I recently had the privedge to spend a week in Iceland. It was one of the most incredible trips of my life. The country is incredible with some of the most amazing natural beauty I have ever seen. And the best part is that there is almost no one there. While tourism has been growing in Iceland it is still realatively small comparted to other popular tourist destinations.
On my trip I made a point to take my nice camera and take pictures that tried to capture the beauty of the place. Here is a small photo tour of our trip. To really appreicate the photos you should visit a popular photo site for the full size versions of the pictures.
There were so many incredible waterfalls and canyons that it was hard to keep track of them all. Many of them didn't even have a pull off or a sign for them. Here is a photo of one taken near sunset.
Icelandic horse were incredible beautful. Icelandic horses are long-lived and hardy. In their native country they have few diseases; Icelandic law prevents horses from being imported into the country and exported animals are not allowed to return.
On the third night we were there the skies cleared enough for us to see the Northern Lights. This has been on my wish list since I was a kid and they were incredible to witness.
My wife and I are both into scuba diving but normally in much warmer conditions. But given the opertunity to dive in between two continental plates was too much of an experience to resist. Yeah, it was cold but so worth it.
The waterfalls were breathtaking. Many of them were simply small pull offs on the road and you would walk right up to them. The mist from the waterfalls would freeze on the rocks and create incredible winter scenes.
At times the landscape was so breathtaking that you could forget you were even on earth. When I posted this photo on Facebook, a friend put it best. It looks like you have traveled to Middle Earth. It felt like that. (There is geocache at the base of the falls that is seen in the distance.)
The coast of Iceland is something to behold. The full fury of the Atlantic crashes into the coast line. Here is a photo of a black rock beach taken during a storm. The ocean was angry.
We were pleasantly surprised that Iceland does not get insanely cold. It was around freezing the whole time were were there. It was neat since it would rain and then the rain would freeze creating these breathtaking scenes.
We took one of the most incredible hikes of my life on this trip. We hiked up to a waterfall in Skaftafell National Park. We started the hike in a snow storm with the biggest snowflakes I had ever seen.
As we reach the top where the overlook of the waterfall was the snow cleared and we were presented with a view that was compeletely dream like.
Here is closer photo of Svartifoss.
The weather can change very quickly in Iceland. When the clouds would clear the sky was something to behold.
Here is a shot of a glacier lake where parts of the glacier has broken off and was floating in the lake.
Eventually the pieces of ice would make it out to see and would then be thrown around by the incoming surf.
Our final adventural was into an under glacial river that created these ice caves. The sun light shining through the ice gave the whole cave a blue colors that seemed impossible to be natural.
I hope you have enjoyed my little photo tour of Iceland.
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