Iceland had been on my wife Karen’s and my wish list for years. This year was so busy with weddings, commercial work and everything else that we decided it was time to treat ourselves to our first proper holiday in around twenty years, and to see some very different scenery.
This was not a trip planned around photography, but I could not leave the camera at home, so I packed very minimal gear. Iceland lived up to every expectation and then some. The one thing that caught us out was the cost. One of our commercial customers had just been and warned us it was expensive, and she was right. Food and drink especially were pricey, so it was not a boozy break. We didn’t let that spoil things. It just meant being a bit more careful, and steering well clear of camera shops.
Iceland has the most diverse and fascinating landscape. Everywhere you look there is another view, and it really is a landscape photographer’s dream. At this time of year the weather was not the best, and with only about seven hours of daylight we had to pack a lot into each day.
Even with the weather against us, the Golden Circle trip was fascinating. It took in Thingvellir national park and Gullfoss waterfall and Geysir, a geothermal area impressive enough that the bad weather did nothing to dampen our enthusiasm.
The Blue Lagoon was a real delight and the place to unwind. I was surprised to learn the water is heated entirely by geothermal energy. Its composition has three active ingredients, silica, algae and minerals, which give it that bright blue colour. Sitting outside in the cold, wind and rain in that warm water was a relaxing and welcome treat.
On our last night we were lucky enough to catch the Northern Lights, even through some cloud. Seeing one of nature’s great wonders was a real joy, and it was one of the main reasons we booked the trip. We were lucky to see them at all. We missed the first night when our bus ran late, and the following nights were cancelled due to bad weather, so the last night of the holiday was our only chance. We were taken just out of Reykjavik into the lava fields where light pollution was at its lowest, and stood watching the northern sky for an hour, waiting for the clouds to part. Eventually they did and a shimmer of light appeared. It was fainter to the eye than I had expected, but the camera, with a long exposure, picked the lights up beautifully.
Reykjavik was a beautiful city, within walking distance of our hotel. We loved the restaurants, bars and coffee shops, especially Café Paris and The Laundromat Café. The locals were friendly and spoke such good English that I felt a little embarrassed to have learned so little Icelandic.
Here are just a few of the hundreds of photos I took in Iceland. As you can imagine, there are many more.
