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| Around midnight, this is how a mountain at Seydisfjordur looked. |
Continuing another day in Hofn
It was a sheer luxury staying 2 nights in one place. It was a pleasure to get up in the morning and not worry about packing and moving on. The morning was overcast and the overnight rain had thankfully cleaned up the cars. One could laze around with a cup of tea in hand and iPad in front. We had no agenda for the day other than go back 80 km's in the direction of Skatafell for our Zodiac boat ride at the glacier lagoon. But that was at 5.30 in the evening. A full day was ahead of us and as we were not the types to cozy in into our quilts we decided to visit the town of Hofn which was just 6 km's ahead.
Hofn turned out to be a town of 2000 people. It is one of the rare places which has a harbour. Being surrounded by glaciers and being in the vicinity of mighty mountain Vatnajökull , it has a few glacial lakes. Fishing is predominant occupation in this area. It was a cold and windy morning and we could not find any place open which served the breakfast other than the lone supermarket's bakery.
The Viking Cafe
There was a tourist centre open and they showed us a few places on the map that we could visit.
One of them was a remote place which had something called the Viking Cafe. The cafe was shut when we reached there but place was pretty on the black sand sea with a fabulous view of the glacier. I understand that a farmer owns all the land and beyond a certain point you have to pay him to go to Viking Village and rest of the land. The next day as we moved towards east of Iceland, we realised this Viking cafe was on the way - just off the main highway.
Finding the Glacier
Glacier is not something that can be hidden. This spectacle of river of Ice flowing down the mountains for several miles is exciting for anyone who loves nature. We heard a lot of stories about Icelandic glaciers retreating and we actually saw some points from where to where the glaciers had retreated in last 4 decades. We were advised to book a super jeep ride on glacier. These formidable monster jeeps take you all over the glacier. But money was restricted and this activity was expensive so we went to find an approachable glacier. I think the one we found was called Vatnajökull or maybe it was part of this glacier called something else. We turned off the beaten path on a gravel road and meandered closer to that big ice river for several km's. There was no trace of humanity here. Finally we came to a place from where a narrow bouncy bridge took us to a lagoon and we were soon touching a glacier.
Anywhere in the world near a glacier you will find glacial sports activities, crowds, experience centre, glacial museum and a hefty fee when you reach so close to a glacier. Here we could have a private picnic on the glacier with no one around for at least 30 km's. And it was all without any entrance charges !
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| In the wilderness. Real wilderness. We had mountains, lakes, lagoons, suspension bridge and a glacier all to ourselves for several hours. |
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| Up and close a Glacier looks formidable. |
Jokulsarlon Lagoon - too good to miss
This lake is something you fall in love with at first sight. If you are driving from the side of Skatafell towards Hofn you see lovely glistening glaciers from far and then suddenly the landscape changes into something brown and undesirable. You see several sand dune type things but they hold no interest as you have got used to freshness and beauty. Suddenly you reach near this lagoon and you gasp seeing these huge icebergs in different shades of blue floating in the lake on the left side of the road. Then you look at the right side and huge expanse of Atlantic Ocean greets you with many Icebergs drifting away. Some had seals on them. Wow. Just wow.
This had been our experience yesterday while driving towards Hofn. Today we were coming back to take a ride on a speed boat in the lagoon in what is called a
'Zodiac boat tour.' This boat ride had been pre-booked ( http://icelagoon.is/zodiac-tours/) by us more than a month back. Sure enough , those who had not pre-booked were either going back disappointed or taking another ride in what is called
Amphibian boat tour. In Zodiac boat tour there were 10 of us in a speed boat which takes you very close to the Icebergs (and allows you to touch them) and takes you very close to the Glacier from which these icebergs were breaking off. Amphibian was a large boat with 40-50 people and did not look exciting.
This Glacier used to fall directly into the Atlantic Ocean but has since last few decades retreated several km's creating this deep lake. Zooming at high speed and maneuvering of speed boat between the icebergs was as exciting than anything else during this trip. The cold wind was biting but could not take the thrill away. We had been given these big waterproof outfits to wear and we could thankfully wear them over our jackets as it was around 10 deg C and very windy and cold. We saw seals jumping around ; we touched the icebergs; we saw one break ; we saw some that were as big as a ship; we broke part of one and tasted it also and then Kunaal and I wanted to take it back to apartment to put in our whisky ! It would have been fun having a drink with Ice which probably was a hundred years old.
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| All zipped up and ready |
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| Cold but fun |
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| Each Iceberg had a different colour and each Iceberg had different shades. It is all due to refraction, compression and loads of other reasons that these blue shades are attained. |
After this expedition we just rushed to the market to buy whatever we could for dinner. Only the shop at the petrol station was open so we picked up whatever we got. Tomorrow morning we would be moving on towards the North East towards the eastern Fjords.
Seydisfjordur : What a lovely town. And what a great drive.
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| A dreamy sleepy town next to the Fjords. The lake adds to the charm. |
Seydisfjordur turned out to be a dream town. It was a 3 hour dream drive from Hofn . We were now moving into less traveled territory. The intent was to stay somewhere near the ring road and do a car trip to the Eastern Fjords. At the time of booking hotel Aldan here I did not realise that we were literally on the Fjords. Just behind the mountains in above picture the Fjords start and you can touch the Atlantic ocean.
I call it a dream drive as we took a right turn from the ring road from near the famous town of Egilsstadir and then the climb started. We crossed the mountains and snow and waterfalls and were enveloped by clouds for quite a distance. It was a bit scary to drive but thrilling as the temperature dropped to 5 deg C at one point. Then we descended into a valley which looked divine. It even had a small golf course with several natural waterfalls. Pictures will tell the story. This is how our drive looked like :
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Landscapes kept changing and clouds kept playing. This was soon after crossing the tunnel near Hofn
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Some pretty places on the way having humans.
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You want to break the journey and start picnicing
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The climb started soon after Egilsstadir
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| As we climbed the mountains it became so beautiful. |
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| The mountains kept changing colors |
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| No one around for miles |
As soon as we checked in Kunaal announced that he would just relax here and not go anywhere at all till next morning. This idea at that moment appealed to me. So we chilled over some local brew some great fish. After lunch while we rested a bit, the children hired the bikes and went to explore the town. They were pretty amused to see the sparse population & hardly any shops in the entire town. They did count 10 or 12 waterfalls.
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| Local Beer in perfect setting |
I don't think anyone actually believed that I would let them rest for more than what was required. Soon we were off on a gravel road towards the Fjords. We hiked, sat around the river, admired the fjords and were back for some partying with newly made friends as the mountains turned golden.
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| This river will go into the sea just 100 m ahead. |
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| Had some interesting company for drinks in the evening |
Day 5 drive
Today we drove just a short distance from Hofn (between 3 & 4 below) to Egilsstadir (5 on map) and turned right to Seydisfjordur. Tomorrow we will come back to Egilsstadir and go North towards Akureyri ( 7 on map) via Myvatn area and not through Husavik as is on the map.
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