Iceland

To initiate our adventures in Europe, Sydney and I traveled to Iceland for a few days. Our house was just outside of Reykjavik in a town called kópavogur. With the fresh blanket of snow that awaited us, we were greeted with a beautiful landscape. 

This was the view right outside form the backyard.

Across the street was this building which is called Kópavogskirkja. It is the oldest church in Kópavogur. And don’t worry, i hard to look up all of these words on the internet and still have only a small grasp on how to pronounce any of them.

At our trip to the grocery store, while there were a lot of foreign foods, i was surprised to see that there were a lot of American foods, such as this wide variety of Philadelphia cream cheeses.

At night we took a walk down to the bay to get a good view of Reykjavik lit up under the dark skies.

Here is a picture of Sydney after I have finished taking my 100th picture. I think the expression on her face pretty much affirms what my thoughts are on how people view constant picture-takers

After a long first day checking out the area we were staying, Sydney and I woke up bright and early to go on a hike. We were picked up from our home in kópavogur and driven about 45 minutes south to Reykjadalur, otherwise known as “The Smoky Valley”

On our way, the derivation of this name became very obvious when we saw a lot geothermal plants such as this one. Iceland produces about 25% of its energy through geothermal heat. Unfortunately, they also emitted the bitter smell of sulfur. However, that is harmless and the attainment of clean energy must be even sweeter.

By the time we got to the mountain at 10:00 the sun was finally starting to come up. In the winter Iceland only experiences about four or five hours of daylight per day.

Through knee-deep snow, thick ice and below-freezing temperatures, we trudged determinately up the mountain.

Our guide brought along his Pomeranian. As you can see his energy was unstoppable. Granted, he had an easier time hiking above the snow because of his size, his excitement helped us get through the hardest parts of our hike.

After about an hour or so we finally reached the hot springs that we could bathe in. Though the hike was physically taxing, the opportunity to relax in a natural hot spring in nothing but our bathing suits made every bit of the hike worthwhile.

There were many hot springs in the area, but some were either too hot or too cold for us to swim in. Our guide took us to one that was the perfect temperature. After swimming in the hot spring for an hour or two, we suffered through the process of getting out and getting back into our winter clothing. We then continued our hike and climbed one more peak before heading back to the Jeep.

Here was our view at the top. Though the climb was steep and rocky, the view was a worthy reward. 

Finally, we did make it back to the Jeep, as the sun was about to set. This is the expression of an achieved mountain-climber.

Our trip to Iceland was amazing and even though we were only there for two days, I feel that we got the most we could have in the time that was provided to us. Unfortunately I did not get to see the famed Northern lights, but that just means that I have to go back to Iceland another time, which is a-okay with me.