By far one of the most popular things that people do when visiting Iceland is to drive what is known as the “golden circle.” It’s not gold (at least this time of year…) and only really a circle due to creative navigation, however it contains 3 noteworthy attractions: Geysir, Gullfoss waterfall, and Thingvellir National Park.

Our first stop on our tour was Thingvellir National Park.

The foundation of the Icelandic parliament is said to be the founding of the nation of Iceland, and the first parliamentary proceedings in the summer of 930 laid the ground for a common cultural heritage and national identity

Next up is Geysir.  Yes, this is where all other geysers get their name! (Move over, Yellowstone!) However, the “real” Geysir has stopped erupting for the time being and attention is now focused on another smaller geyser called Strokkur.  It erupts multiple times an hour, making it an interesting and exciting destination.

So the weather was pretty terrible this day.  Blowing sleet sideways at like 40 mph doesn’t make for a very enjoyable sightseeing experience… so we piled back into our car (with the heater blowing full blast!) and continued on to the next stop on our whirlwind (literally…) golden circle tour: Gullfoss.  Gullfoss waterfall occurs where the Hvita river plunges spectacularly straight down into a giant crevice.  It was very impressive, but hard to take pictures of without coating my lens in mist.

Pretty spectacular and interesting day! However our 4 hours of daylight ran out, so we took the side roads back to Reykjavik for a hot shower to warm up and a tasty hot dog for dinner.