - The Golden Circle

Mountaineers of Iceland picked us up at just after 8 AM. Hafsteinn (call me Haf) was our guide, accompanied by two videographers from the company (Alex and Marco) who rode along to take pictures for a new brochure and website update. And, thank goodness they were there. Read on to discover why.
Our tour vehicle is a one-of-a-kind truck made here by the company. It takes a Ford F350 Super cab engine and and front end, then melds that to the body of an old Expedition, creating a limo-like, 6 door off-roader that rides very smoothly on the paved roads while being able to navigate the lava beds and glacier tracks of this tour.
We drove around the coast road but the morning was kind of foggy with limited visibility, so not much to see except for rugged cliffs, pounding surf and lonely cottages and houses. I can’t help wondering how these folks stay sane out here in the hinterlands but I guess their daily lives are so focused on working that they have little down time.
Our first stop was the small waterfall, Flaxa Tunda, which houses a big salmon ladder off to the left of the falls and some gorgeous scenery.  From there , we traveled to the bigger falls at Gulfloss and discovered the tale of Sigridur who with her sisters began leading tourists to the hard to reach falls in the late 1800’s.The water falls into a gorge that I could not climb down to get a good image of, so you’ll just have to imagine the 100’ chasm into which the water flows. This water comes from the Langjokull glacier which is our next stop after the geysers.
The smallish geyser park offered a 20 minute stroll over lava beds winding through a series of fumaroles and geysers, one of which had the nicety to erupt while we watched. It wasn’t Old Faithful but it was cool.
Snowmobiling on a glacier was a lot more involved than I anticipated. First, we had to stop and let the air out of the tires so they had more surface on the iced-over lava of the road, then we had to suit up in first a heavy snowsuit, then in a bright orange weather-all cover up, followed by a head/neck warmer and topped by a heavy duty motor cycle helmet with visor. I could hardly move, getting into the truck to drive up to the glacier filed and the snowmobiles was a feat!
All was worth it to stand on a glacier and walk around throwing snowballs and looking at bleakness wondering how Peary and Amundsen ever managed to stay alive! The black over the snow is not all lava, most is the ash from the 2007 eruption which is gradually going away but covers everything! It even rains ash when the mists come and dirties the car windows so riders can’t see a thing. 
After the glacier, we went to the national park to view where the tectonic plates between Europe and America meet. About three years ago, the plates jarred apart and left a huge ravine that sports a walkover and was where a season 2 episode of Game of Thrones was filmed. Amazingly enough, the water here is 100% clear and people dive in it. We came across a few divers returning from their swim. Then we hiked through a birch forest over trails that rivaled those of the cliff walk on Guernsey until we came to the tectonic plate wall!!! Humbling! Mom would have been in 7th Heaven! This is looking down into the Earth where the plates jarred open three years ago. There’s no way to get an accurate sense of the depth of this hole.
All over Iceland we saw the ponies and the sheep for which the island is famous. We even spotted a riding club out for a jaunt.
As the tour wound down, we stopped for excellent pizza at the biggest farm furthest from the sea where everything on the pizza was locally sourced!

We arrived back at Silica, tired and happy after a 10 hour tour of this scenic and intriguing country!