Iceland in Winter

This week in Iceland has been full of adventures starting out with some tours to see the main sights, slowly shifting into meeting up with other people from the group and getting to know them, and literally ending with a bang for New Years. Icelanders really love their fireworks!

One of the tours was the Golden Circle, a classic daytrip including three of Iceland’s main sights, Þingvellir national park, the geyser Geysir, and the waterfall Gullfoss.

Geysir is one of the largest geysers of the world and also the origin of the word geyser. It doesn’t erupt that often though, but there’s another geyser in the area that erupts pretty much every five minutes. Talk about tourist friendly!

Gullfoss is a huge waterfall not too far away from Geysir. Even though it’s not the highest nor the widest waterfall in Iceland it’s by far the most popular one, and it sure was an amazing view!

The day ended with a spa-visit including steam-rooms built straight on top of a geothermal area. Perfect way to warm up after a day outside.

As more group members started arriving it was time to get to know some of the people I’ll be spending the next six months with. This covered sightseeing, eating weird things (including rotten shark), meeting up to plan for the first leg of the trip, having a few drinks together, and eventually a New Years party. We also got to see the truck for the first time!

New Years Eve was spent drinking beer, walking around pretty much half of Reykjavik to find a bonfire, and then watching the fireworks by the cathedral at midnight. We wouldn’t really have had to wait til midnight though for the fireworks. There have been fireworks going off at least a few times a day the whole week, and several times every hour during New Years Eve. Icelanders really do love their fireworks!

Thanks Reykjavik for a great week! Tomorrow it’s time to stuff my backpack into the truck and get started for real!