Reykjavik
And surrounding areas
June 25, 2026
Today we are heading to Iceland, and that will take most of our day. The taxi ride to London Gatwick Airport showed us a great deal more of London and took a bit over one and a half hours. Yes, there is a train to Gatwick (which is undoubtedly faster), but due to the heat and the amount of luggage we had with us, the taxi was the preferred choice for this trip. The flight to Reykjavik (Keflavik, or KEF, Airport) took just over three hours. Immigration was very quick and easy, even with the new EES system in place. We then walked out into the blustery wind to pick up our rental car.
Here is a map of our flight route, 1,205 miles with a change of one time zone (7 hours ahead of our California home).
We drove forty-five minutes or so to the capital and checked in to our apartment/hotel.
Along the drive, we were impressed by the endless fields of lupine in bloom and the sun peaking around clouds. Tonight we walked to the first of three good dinners we had in Reykjavik.
June 26, 2026
We went to bed on Thursday in the daylight, and the sun eventually set at two minutes after midnight! The sunrise this morning was at 2:56 am! It never really got fully dark in the night. It doesn’t look like we will see any beautiful sunsets or sunrises on this trip.
Early Friday morning, we walked to a local bakery and picked up traditional Icelandic pastries (see link) for breakfast to eat back in our hotel/apartment.
This is a map of the places we will visit in and around the capital.
We then walked just under one mile towards the old harbor area, west of the city center. The temperature was in the high 40’s (F) and the wind was blowing somewhat, making it a very bracing walk. This morning we are going to attend two Icelandic shows for tourists.
The first is called the Lava Show. The show is a one hour long introduction to Icelandic volcanoes, including the history of some enormous eruptions over the past thirteen hundred years since Europeans came to the island. After the introduction video, lava heated to 1,100C/2,000F was poured down a chute into the room, and the temperature in the room immediately shot up!
The presenter caused the lava to bubble up by adding ice and explained the different stages lava goes through as it cools. Eventually, the top surface of the lava turned shiny black, but we could still see red hot areas on the bottom side of the lava stream. The show was fascinating. Here are a photo and a short video.
When it was over, we walked five minutes to another exhibition called Fly Over Iceland. This attraction started with two separate video presentations about the history of the Icelandic people and the geologic history of the island.
After these presentations, the participants climbed into seats for the ride over Iceland. We had to wear seat belts, because the seats move to give a sensation of flying. The video, a bit less than 10 minutes long, featured many different scenes of the island shot in all four seasons. The aerial footage showed us places we surely will not be able to visit on our car tour.
After this, we walked back to the city’s bustling center, and had lunch in a food hall. To reach it we walked through a beautiful square housing two Icelandic hot dog stands
Reykjavik street scenes.
We spent the early part of the afternoon shopping and exploring some of the central business district. After completing our errands, we drove to the famous Hallgrímskirkja, a Lutheran Church in the heart of the city. It is a national shrine and a memorial to Iceland’s most influential poet (Hallgrímur Pétursson). The story of Pétursson was interesting, here is a quote: “In Copenhagen he met his wife, Guöriöur Símonardóttir. She was one of the Westman Islanders who were kidnapped by pirates in 1627 and taken to Algeria, some of whom were subsequently ransomed by the King of Denmark. Hallgrímur was appointed to refresh their memories of the Christian faith, after their long stay among Muslims.”
The church was built after a design competition held in 1929, but it was not started until 1945, with the choir consecrated in 1948. However, the construction was not fully completed until 1986. The church has an austere interior and a seventy-three meter high tower offering a 360 degree view from the top. As we ascended the tower, the largest bell in the carillon rang very loudly near us (it rings every quarter hour).
Two views of the church exterior, left and below, left. Also two views from the tower. In the bottom one, the Rainbow Street is visible.
After enjoying the view from the top, we made one more stop in the city center to admire the historic parliament building and its surrounding square. Then we returned to our hotel to relax before our walk down Rainbow Street on our way to dinner.
Parliament above, and a nice square below with hot dog stand and mural.
Rainbow Street.
June 27, 2026
We had breakfast in our apartment with the left-over pastries from yesterday and then set out on what was forecast to be a mostly rainy day.
We decided to see one site on the so–called Golden Circle tourist route today rather than try to squeeze them in all into a single exhausting day tomorrow. We drove about forty-five minutes to the headquarters for the Þingvellir National Park. The park was founded in 1930 as a national shrine for all Islanders. In 2004, it was designated a UNESCO World Heritage Site. The site is historic because it is the location during which the Icelandic Law Council dispensed the laws for several centuries, and in 1949 was where the newly independent Iceland adopted its constitution.
The park contains Almannagjá Gorge that defines the eastern edge of the North American tectonic plate.
Four photos from our walk through Almannagjá Gorge, which was lined with purple and yellow flowers.
The park also hosts Iceland’s largest lake and Öxarárfoss, a nice waterfall. We took a walk through to gorge to the waterfall, a total of 2.7 miles round trip, which took just over an hour.
We had light rain through more than half of the walk, but at least the chilly wind wasn’t blowing. The walk was lined with wildflowers, but not the lupine we had seen on the drive to the park.
Öxarárfoss, our first of many waterfalls in Iceland.
After our walk and warming up with coffee at the Visitors’ Center, we drove about ten minutes to Harafnagjá Observation Deck, which provides a good view over the lake and the rift valley, and has some bright green moss on the rocks. Photo below.
This map shows the places we visited on the Golden Circle today as well as those we will visit tomorrow.
This photo was taken on our drive back to the capital and shows lupines and other flowers covering the landscape.
We then drove back to the capital and stopped for lunch before continuing to the Perlan Museum. This scientific museum features three shows that we enjoyed. The first was a two part volcanic presentation that started with a movie of the 2021 eruption from a volcano very close to Reykjavik, allowing residents to see shooting lava from their homes.
The next part of this show was a fantastic 3D video voyage showing lava on its journey from deep in the Earth until it explodes through the volcanic cone. It is hard to describe, but was amazing and realistic. Here’s a photo giving an idea.
Next, we visited an ice cave, the only indoor one in the world. It was very cold inside, so we elected not to sit in the big ice chair. The final show took place in the planetarium and showed videos of aurora borealis and explained the scientific basis as well as historic and cultural beliefs about auroras.
After completing the shows, we toured the remaining scientific exhibits in the museum and learned that Iceland was connected to both Europe and Greenland until about six million years ago.
On our way back to the hotel, we decided to try putting gasoline into the car, even though we didn’t really need it yet. Icelandic gas stations are unstaffed and complicated and, we had been cautioned about how difficult it could be to fuel up. It turned out, this was really much ado about nothing. We used three different gas station chains on the trip (as well as Costco) and succeeded each time, even with our US no-PIN credit cards.
This is our last night in the capital before we head out on a counter-clockwise ring road drive over the next eleven days.
This is a nice tomato dish we had for dinner tonight. We were really surprised at the good tomatoes we ate in Iceland. More about that tomorrow.
