This was a long day as we decided to try to push further out so that we'd have some more time in the back end near Reykjavik. People will probably say that we were too ambitious but I think we did manage to see a lot . The long hours of daylight and the willingness to drive helped. :)
After breakfast, we headed east on the Ring Road. There were no major sights along the way initially. The landscape was quite stark with mossy lava rocks and moonscape-like landscapes. There still were a lot of tourist drivers though it did start to thin out now that we were further from the capital. But with towns further and further apart you got the sense of how sparsely populated Iceland is out here.
Our first major stop was Fjaðrárgljúfur Canyon. It was a rift valley with a nice waterfall amidst it. In order to get there, we had to go on our first gravel road. At first we turned back, but after asking someone if it would be okay for our car, we went ahead. It turns out that Ring Road itself becomes gravelly later on. Had we known, we would have been okay with this road. Iceland has what are called F roads. These roads are only passable with a 4x4 -- not our hardy little Civic. The canyon was well worth it with precarious cliffside views of the waterfall. Someone even brought out a drone.
Lunch was at gas station(!). Yes, one would never do that in the US but we heard that the hot dogs at gas stations were amazing. Frankly (no pun intended), I wasn't impressed. Still, it was worth trying. Normal food is otherwise expensive in Iceland so if you come here be prepared to spend money. (Also, I was irked at my credit card company. They said that the PIN at self-service gas stations would be my zip code. Nope!)
After lunch, we continued along the Ring Road, stopping at scenic spots along the way. The next major stop was Skaftafell National Park. This park is right next to a glacier -- there were offers of guided tours and hikes on the glacier but we'll hopefully do that later in our trip. Instead, we hiked out to the Svartifoss Waterfall. That was another impressive waterfall. We came back along a ridge with some beautiful views of ice-capped mountains. The 45F weather was quite comfortable to hike in! Especially when it was steep...
Our last major sightseeing stop of the day was Jokulsarlon Lagoon. We knew we wanted to visit and stumbled upon the alternate entrance. So there was hoopla; just a simple sign. You climbed up to a ridge and then you suddenly were presented with a lagoon with blue icebergs floating in the middle. It was quite impressive. We hiked down to the edge of the water and actually picked up some pieces of ices that floated to the shore. You could take a boat out to the icebergs but we opted not to. Instead, we went out to the black sand beach across the way. Everything is so stark but beautiful in Iceland.
Since this was a long day we had stopped for dinner in Höfn. I had a local beer that was brewed from water from the icebergs. Dinner was a local sole and langoustine (lobster) tails. I'm trying to go as authentic and local as I can while I'm here!
We pulled into the hotel about 2 hours past Höfn at 11 o'clock at night. And of course it was bright out. I'll have to take a picture of Iceland at midnight one night to give you an idea of how bright it is. Of course we are right near the summer equinox...
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