Things to do in Iceland - Part 2

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Posted 2016-01-08 by London Schweppes ⇒ follow

Saturday morning, again began with a sumptuous breakfast at this time, a Paris cafe- I think it was actually called that. Wanting to again hit as many of the best spots as we could, we drove straight to Dyrholaey, a southern coastal village, where you can see and walk on the amazing Black Beach. It's totally black - the large rocks, the medium sized pebbles, the smaller pebbles and the black sand. Spectacular- just watch out for those waves; they tend to jump out at you unexpectedly.

We drove further along the coast to Vik, another town and stopped for lunch here. There's not much in Vik except some hikes if you're interested and a viking tomb. We skipped this because we wanted to make sure we had time for other things, including the glacier (Myrdasjokull). It's a smaller glacier along the south coast, the big one being Vatnajokull. This covers 8% of Iceland and is the largest glacier in Europe where you can see ice caves, melting icebergs on the black beach and get into adventurous snowmobiling and glacier hiking. However it is about 6 hours drive from the capital, so not this time. Myrdasjokull also had the interactive snow activities mentioned above.

Along the south coast are also .. you guessed it - more waterfalls - Skogafoss and Seljalandfoss (where you can walk behind the waterfall) which are very scenic. Watch out for the spray.

Icelandic horses. These are beautiful and amazing creatures and you can ride one! There are many farms and riding companies including Solthestar and Eldhestar, along the south coast toward Reykjavik. Pre-booking is advantageous but we managed to squeeze in to a riding lesson on the same day. It is recommended to call in advance though.

Feeling extremely fulfilled and happy, we headed for our last attraction in Iceland- the Blue Lagoon. Amidst 800 year old lava fields, and geothermal active geysers, there is the blue lagoon- a milky blue pool of sea water from underground at an average temperature of 38 degrees celsius; it is a must do. Even more amazing at 11 pm at night, when the sun hasn't set in summer in this part of the world, relax and rejuvenate in the spa, get a massage or simply rub on some of that silica face mask.