Mountains and more mountains

For our second place to stay we traveled far north. Far north. When we started on our way to the place we were staying, we thought that it was going to be easy roads, paved, not many hills, and beautiful land to look at out the window. The land was beautiful, but the roads were gravel, every now and then there was a stretch of paved road. They started out paved and then it became gravel, with mountains and more mountains!

The mountains started out where we had to go up and up then come back down the other side, just like I expect a normal mountain road to be. But then some of the mountains became steep and windy. One of the mountains that we went up had a 16% grade. That made me feel a little nervous because there were no guardrails on the side that dropped straight down to the fjord below.

The speed limit on a gravel road is 80km/h if the road is not marked. The road is very narrow and so it is kind of scary to pass a car on the roads that the one side is mountain and the other you fall down into water. (Note from mom: most of these roads were 1 1/2 lanes) The locals drive around 80km on these hills and sharp curves. The curves have no guardrails; and on the side of the road where it falls straight down, they do not have guardrails either. So we are thankful when we see the few guardrails they have here in Iceland!

The road is very narrow and so it is kind of scary to pass a car on the roads that the one side is mountain and the other you fall down into water. Did I already mention that? Scary! But the sights are beautiful!! On the top of the mountains there will be big ponds of water, because the snow from last winter has not yet all melted. My brothers and sister and I got to touch the ice/snow, it was cold. :)

Also on top of the mountain there are rocks covered in moss-like stuff and snow in some places. Iceland has telephone wires going over the mountains. ; ( I don't like that because it disturbs the natural look. They are starting to bury the wires now. The only thing that lives up there in the Summer and early Fall is sheep. Nothing lives up on top of the mountains in the Winter and Spring. I would really like to climb a mountain!

Today (Sept. 18th) in the afternoon mom took us to see the two most popular things to see in Iceland, the Geysir and Gullfoss waterfall. At the Geysir the hot water is evaporating and the sulpher smell is very strong , I did not like it. The geyser was fun to watch go shooting up. The geyser erupts every 8-10 mins. some times sooner. If it does erupt before 8 mins. the geyser is small. The water is hot, because it is a hot spring. The temp. of the water is between 80-100 degrees Celsius. That's hot!

[To best enjoy the video, click the full screen button in the lower right.]

At the Geysir there are holes in the ground filled with hot springs. They are so cool! The water looks like a very bright blue then it gets darker as the hole get deeper. There were ropes around where you were not allowed to walk. (Note from mom: this is somewhat unusual in Iceland. Usually you are at the mercy of your own stupidity or common sense) They also have signs that say not to throw coins into the pools of water, and people do anyway.

Next stop was the waterfall. Gullfoss. The fall was beautiful!!!! It is the biggest water fall I have seen so far in Iceland. The water was not completely clear and rushing very fast! It was not one big fall, it was many falls all together.

At the falls there was a rainbow, and at one point there was a double rainbow.