Today was our big East Iceland to South Iceland transit day, and we spent a significant portion of it on Route Once winding through foggy East fjords.
We woke up at the beautiful campground in picturesque Seyðisfjörður, made a quick pit stop at the local supermarket for breakfast, and then hit the road. This South-Eastern section of Route One is still relatively new, and portions of it are still just dirt roads. Also, although portions of it are straight, the majority of the road here winds up and down the fjords, giving an incredible view out to the ocean.
Sleepy fishing villages dot the coast, and we stopped at both Djúpivogur and Hofn for quick breaks. Hofn was especially nice, with a great information office too.
Our big stop of the day was at the Jokulsarlon Lagoon. This spectacular lagoon sits at the end of the Breidamerkurjokull glacier, and is filled with huge floating chunks of blue shimmering ice. The lagoon is spectacular, and we did a quick hike around it. At the end of the lagoon, the water from the melting glacier flows out under a bridge, and forms a short river until it gets to the coast. At the intersection of the glacial melt river and the ocean, huge waves are created, and the black sand beach is littered with blocks of ice ranging from car sized to ice cube size. The contrast of the white ice on the black sand with waves crashing in the background was especially beautiful.
Also notably, this lagoon was used in the James Bond film “Die Another Day” – the lagoon was specially frozen, and six Aston Martins were blown up on the ice.
After Jokulsarlon, we continued on to Skaftafell, where we had a quick dinner, and then took an evening hike with one of the park rangers.
Tonight we’re getting to sleep a bit early, in preparation for an early wake up and a day of hiking on the glaciers descending off of Hvannadalshnukur.
