Day 1 - 2.8. Prague-Berlin-Reykjavik

Ivo arrived first directly from Warsaw after few hours of last emails and conf calls I had pleasure to show him a local pub in our village and introduce Kofola drink. Then last shopping to buy necessary  food and equipment for our trip. Jirka arrived at 2 p.m., after a quick check with Lufthansa we had to slightly repack our backpacks in order to reach maximum weight of 23kg each. Biggest issue was food. At 3 p.m. we finally left my house, Czech and German highways were without any surprises so we reached Berlin Tegel airport shortly before 7 p.m.

Ready to go, Tegel Berlin

After baggage drop off we took steaks and biers in Red Baron restaurant. Almost 4 hour flight was really exhausting, curry wurst served as dinner also didn’t help to survive in a full airplane. Nevertheless we touched the ground in Keflavik at 0:30 a.m. After arrival we had to summon our car rent company ATAK, nobody was waiting for us. 15 minutes after call a driver finally arrived and took us to their office. It took 1 minute drive and costs 20 EUR – perhaps most expensive taxi ever. That’s service called car pick up and drop off at the airport (20 EUR each way). Obviously this was just first example how Iceland will be expensive. Anyway after another 20 minutes of paper work we were quite sure that we are first customers served by this guy, he didn’t explain anything, only asked for sign off and then finally brought the car, no explanation, no word. At least we got, what was promissed, quite a new car. Happy that we have the car we jumped into our Grand Vitara and headed to Reykjavik. Around 2 p.m. we parked in front of our Radisson 1919. Quick showers and quickly to bed.

Night drive to Reykjavik

Reading this blog please understand:

1. Each day is logged with number and date
2. At bottom of each day you can find how many kilometres we drove, detailed maps with summary you can find here
3. Some days includes videos, rest videos you can find here
4. At the end I added few articles summarizing trip and experience

Drive 55km, road 41.

Day 2 - 3.8. Golden circle

After refreshing 6 hour sleep we took descent breakfast in Radisson. Next we had to go to famous and everywhere listed discount supermarket Bonus (pink pig in logo), where all the tourists buy staff (its the cheapest one).

Bonus supermarket

Radisson SAS 1919

First day we had a single goal – to see golden triangle and find accommodation in inland. First stop was Thingvellir – the oldest parliament in the world. Whole area was very well preserved, we took very nice walk around, there were many things to see and as it was our first stop we wanted to enjoy Icelandic nature.

Thingvellir place

Next stop was Geysir and its thermal neighbourhood. Unfortunately Geysir is not any more active (due to blocked hole) so main attraction is Geysirs brother Strokkur. He injects water every 6 minutes to 15-30 meters. I cannot imagine Geysir and his 80 meters in past. Each water and steam dose was quite effective and you have big chance to get wet here (or steamed). We visited also small volcano museum there, much more money we spent for lunch here, for IKEA style lunch we spent 9000 ISK, which means 60 EUR. Yep, Iceland is expensive country.

Strokkur

Strokkur

Geysir doesnt work anymore

Last stop – Gullfoss giant waterfall. First waterfall we visited, very well accessible and again overcrowded by tourists.

Gulfoss

Gulfoss and view into second cascade 

That’s main issue of Golden circle, its close from Reykjavik, so you meet there all tourists. Mandatory program was done, now it was time to go to our accommodation destination and leave after few kilometers Road 1. Then we understood why Google calculates for 60 kilometers on grave path almost 2 hours. All F roads are very tough, covered by stones and gravels, it’s almost impossible to travel faster than 60km/h, mostly even less.

F road behind us

F road and infront of us

Wasteland around F road

Change wheel is not that funny here

Vibration and shakes which car has to take are very intensive. Normal (2 wheel drive) cars are not allowed to access F roads, and it’s clear why, not speaking about wading. During our first day we saw what F road can do with your car, we saw and helped with one tire defect (try to exchange on your own big wheel on JeepJ) and saw one more issue with car axis. First day we also faced our first micro wading, but for us it was first sign of adventure, so we really enjoyed it. Finally at 8 p.m. we reached Hveravellir camp. And let me say that this was without questions the worst accommodation we had in Iceland. Thehut we had was old, stinky, the kitchen was even worst and almost no space for anything. 1 hour later arrived 20 Italians and situation was even spicier. Not speaking that for the whole camp and the hut there is only one men toilet and a shower. Anyway we though this is normal in Iceland (but it’s not) and accept everything as interesting change against previous night in 5 star Radisson.

Hveravellir hut where we spent our night, pool is on the left side

The only benefit of this place is a thermal pool, just behind the hut. But you have to get there, what is little bit complicated when the camp is full of people and of course everybody wants to be in. Ivo nominated himself to Chef role and prepared quite windy dinner – Heinz beans with sausages and lens soup. Around 10 p.m. we also dived into pool, its was relaxing, water temperature is managed by two tubes – hot one and cold one, so it’s up to you if you want to boil yourself or cool down. We faced one more funny issue, one of Italians somehow liked us more than his pals and he chased us during our whole stay. There was no place to hide or escape. So greetings to one-hand barman from Rome. Last but not least let’s mention snoring competition among Ivo and one old guy in the hut. Ivo won.

Our chef Ivo and the soup

Local thermal pool with Ivo and Jirka

Driving 210km, roads 36, 37, 35 and F35

Day 9 - 10.8. Fight with Hekla and Landmannalaugar

We started the day with fresh eggs breakfast.

Fresh eggs

After some time on the road we finally found a way to the top of  Hekla. I think we can say that day wasn’t really a good day to reach Hekla. The weather was normal at the bottom of the mountain (even rainbow) but with each meter up the situation was getting different. After some time it was clear that under current circumstances we cannot continue by car to parking in the middle. We couldn’t see anything.

Road to Hekla, shortly we had to stop, we couldnt see where we go

Really nice weather

Jirka and I left  the car (and Ivo) somewhere around 800 meters above sea level and tried to walk up to the hill. They made only 200 altitude meters and had to come back, totally wet. Not even with almost all clothes on us we couldn’t resist Icelandic weather. We faced very strong wind and snowing. We had to say goodbye to Hekla and gave up. Maybe next time. The next stop was Landmannalaugar, one of the most famous spots in Iceland. On the way we stopped at Ljotipollur to see the beautiful blue lake in red hill (colored by iron).

Ljotipollur lake

Ljotipollur lake

When you reach Landmannalaugar camp you have to make decision. You can leave a car on a dedicated parking slot or you can go directly to the camp but you have to wade challenging rivers. There was no question for us we decided to go. Iit was funny like everybody looked at us immediately  whether we could make it. We made it through (and later also back). We were little bit behind schedule so we had time only for a few hour trek in neighbourhood to see colorful mountains here and of course huge lava field above the camp.

Landmannalaugar hut, permanently full by groups

Mountains behind the camp

Active area around Landmannalagar

Colourfull mountains

and green ones

We were lucky again the weather was perfect and we saw blue sky for few hours. But it changed quickly on the way to our last stop in Iceland – to Eldgja. Under heavy wind we took only snack here and continued back to Road 1.

Inside Eldgja

View to the Eldgja from the road

Leaving Eldgja

Shortly we were reached by rain and later also by fog. Let me say that nothing changed regarding weather for next two days.

Nice way to Reykjavik

same way in 20 minutes

We used all our good luck. At 8 p.m. we came back to our start and end point – Radisson 1919. Our rooms were ready and even bigger ones then before, but we had different issue the next day (on Saturday). Reykjavik hosted Gay pride and our hotel laying directly in the center was affected by this so we had to park little bit far away (not very good while it was heavy raining). Anyway at the end we managed to get our staff into the rooms and at around 9 p.m. we left the hotel to take some good dinner. Our selection wasn’t good we believed the guide and chose gourmet restaurant Einar Ben.

Einar Ben

Small portions, high prices and the most terrible service. It was a big disappointment. On the other hand we had dinner quite cheap, because they  made some mistake in calculation, no objections about that. As dinner left us little bit hungry we aimed for more to close bar Dubliner for some Guinness beer. After Guinness we felt all the kilometers we made in last 10 days and decided to save some energy also for our last day in Iceland.

Driving 380km, road 26, Landmannaleid road, F208, road 1