Hello,
I feel like writing today. Not exactly, I feel like sharing pictures. In case anyone wonders, I did backpacking for 2 months in Europe last summer. Now I have the chance to share my journey. I took awesome pictures.
5/17/2016
We flew from Boston to Reykajavic which is the capital city of Iceland.
Tip 1: The exchange rate is 1 USD = 130 ISK
The first place that we visited is their famous church called Hallgrimskirkja due to its architectural style.
Fun Fact: Iceland is an inhabitant country, 90% of their population stays in the capital city. We camped during the whole trip with our own camping gear.
5/19/2017
Tip 3: We rented a car from the airport. Need international licence. All the cars are using manual drive!
Our first stop from Reykjavik is the Thingvellir National Park. The drive took about 40 minutes. This place is the plate tectonics that divide the North America and Europe continents.
Tip 4: If you have a GPS, buy the Europe chip so that you won't have to rely on internet if there's no connection.
After few hours spent exploring the national park, we drove to Geysir which is the active natural geysir that spouts water every few minutes.
It was fascinating as we can experienced the water sprouts a few meters in front of us.
Then we continue our journey to Gullfoss Waterfall. It was told that this waterfall is the most popular attraction in Iceland.
Geysir and Gullfoss are 10 minutes away, so you won't miss the chance to visit both!
5/20/2016
The next day, we drove to Seljalandfoss which took 1 hour and 30 minutes drive. We camped the night around the waterfall.
Then we continue our journey to see Eujafjallajokull which means the 'island mountain glacier'. It is a volcano that is entirely covered by an ice cap and the last time it erupted was in April 2010.
We also visited Skogafoss waterfall which is the famous waterfall from Shah Rukh Khan new movie. It was funny as we reached there, nobody was there and we had the place for ourselves. Once we were going back, people came from any side and started to crowd that place. We also did a lil bit hike here to view this waterfall from the top side. It was amazing!
Tip 5: Go to all these famous attractions early in the morning and enjoy the view all by yourself.
After few hours, we drove to the famous Wrecked DC-3 Plane which landed on Solheimasandur beach 40 years ago. This attraction is famous as it crashed badly, but all the passengers survived and have been there ever since. We have to walked 2 km from the parking lot to the airplane and we did not expect any long walk. But we went through it for the sake of Iceland. Imagine that we have to walk for 4 km in total just to see this crashed airplane. Fuhh
My favorite place in Iceland would be Dirholaey, which is a cliff 30 minutes driving from the airplane. The cliff is so amazing that all I can say is God is a wonderful creator.
Iceland is famous with its Black Sand Beach. It's so wonderful that I can experience a beach that is different from what I always see.
As you can see, there's a cave, the opposite side of the cave is this magnificent view. The rock was natural carved to hexagonal shape die to the lava and erosion from the wave.
5/21/2016
Skatafall was our next destination. We hiked to see this waterfall with black basalt column. This is biggest waterfall at this destination. There were a lot of small waterfalls and we hiked to experience the nature here.
The hiking was about 5.5 km and we can experience being in the peak of Iceland and enjoy the mountain views.
We travel to Jakursalon Lake, although it is summer in Iceland, the weather is still cold. We did not fully prepared for a cold weather, so we only bought our Fall jacket which was our biggest mistake. Went we reached Jakursalon Lake, we were in awe that the lake is still full of icebergs.
We drove to Dettifoss for almost 6 hours to experience the biggest power waterfall in Iceland.
5/22/2016
Our last destination before going back to Reykjavic was Godafoss waterfall. Godafoss means The Waterfalls of the Gods, and it is considered to be the most magnificent waterfalls in Iceland.
5/23/2016
We drove to Akureyri which is the second city in Iceland. This city is famous with their fish and seafood. At last, we managed to eat decent food after a week on camping ground and eat camping food. We spent the whole day in the city.
5/24/2016
We drove to Blue Lagoon which was the highlight of our trip. On our way, we stopped by the road to take picture here as the view was so nice and the rainbow there was perfect.
5/25/2016
We end our Iceland journey pampering ourselves in this natural hot spring.
The end. I hope that my journey can help any of you guys if you're planning to go to Iceland. This is only the first part of my summer travel, I have way more pictures to share. Just wait for it. :)