By Li

Easter morning, the Easter bunny had come. Mummy came prepared Lindt bunnies and mini eggs but it seems the Easter bunny came with Icelandic filled eggs with a various sweets (jelly beans, liquorice sweets, chewy sweets, mini chocolate sweets and some fruit rock pieces). After all the excitement, we went down for breakfast and filled our tummies up for the journey ahead.

Along our road trip to Skagafoss, there were so many waterfalls en-route and the landscape varied along the way. We stopped off to the side of the road at one point and the moss growing at the sides was very thick and bouncy. It was like walking on the rubber bouncy mat.

Further along the car trip, we saw a few cars parked to one side and decided to investigate; there was a river with some impressive rapids. There was even a few guys fly fishing in it.

First stop was Fjaðrárgljúfur Canyon, the view was pretty awesome. It’s about 100m deep and about a 1km long. Parts of it was rather narrow and the sides was steep.

We finally stopped for some food, short stint off our second planned stop – Black Sand beach, it was a very impressive pit stop. Large shopping mall and a bistro for food. Spent more time in the store than eating. Tony was very taken with all the outdoor clothing by Ice Wear.

When we pulled up into the car park, I was confused, why were we here? Then I discovered that we were going to have lunch; I was relieved as my tummy was rumbling. We found a shop called ‘Ice Wear’ as soon as William and I saw these amazing hats I immediately wanted them! They were sheep hats! After, we had lunch I was quite sad because I had wanted them but we couldn’t get them because first we had to have lunch.

For lunch William and I shared a portion of fish and chips, Mummy had lamb soup and Daddy had a classic cheese burger. Once we had finished we went into a different shop (which didn’t have the sheep hats in). Eventually we did go to the shop which had sheep hats in. Guess what? We got them! William and I now have our very own sheep hats to wear.

By Rebecca

It turns out we were walking distance from another part of Black sand beach and we took a mooch along it where the children tried to avoid the enormous waves crashing along the beach.

We decided to still stop off at our next destination and there was a very impressive cave like structure with balsat columns like you get at the Giant Causeway. Some of the columns stuck out of the cave walls.

We went to black sand beach (the sand was black all over) there were these rocks ( they looked like the giants causeway) we climbed them and daddy took some photos of us, then climbed down and me and Rebecca went to the waves and when the waves came near us we ran back and again and again.

By William

We took a slight detour to see the lighthouse at the top of Black sand beach and the views were spectacular albeit some parts were a little dicey right at the edge of the cliffs. It was lovely having the sun beaming down in the early evening approx 7pm. By the time we wrapped up, it was getting late so we went straight on to our hotel.

Wow wow wow, the hotel turns out to be right next to the Skógafoss waterfall, pretty impressive!! We had dinner in the hotel restaurant with the view of the waterfall in the background. Tony didn’t think the food was as good as the last hotel we stayed in and they certainly didn’t cater for the children as well. However, we still had a nice meal – kids and Tony had BBQ ribs and fries. I decided to opt for a lovely lamb shank.

By Li

Earlier start than normal, down to breakfast for 8.30am. Breakfast wasn’t a bad selection, there was lovely fresh bread, bacon, eggs, beans, pickled herring, selection of ham and cheese. Kids even got to have hot chocolate with their breakfast.

Even though we got out on time, we followed the sat nav and ended up in the wrong place. Thankfully it wasn’t too much of a detour. After checking in for our glacier hike, we wasted a lot of time waiting for others who arrived late.

We got all geared up with harnesses, crampons and ice picks before setting off on a short bus ride to the foot of the glacier. It was a bit of a walk up to the glacier.

Once we got up, there was a lot more mincing waiting to get in to an ice cave. We finally got our turn and it was obvious where the cave entrance has collapsed, it was a bit of a tight squeeze getting in and no fun for tall people.

Inside the cave was small but really bizarre, natural light was coming in through the thick ice walls but inside the cave walls was melting as water built up on the floors. We squeezed through a very narrow corridor into another room. The ice was very blue inside.

After our close up encounters inside the cave, we embarked up the glacier. There was a loud crack where the glacier was shifting, a little scary but nothing to worry about. There is some serious deep crevices we had to walk around, apparently the glacier depth can be as much as 200m deep.

We also got to try drinking glacier water from a river coming down, strange way of drinking it – using a pick axe as a lever and doing a press up. Water tasted very cold and fresh though. Hi

For what we paid for, the ice cave extra was a complete rip off costing 45 minutes of lost time waiting around and £80. However, overall trip was an experience.

We got back to the hotel afterwards to dry off as it rained while we were out. We had some sandwiches and a cup a soup for lunch. Seeing as the weather is awful, we opted to stay out and chill out at the hotel. Not to mention less spending since the last 2 days have been quite extortionate which makes dinner at the Ritz look cheap.

Dinner was once again in the hotel, expectations were high given the quality of food last night and we weren’t disappointed

Li had chicken, William of course went for the lamb again as did I, and Rebecca opted for a chickpea curry.

So, back to my lamb, amazing just doesn’t do it justification; it’s shockingly good, the best I’ve ever had! Tender like you’d not believe, deliciously flavoursome and mind blowing taste. Top work to the chef!

By Tony

By Tony

Today is going to be a turning point, the weather has sorted itself out, breakfast was not too bad at all and the kids even got themselves ready without too much stress. Happy days!

We left the “country hotel”and headed into the Vatnajökull National Park. The park is one enormous great big glacier, covering around 10% of Iceland. At the southern most area there are a couple of big lagoons created by the meltwater and the glacier itself.

Our first stop was at one of the lagoons, we wandered along the shoreline that was littered with glacier ice; more floated in the lagoon and was beautifully blue.

After the walk we headed to “Diamond Beach”, so called due to the ice that is scattered along the shoreline contrasting against the black sand.

Another short car ride and we arrived at the next lagoon where we unexpectedly had some open wallet surgery to take a boat tour on the lagoon right up to the glacier. I did wonder how I was going to get the boat home that I had obviously purchased, but happily they informed me that I was misunderstood.

The boat tour was a few hours wait, so a quick instant noodle in the car park was followed by a cracking walk along the lagoon edge, although the we did seem to miss the intended circular route and had to practically jog back!

Arriving for our boat tour, we were kitted out with the necessary waterproofs, life vest, etc and made our way to the ribs. One great point was the lack of people, so it ended up only 7of us in our boat.

We had a charming beaded Icelandic chap called Yuri, he gave some really colour to the tour, providing history of the glacier and how things are changing with climate change.

The kids loved the boat ride and we were able to get really close to the glacier. Rebecca and William also got to hold some ice which the skipper pulled out of the lagoon, which was quite cool.

As we got closer to the glacier, the man stopped the boat and we started to hear a sound like wind chimes. Then, he picked out a piece of ice from the lake. We all got to hold it. I described it as ‘honeycomb’ it was so lovely, until William & I got to put it back but we didn’t see the ice that we dropped it on hence it smashed.

By Rebecca

We went on a big drive to a glacier and we went on a boat ride around the lake that surrounded the glacier. The man in charge off the boat told us that the black ice was just dirty ice.

Before that we went on a hike around the grounds.

By William

30 minutes down the road, our hotel was comfortable and although we are again split over multiple rooms at least we have a great view!

As we’ve found out dinner was expensive but excellent, great quality and the kids are really well looked after. In our hotel, half size potions for 50% of the cost; but, they are not half size, at least 70% of an adult. Top stuff. William had the most amazing lamb, I had pork Schnitzel, Li had pork tenderloin, and Rebecca had Arctic char again. Chocolate Brownie for dessert!

By Tony

Well that was quite a rubbish day! It started of so good with a really nice breakfast and Rebecca particularly enjoyed making her own pancakes.

Post breakfast we headed out with a feeling of excitement in the air; we’re off to see some Puffins in one of the biggest and best places to see them in Iceland

The risks were of course known, it’s right at the start of the season, only a week or two into it, but with the confidence of David fighting Goliath we devoured mile after mile of boring landscape

Puffins, it now appears, can’t read calendars very well so were still in the middle of the Pacific maybe; the key thing is, the harbour, the rocks, the nesting sites they return to each and every year, were Puffinless

We had sad and disappointed children and adults alike, and more significantly another 90 minutes drive back to exactly where we started. Still, at least there was a petrol station there to fill the car back up at the bargain price of £1.80/L. What a puffin waste of time!

Lunch on the other hand, in the same place as we dined yesterday, was once again excellent. Mexican burritos, tacos and spicy lamb was consumed with significant enthusiasm by all as we recounted the days exciting adventures

Back on the road, the weather decided to put an extra spin on the proceedings, turning pleasant views into near zero visibility as the road turned from tarmac to a gravel track with football size potholes, and shear cliffs on both sides. Lovely driving!

Not wishing to be left out, the torrential rain commenced; but this actually did provide some amazing waterfalls to watch cascading down the cliffs above us as we continued our journey along the coast

Our “Country Hotel” was slightly below expectations however, warm, dry and finally interconnecting rooms.

Dinner in Holf was excellent. A fantastically tender lamb steak for Li and I, with some Salt Cod for the kids

By Li

We packed up our gear and we were sad to leave our little home we had for the last few days. We headed on to our next destination Egilsstadir, en-route we stopped off Stuðlagil canyon after a couple hours drive. The view was quite spectacular and the view point was a large metal platform which made Li’s legs turn to jelly as it was so high up.

The canyon itself was very long but the key viewing area of rock was very strange, it reminded us of the giant causeway in Ireland; the column structures were of the same ilk. Although some were stacked like logs, some curved and some were dead straight upright. There was a waterfall but it was majority frozen, still there was some serious water flowing through in to the canyon.

After the canyon, we headed on to Rjukandi waterfall which was pretty amazing. It had 3 feeds coming down, the frozen water coming down made it quite superb to look at.

We finally arrived at our hotel and was very hungry, after all it was gone 3pm so we went on a hunt for some food. We found a cafe / bistro called Salt which had some amazing pizza. I even managed to get a glass of rose in for a grand price of £8.50, I won’t be having too many of those.

After checking in to our hotel, we didn’t fancy sitting in the room so went out on the hunt for another waterfall, this one was only 7 minutes drive away. We arrived at Fardagafoss, albeit we did drive pass the parking as it wasn’t clear. another excuse to wear our crampons, it was a half hour trek to the waterfall.

Sadly, due to the snow build up, we couldn’t climb behind the waterfall to explore the cave but it was a lovely trek and we also passed another waterfall called Gufufoss (Steam falls).

Back to the hotel and not feeling much for food, we decided to relax in the bar instead. Catch us tomorrow when we move on again.

By Tony

Today was destined to be a day of two halves, first a nice, albeit slightly strenuous walk to a couple of waterfalls, followed by a relaxing time in some hot spring baths.

The waterfalls, Selfoss, and it’s big brother, Dettifoss, were around an hour and half drive, and, unfortunately I had made a mistake in checking the road closures so we added an additional 20 minutes on to this as a result.

The car park, when we arrived, was a good size and Li was happy as there were toilets – little wins! We kitted up, including our first use of our new crampons and headed off. The crampons were excellent, although William’s were too big as expected so I had to fix with velco straps that I took with us specifically for this job. It worked! Stability perfect on the compact ice and snow, well worth the purchase from Amazon.

Selfoss, the smaller of the waterfalls was about 30 mins walk but certainly worth it, amazing splendour, and some great photos hopefully.

Next on the list was Dettifoss, reportedly the most powerful waterfall in Europe, but then a place in Germany also claims the same! Still, after the additional 40 minutes walking, we saw, it’s big either way

However, as we couldn’t get to the original, East side (of the river) as planned due to the road closures, we could only see about half the width. As a result, although bigger, it wasn’t anywhere near as impressive as far as we were concerned, but still photo worthy of course.

We went to a small waterfall. Then to the most powerful waterfall in Europe it was amazing!

After the waterfalls, we saw these coral like things, but they were grass with ice and snow on them.

There were iron bars to make sure that we do not fall into the river below. The iron bars had ice on and what I did was I picked the ice off and I got a ice tube and there were square holes in the railing on the floor and I dropped the ice tubes on the floor and squished them into the holes and I came out with a square ice cube!

We also needed crampons, they were bright orange but mummy’s and daddy’s were black and they had enormous spikes, but we just had little ones.

By William

Leaving the waterfalls, after a quick sandwich that Li had packed, we travelled the 90 minutes to the saltwater thermal baths in Húsavík.

GeoSea Thermal Baths were very different from The Blue Lagoon. GeoSea is right on the coast, and the baths are created by natural hot sea water rising from the bore holes drilled whilst the locals were trying to obtain hot water to heat their houses. It turned out to be too corrosive to the metal pipe work, and hence the baths were made instead by an enterprising local.

Designed as a number of infinity pools, each a different temperature the place was very relaxing and the water crystal clear unlike The Blue Lagoon’s milky water. The selection of different pools, and the view really made this a fabulous place to relax; which we did for a view hours and Li would have happily stayed another few if we didn’t have a long drive back!

A top day, but now we have to pack, say goodbye to our shed in the field as we’re on the move tomorrow.

By William

Today, first thing we went shopping in the morning. The town was about one hour drive. We went looking for some warm clothes, mummy brought a puffy jacket and Rebecca brought the same as mummy.

For lunch, Rebecca and I had a quesadilla each mummy and daddy had a taco each and we shared a Pepsi

After that we went to a bar, Rebecca and I had a chocolate chip cookie each (they were very big) mummy and daddy had a beer.

After we went back home (which took 1.hour) ,daddy and I finished our snowman, that Rebecca and I started the day before, we made it facing the door (so when we open the door we see the snowman). The snowman had 6 stone button’s and a smiley face and a nose.

By Rebecca

It was the start of the day, Daddy woke me up at 9:30am we sat down for breakfast and had herrings on toast, and William had mini chocolate Weetabix.

By about 10:30am we were out; ready for our day of adventures. Our first sight seeing was walking (I know that sounds really boring but we were walking to an exciting sight). I saw a sheet of what looked like glass over a vast area but I realised it was ice, covering a huge lake.

I really wanted to walk over it! I couldn’t though but I did get too later.

Another great thing was walking (again) but through a lava field (it wasn’t real lava though it was obsidian I did a whole bit about it in the first blog) and they formed spectacular formations! They were amazing.

My personal favourite was the mud fields. They were beyond stunning for 2 reasons. The first is because of the heat; ever sat round a campfire and warmed your hands up against the flames? Well, this was even better; if you put your hands against the rocks that the steam was coming out off, it literally felt like a radiator!

My second was the colours on the mud/clay; seen graffiti before? Those artists use spray paint and the mud/clay looked like it was spray painted (but obviously it wasn’t). I would describe it as the galaxy on the floor!

We arrived near the caves, we got our gear on and we set of to the caves. As we looked into the caves, we saw pitch black, as we went deeper we saw a pool of water. Daddy was trying to find the water surface. Then daddy put his foot where he thought the water was below then as he did it he found that it was much higher than he thought it was, so he got his boot wet.

He felt it was very warm so Rebecca,mummy,daddy and me dipped our hand in the water and we felt the warmth. Then we saw other people in the caves and we turned back to the water. Then we took a photo of the water and Mummy,Rebecca and me because Daddy was taking the photo. Daddy joined us in the photo. We went out the caves and we went back to the car and drove off

By William

We also climbed a volcano! This was the most energetic thing we did all day. Near the end of the massive climb I felt like my legs were going to fall off my body. In the end we all made it to the top (it was like a hurricane up there it was soooo windy)!

For dinner we had burgers then after we went into the hot tubs and William and I kept of jumping in and out of them. Today was probably the most interesting by far!

Come back soon for tomorrow’s adventure

By Tony

Today was destined to be dull, hours of driving and not much else to get us to the north of the island. We had a relaxing start, with a surprisingly good breakfast and then headed for the first destination en-route, Hvitserkur, which is an Icelandic version of Durdle Door.

We arrived at Hvitserkur and that was the first real experience of just how cold it was! Freezing! With a windchill that subtracted another 10 degrees or more. A very swift walk resulted in a couple of photos, a few nice comments and what felt like frostbite

Back on the road in our nice warm car we then had an impromptu meeting with one of Li’s colleagues just to say hello for 5 minutes as we were driving in opposite directions around Iceland. A quick, but tasty burger at a petrol station and we were off again, this time with a supermarket as the destination.

Dull. Expensive and dull! Like a Lidl’s in style but Fortnum and Mason in cost! still, we have to eat and the food quality was good. We also found some Ling, similar to Cod, and Arctic Char, similar to trout for dinner; which although was expensive, was equally delicious we were to find out.

One excellent and small diversion around 30 minutes from our accommodation was a waterfall called Godafoss. It’s reasonably famous, in Iceland, and you can see why given the close proximity to the road, easy access and two really nice waterfalls.

Arriving at our Airbnb place around 7pm, we were pleasantly surprised. Similar to a shed in the middle of a field, but, well equipped inside and most importantly clean and very warm.

Li cooked a lovely dinner, the fish, and we relaxed. Happy that even though we’d driven for around 6 hours, it seemed quite an easy day

By Rebecca

It was an early start to the day. We got up at 4:00am and we set of at about 5:00am. This was the first step on our 2 week adventure!

When we arrived at Heathrow, a few things went wrong. Firstly, we went through the barrier that we weren’t meant too. Fortunately, we finally found the the right passage, that was one problem solved. Unfortunately, the person who was meant to pick our car up was late; because he went to terminal 3 when we were at terminal 5. It was really annoying because as the man was late I didn’t get breakfast at the airport.

☹️☹️☹️

Finally, we were on the plane! Yay! I was happy with my odd breakfast that Mummy had made me; sushi. I started watching ‘Matilda’ but then Daddy said that I had to go to sleep. But I did get to finish the film when I woke up. As we were approaching the island, I saw some amazing scenery from the air. When we got off the plane I was taking my first steps in Iceland.

The car we (Daddy) had hired was a Toyota RAV4 (it is very big but I don’t like the smell of it). But the rest of it was very nice (except from the dents in it) our first destination was ‘The Blue Lagoon’.

I was soooooo excited I felt like I was about to burst (but I didn’t). Mummy, Daddy and William and I got these cool wrist bands William’s was yellow, mine was red and Mummy and Daddy’s were blue these were are passes into the experience of a life time!

We had to get changed, then we went down a slope into a cloudy, white/blue water (we called it milk); once you opened a door that was partly in the water and the top of it was out of the water it got even better. It was so weird because your body was warm due to the thermal vents in the water but your head was cold because you are in Iceland! It definitely a experience to remember.

There was a awesome cave thing about 10 feet away from the door. Inside of the tunnel like cave we got our first sighting of silica on rocks it was strange because the rocks had a band of white at the point where the water met the surface. They would look like mountains to ants but obviously nothing could survive in the water hence the name the vikings gave it which translated into poison lake.

One of my favourite things about the lagoon was a thing called ‘silica’ it was such a strange feeling when you put your feet on the bottom of the lagoon and felt all of this squidgy slime seep in between your toes. Also, we got the opportunity to have a lump of goo (which was silica) and spread it over your face (which when I put it like that doesn’t sound very appealing but I was really excited about it).

After that we (Daddy) drove about 3 hours to a hotel called Hotel Bifrost (with some funny symbols above some of the letters) when we arrived the man asked us when we would like dinner and then Daddy asked where the nearest town was turns out it was 39 km to the nearest town, so it was decided that we were going to have dinner in the hotel.

Daddy and William’s room was 416 and Mummy’s and my room was 417. When we saw the corridor Daddy described it as ‘a scene from when the Berlin Wall existed’ which I wasn’t very happy about because that was where we where going to sleep (no not in the corridor in the rooms) but at least the rooms were kind of modern. From My room the was quite a strange view, one house for some reason had obsidian (for if you didn’t know is volcanic rock also if you didn’t know that don’t worry because Daddy didn’t know either, not that helps) ; another roof was covered in grass Daddy being Daddy asked how they cut it (he is paranoid about his grass at home if you didn’t know) but I must admit i did think it was strange.

Soon we went down for dinner and I my jaw dropped when I saw the prices (okay maybe I am exaggerating a little bit) but after the discussion about the prices we finally made up our minds.

William chose pizza (which consisted of: cheese, pepperoni and green olives), Mummy chose confit duck, Daddy chose Icelandic lamb and I chose local salmon (which I know sounds very boring but it was very yummy).

After, we had finished William and I shared a chocolate mousse cake and I found it very funny when there was whipped cream and William put some in his mouth (not knowing what it was) and then looked like he was about to be sick luckily he wasn’t.

Today was a brilliant day but ‘The Blue Lagoon’ was defiantly the best thing I have done in Iceland so far (though I have only been here for 1 day so I doesn’t really count). I hope all of my other days will be just as fun.

Log on tomorrow for tomorrow’s.