The Land of Ice and Fire (but mostly just ice) - part III

Day two of our vacation brought us to the Westman Islands, an archipelago off the southwest coast that is home to a little over 4,000 residents.

Iceland is roughly the size of Ohio. Ohio has 12m inhabitants. Iceland, 320K.

While waiting for our ferry, we explored one of Iceland's famous black sand beaches.

Flappy Derek

The classic Captain Jack Sparrow pose

On the ferry ride we caught a glimpse of the house on Elliðaey island, which is also sometimes referred to as the loneliest house in the world. We actually had no idea that the island was part of the Westman archipelago so it was a real neat, hey-would-you-look-at-that, just-look-at-it moments.

As the ferry pulled in closer to the main island, Heimaey, the views got better and better. It felt like Scotland and Mars made an island baby and plopped it in the middle of the Atlantic ocean.

First order of business: find one of them famous hotdogs that people here are so nuts about.

The verdict: very good. They add lamb meat for extra yumminess and the topping choices include two kinds of mustard, ketchup, and two kinds of onion - raw and crispy. All of it was delicious and terribly convenient. And at $5 apiece, inexpensive by Icelandic standards. 10/10 would scarf down again.

Bellies full, we turned our attention to learning more about the Westman islands, which came to international attention in 1973 when one of its volcanos, Eldfell, erupted without much warning. (Sidebar: Eldfell means "Mountain of Fire" in Icelandic. That's like naming a waterfall "Water falling down a ledge") Everyone on the island had to be evacuated to the mainland and much of the town was destroyed following the eruption. According to Wikipedia, the lava flow from the eruption was threatening to destroy the island's harbour, which provided the island's main source of income as a fishing hub. So the Icelandic pumped 6.8 billion gallons of sea water to cool down the lava and slow its path of destruction.

We rented bikes and checked out some of the houses that were destroyed by the eruption and preserved in their original state. It sounded like a cool idea in theory but it was actually rather depressing to see these ruined homes and to imagine what they would have been like before the eruption.

After that we biked toward the coast of the island to see some puffins. Heimaey was a joy to bike around on - the roads were well paved, there were very few cars, and there were enough hills to keep things interesting (and my back sweaty).

One of my favorite areas where we stopped was at Herjolf's Valley, where we explored a replica of an old Icelandic home.

Hobbitses

The inside reminded me of Crastor's Keep from GoT

We reached the coast just a few short minutes later (the island of Heimaey is only around 5 square miles), admired the view and scanned the skies for puffins.

We ended our day on the islands with a good old hike up the valley. There was no trailhead or anything, just a small, steep meandering pathway that led us to increasingly breathtaking views of the island. Ad-hoc hikes with zero expectations are always the best.

Ravenous, we returned the bikes and headed to downtown (a little strip of restaurants and stores) for a meal. We found a cafe that was absolutely excellent. I didn't take pictures of my chicken burger because I was too preoccupied with consuming it as fast as humanly possible. Then we boarded our return ferry where I think all of us fell asleep in about five minutes' time.

Our evening began with a journey to yet another epic waterfall. Along the way, we passed by many smaller waterfalls. They were inferior only in comparison to the huge and incredible ones elsewhere in this country; I would have stopped for and taken a zillion pictures of the smallest ones if we were anywhere else in the world.

Skogafoss - flawless.

I woke up like this

Too good not to share

We ended the evening with a visit to an unmarked natural hot spring which required quite the trek to get to. It was dark and absolutely freezing by the time we found it. Slipping into the warm water felt amazing and we had it pretty much all to ourselves. We stayed for an hour or so, admiring the stars above and taking turns sitting on the "throne" where the hottest water was gushing from. I don't have any pictures from the experience but it was one of the best things we did in Iceland, and a stellar way to finish an amazing day in this otherworldly place.