We were up early around 7:30, got ready, and headed down to eat some hotel breakfast buffet. This time we were one of the first people down there. Mwahaha, take that Hilton Nordica!
Around 8:30 or so we were picked up for our Golden Circle tour by Go Travel Iceland.
We drove for a couple of minutes and then stopped in this weird little town. I'm not sure why we stopped here. TKO and I figured the tour company must have had a deal with the wool shop to bring in tourists. The "town" was about 1 block and was deserted. There was a wood shop, a little pub, and this giant ear hanging on the wall.
After about 20 minutes we headed back into the van and stopped at some gorgeous lookout points.
We took a walk through the historic site, Þingvellir, where we could see the mid-atlantic ridge (Eurasian plate on one side and North American plate on the other). Þingvellir is also where Parliament was established. You can still see the remains which was pretty cool.
Our next stop was Iceland's most famous waterfall: Gullfoss. It was really beautiful, and once again pictures don't do it justice. At one point we were looking at the waterfall from the highest point and everything around us was totally white. It felt like TKO and I were completely isolated -- so crazy!
Who is that loser posing like she's on the red carpet??After a little while we walked over to a nearby restaurant/cafeteria to warm up and eat some lunch. I ordered some all-you-can eat lamb stew and had two huge bowl fulls. It was so good! And now I want lamb for dinner...
When lunch was over we headed back into the van to make our way to the Haukadalur Valley to see "The Great Geysir." We didn't see Geysir erupt and I wasn't too upset about it. The tour guide told us if the Geysir erupts while we're nearby we have about 30 seconds to run as fast as we can before boiling water falls onto us. No thanks!
A few interesting facts about Geysir:
- the English word Geyser derives from Geysir, so all of the geysers in the world are actually named after Iceland's Geysir.
- Geysir's eruption height is actually taller than that of Old Faithful in Yellowstone National Park. For some reason I was really surprised by this!
We spent some time walking through the valley. I even got to dip my hand into this non-active pool! It was warm and felt kinda slimy. Can you sense the "eek" on my face?
There was one geyser that erupted every few minutes. Even though it became somewhat expected I was startled every time. It was no Geysir but the eruption was still pretty tall! Note the people standing next to it:
After an hour or so we headed into a gift shop for a few minutes then boarded the van once again. We made a quick stop to play with some horses on the side of the road. Icelandic horses are short, stocky and have long hair. They are known for being super docile and these horses definitely lived up to the description. I was obsessed with this white one!! Look at its white eyelashes...so pretty!
I tear up a little bit whenever I see the picture below. We had a real bond.
Next stop was a "secret" waterfall known as Faxi. Our guide said it was pretty unknown because it's off the beaten path. I am choosing to believe him on that one and think we saw something pretty special :)
Next, another natural phenomenon: a gigantic implosion crater called Kerið. This thing was SO big but you can't tell in the picture. In the warmer months when the water is not frozen they actually host concerts here and the singers play on a barge in the middle of the lake. So cool!
That was the last stop on our tour and we soon headed back to the hotel. It was a long day but we definitely wanted to make the most of our last night in Iceland so we quickly got ready and headed into the city. We stopped first at Cafe Paris, a cute little casual bar. We ordered some beer and a cheese, prosciutto and olive plate. We were really hungry at the time but didn't know we were in for a big, awesome meal.
I had read about the Fish Market on TripAdvisor before we left and really wanted to hit it up. We decided to go for dinner and got there around 9:30. The place was packed! The host apologized to us and said the only place he could sit us was at the sushi bar overlooking the kitchen. Ummm, yes please! TKO and I are both huge foodies so this was awesome. The view looked into the entire kitchen, not just the sushi area, so we got to see all the behind the scenes action. I felt so weird taking pictures of them cooking but I couldn't help myself.
While looking over the menu we were brought out an amuse bouche of salmon (I think) tar tar on a crispy cracker. Yum.
They also brought out a loaf of bread with some chipotle-mayo-tasting sauce on the side.
We decided to get two appetizers to split: the crab legs,
and the langoustine salad.
I could have easily taken on the crab legs by myself because I'm a crab leg monster. These were so good and were cooked and presented in such an interesting way. I wasn't crazy for the langoustine -- it might have been my least favorite part of the meal.
For our entrees TKO ordered the salted cod, which he loved.
I ordered the lamb and owned that plate. The lamb was cooked two ways, which is hard to see in the picture. I couldn't stop talking about how much I loved it!!
For dessert we went with this deconstructed cheesecake on the recommendation of the chef. It was tasty but definitely not what I was expecting.
After dinner we toyed with the idea of going out but decided to head back to the hotel instead. Iceland supposedly has a pretty crazy nightlife but neither of us was feeling the house music.Will be back for the last Iceland update!
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