ICELAND TRIP

Hi readers,

as you can understand by reading the title, I will speak about my trip to Iceland about a week ago.

I know this isn't a travel blog, but I use it to share my life and the experiences that I lived, so, let's start.

Day 1 - 13th February 2024

On 13th February I went to Milan to leave Italy and flew to Frankfurt, Germany. I spent about an hour on the plane - I thought I should spend more time on the flight.

In Frankfurt, I had to wait for the flight which he would take us to Reykjavík, Iceland. While waiting, I bought a sandwich: it was terrible - maybe because I'm used to eating good Italian food.

Finally, I got on the plane - unfortunately, I wasn't near the window, but in the middle seat - so I could see what happened out of the plane, but not clearly.

When we flew over Iceland, after about four hours spent on the plane, people seated on the opposite side of the mine could see all the ground covered by ice. I stood up to see it and did it, but I did not take pictures of it or even take videos.

When I got off the plane, I immediately saw the snow on the streets and the wind came inside my nose, putting in unpolluted air.

I met my group's guide out of the airport. She was a young woman with red coloured hair and a lot of earrings - she seemed like a rocker woman, but very kind and friendly - she is Italian too.

We got on the bus, and she presented the driver of the bus, a big Icelandic man, Smàri, he was very kind too.

We went to Reykjavík, Iceland's capital, and we took a tour of the city centre - we saw a frozen lake where people walked on it. After that, we went to the hotel where we would spend that night.

After dinner in the port area with great fish and chips and an Icelandic beer, our guide, Ilaria, sent us a message saying that night we could have seen the northern lights. I was very excited about that - I'd seen a lot of pictures and I wished to see them with my eyes.

I wore the warmest clothes I had in the luggage and was hopeful after I got on the bus.

We arrived at a little park near a house, and we got off the bus. I walked some meters to get a little far from the others of the group - 'cause they had lights, and they could ruin my photos.

I put my tripod near a wire in the field where I was, and I started taking pictures of the stars. I had a problem with the focus mode, so I asked a tip to another photographer who was next to me. He told me to focus my camera on the moon, and after all the stars would be in focus. I did it, and after the issue disappeared.

I didn't see the northern lights, so after half an hour I asked the other photographer if he had seen something, and he told me that there were some lights but not very visible. Likewise, I started taking pictures with brighter values and I saw them. After twenty minutes of taking pictures, the lights came out, and I could see them without the camera. It wasn't like the photos I had seen, but it was very wonderful too.

Day 2 - 14th February 2024

After waking up in the Icelandic capital, we have breakfast - I eat for the first time an English breakfast!

We got on the bus and started our trip to the famous Golden Circle.

The first stop we made was where the Icelandic parliament was born, Thingvellir National Park. It was a big plant where the king spoke to the people. It was amazing, 'cause of the reflection of dawn sunlight on the water of the lakes.

We returned to the bus to move to the next stop: Geysir, the place named the geyser, holes where very hot water is shot in the air, creating water columns very high.

There were a lot of holes where the smoke came out, it was breathtaking - there was a not-good smell caused by the sulphur.

We spent our lunchtime in a visitor centre near the geyser: there were many people, but fortunately, I found a sit where I had my lunch with delicious meatballs.

Next stop, Gullfoss, the gold falls. It's one of the biggest falls in Iceland, but the best season to see it is during summer when there is less ice.

But, the ice made it very beautiful when I saw it. There was ice everywhere, so you could see some water falling, passing between huge pieces of ice. The contrast between the white of the snow and the light blue of the ice was incredible - during this trip, I saw this contrast lots of times, as you can imagine.

We finished our day in a hotel in the middle of nowhere. We have a very long house in the snow and, if the sky hadn't been so cloudy, that place was perfect for seeing the northern lights.

Day 3 - 15th February 2024

The third day was very full of places to visit, including one of my favourites for this trip.

Firstly, we visited Skógafoss, a waterfall where you could go to the top to see it from a high perspective.

Now we have one of my favourite places: Kvernufoss. A waterfall inside a cavern, and to see it you have to walk inside a canyon. It was unbelievable.

I also went behind it to see the fall from another perspective - it was very adventurous!

I took a picture when I was walking to the place behind the fall, below you can see it. It's one of my favourite photos. The funny thing is that I didn't want to take a picture, I missed the button to start recording with my camera.

The next stop of our tour was one of the most famous, and also most dangerous, beaches of Iceland: Reynisfjara, the black sand beach. The particular colour of this sand is caused by the volcanic nature of the sand: most of the Icelandic beaches were created by volcanic eruption, so they have black sand.
I also saw a skeleton of a cod's head. I was very surprised to see how big a codfish is.

We returned to the hotel, and, as the night before, we didn't see the northern lights, 'cause the sky was very cloudy.

Day 4 - 16th February 2024

On the fourth day of my trip, we visited the second place I liked most: Jokursalon, a glacial lagoon, most known as “Diamond Beach”. Our guide told us why that place is named like that: one day a tourist visited that place and saved in Google Maps that place as “Diamond Place”. He thought that the note's name was private, but it wasn't. So other people discovered that place and named it, as we know it.

Now you may be asking what do diamonds have to do with it? During summer numerous icebergs form in the lagoon, due to the hotter temperature than in the winter, and they go into the ocean. The waves push some pieces of icebergs to the beach, and they remain on it. The ice on the beach seems like a diamond, with different dimensions.

I didn't see a lot of icebergs, 'cause it was winter and the temperature was cold, but the lagoon was magnificent too! I also saw seals!

The glacial lagoon was the second, and also the last, place we visited on the fourth day of the trip: the first one was a big glacier, which was inside one of the oldest national parks in Iceland, and also the largest in Europe.

I walked for about twenty minutes - I arrived at the glacier first, because the other part of the group went to the toilette and the bar before the beginning of the trekking. It was very hot - for being in Iceland of course - I was walking without a jacket, hat, and gloves.
I didn't like so much the glacier because I've seen a lot in the Alps - when I was a child because now is very hard to see ice on the Italian mountains - and it wasn't so particular.

We spent the night in a very beautiful hotel: it was very modern, and it made a lot of contrast with the landscape. That hotel was behind a mountain, and it was a big black building, in the middle of a white landscape.

Before going to bed, I spent some time in the spa zone: I spent time in the sauna and the hot water pool in the garden - it was lovely for my body to see the contrast between cold air and hot water.

Day 5-6 -17th & 18th February 2024

I gonna talk about these two days together because we didn't so much.
We spent the fifth day coming back, with our bus, to the Icelandic capital, so I saw a lot of landscapes and nothing else.

Finally, on the last day of our trip, we prepared ourselves to come home: we made our luggage, we went to the airport, and we said goodbye to our guide and our driver.

This trip has ended, and I am bringing with me a very beautiful experience, with the wish of coming back to Iceland during summer.

I hope you enjoy the reading of this post!

P.S. I know this trip was one month ago, but I didn't have time to write it. Now I'm writing the February recap - I know, I'm late.