After a flight day and a glimpse of Icelandic weather and winds from the airport to Reykjavik the day before, we woke up at 4AM to haul our luggage back in the car and made our way to the busiest day in our itinerary.

First in the day itinerary is found in Iceland’s Golden Cirle, the Strokkur Geyser. We stayed for about 30 minutes tops and got to witness three geyser eruptions—they were amazing! But it really smelled of rotten eggs in the area, and there were signs of the water temperature posted on the ground (80-100 degrees Celsius) to keep off people from getting near it.

Next was the first Icelandic falls we’ve ever had the chance to meet—the mighty and roaring Gullfoss. The winds were blowing so hard when we exited our cars and the wooden pathways were covered with thin, slippery ice. Put them together and we got ourselves automatically skating even when we just wanted to stand up. There was slippery ice everywhere so we had to be careful especially on the rocks nearest the first level of the falls.

It was utterly insane. It was the most beautiful falls I’ve ever seen. And the background for it just made it more beautiful—the sun shining, the grass golden, and a sky that was so blue. And it was just the first falls.

We’ve prioritized four falls in this trip, and I’d put Gullfoss on top. It was the biggest and the grandest among them, and it will forever be first for me.

We then drove our way out of the Golden Circle to further Southern Iceland. We stopped for about an hour in a gas station to fill our car up and eat lunch. This is where we ate our first very expensive Icelandic fast food lunch, and it was okay.

And then we met Skogafoss. To me, among the four falls, I think it is the hippest. I know what you’re thinking, “Hippest?” To me it’s like meeting a very cool person—effortlessly artsy, stylish but not a snob. It’s a very friendly falls! It even welcomed us with not just one, but TWO COMPLETE RAINBOWS and it was just the greatest welcome. See, it’s a really good friend.

It was at 4PM when we started our steady trek to the Solheimasandur Plane Wreck. We’ve read blogs saying one can walk to the place for about 30-40 minutes, but for us people with short legs, it took us about 1.5 hours each way—true story.

There were many people on the wreck and you just can’t take a picture of it empty. There were a couple of people who really made the effort to bring big dresses and wear them in the cold and I applaud them. (I wouldn’t do it though.)

The sun was setting when finally were near the parking lot. It was around 6PM. We made our way to Vik to settle in our Airbnb and eat dinner before we hunt for the auroras.

And what do you know, not five minutes when we left the town of Vik, the auroras appeared and we lost our wits out.

We were driving and our friend from the passenger side was like, “Hey, what are these white things? Are these clouds?” And a couple of minutes after… “GUYS! THOSE ARE NOT CLOUDS! THOSE ARE THE AURORAS!!!” And we were SO LOUD in the car and outside the car setting our gear up afterwards. We were at the side of a very dark main road together with some people and a woman, I think a local, said that it’s very dangerous and that we should get out of there. We took her advice and found a safer side by an inner road and we took all the time in the world taking photos of the magnificent play of lights before us.

That’s just Iceland Day 1.

*****