Day 13 Akureyri, Iceland

Day 13 Akureyri, Iceland

 

Okay third time entering this information for my blog – let us hope I don’t lose it in cyberspace this time! Writing this as if it were July 3, 2023 and when did actually visit Akureyri, Iceland.

 

We booked an independent tour with Iceland Everywhere Tours (EIT).  It was a full day tour runningfrom 9 am till 5 pm.  Originally we were to depart at 5:30 pm today so the schedule would have been tight – but as NCL revised our itinerary we are missing Isafjordur as a port and staying in Akureyri until 4 am on July 4.  Isafjordur is a smaller port and they were trying to dredge the harbour to accommodate for larger ships like the Norwegian Prima.  This work was originally to be complete in October 2022 but has been delayed.  It may be done by the middle of July – but not soon enough for our cruise.

 

Our excursion was a tour on a mini-bus, a Mercedes Benz with 19 passenger seats.  Siggi, our driver, said they intentionally leave a couple of seats empty to move around.  I also think it gave some breathing room because these were TI-NY seats!  JG and J each chose a single seat so they had an acceptable amount of room, but P and I shared a double seat and there was lots of rubbing of shoulders!  The whole mini-bus seemed much narrower than a North American vehicle, to reflect the narrower size of roads in Iceland.

 

There were many mini-buses and a number of larger buses from the cruise ship that visited just about all of our destinations today.  With three cruise ships in port – there were many tours running.  Our tour was essentially to visit Godafoss and Myvatn.  Foss means waterfall in Iceland.  Godafoss was like a mini Niagara Falls.

 Our second stop was at Skutustaoagigar – it is an area of Myvatn Lake with a high concentration of pseudo craters.  Here it was particularly windy and 5 Celsius.  Good thing we are Canadians who know how to dress in layers as we were well prepared for this weather!  This is where we chose to eat lunch.  Each person had to buy their own lunch.  J had the best one – smoked trout on pumpernickel bread.  The pumpernickel bread was cooked in a geothermal hot spring for 24 hours.  It was delicious!

 

After this was my favourite stop – Hofdi Nature Park.  Hofdi had a small parking lot so the large size coaches couldn’t stop here and it was a quieter experience!

 We then visited Gonguleidir in Dimmuborgir – a lava field.  The rocks looked very much like trolls and the Icelandic people believe that there are 13 prankster trolls (Yule Lads) that are associated with Christmas.  J like this area best as it has amazing landscape architecture that feels like the badlands of Alberta, but in magma rather than in Sandstone.

 

Our last two stops were at geothermal hot springs.  JG and P liked the hot spring best where they climbed below ground to put their feet in hot springs.  The temperature was about 40 degrees Celsius and absolutely beautiful!

Our very last stop was at Namafjall Hverir – a high temperature geothermal area with fumaroles and mud pots that smelled strongly (stunk one might say) of sulphur).

 

We returned back to the port about 5:20 pm – just in time to race to our room, change clothes and go for dinner for our 5:30 pm reservation!  Dinner was its usual amazing service and food.  And three of us were all very tired – and went to bed at 9 pm.  One of us face timed his girlfriend and then went to bed!