It was never part of my plan to visit Iceland – not that I didn’t want to go, but it seemed too far out of the way and therefore too expensive so I didn’t even bother looking. This was before I got random invitation to head there for a week.

The invitation was from Barbora – a Slovakian living in London. I met her and Lukas in Kiev back in May. I figured I wouldn’t get another chance to go to Iceland for a while, so I booked my flights and met them at Keflavik Airport in Iceland. I had only met Barbora (Babs/Baska/Barbie) and Lukas (Keko) before, and travelling with us were Lubo, Joe and Mima.

First stop – Reykjavik to check into our apartments and start exploring. It was great travelling with the group – they had pre-organised everything and I got to sit back and relax for a while.

The next morning we picked up our hire car – a huge 7 seater SUV and headed East from Reykjavik along the south coast of Iceland. Our destination was a glacier at the point where it broke off and joined the ocean. And as they say – getting there is half the adventure. I quickly got to know everyone over a few bottles of homemade fruit brandy that we consumed along the way and we had plenty of fun both in the car and stopping off along the way at various waterfalls and pit-stops.

We finally reached Jökulsárlón in the late afternoon and went exploring around the huge lake of icebergs that has formed between the glacier and the ocean. Little did I know but the boys had a bit of a dare going and had decided to jump in the (literally) freezing cold water for a bit of a stunt. Lucky for you they filmed it.

It took us a while to find our accommodation for the night – a youth hostel basically in the middle of nowhere off the highway. We had the place to ourself – this huge ‘youth camp’ that could easily have accommodated 60 or more people. Needless to say there was drinking games involved before the night was over.

It was a pre-dawn rise the next morning and most of use slept off the night before while Lubo took the wheel again on the way to our destination. We arrived just before lunchtime – a shop and restaurant in the middle of nowhere. After lunch we took a short walk down the way to see what the fuss was about. A rather large waterfall – Gullfoss awaited. The weather was crap – so we returned to the shelter of the restaurant.

Our actual destination for the morning was a glacier nearby. We were picked up in a huge (and I mean huge) 4wd and driven over to the glacier. What awaited was a fleet of snowmobiles. We had originally planned to go dog-sledding, but due to the lack of snow we opted for snowmobiling instead. Driving these was much like a jetski, except slightly more dangerous thanks to large fissures in the glacier. This meant that we needed to stick to a pre-defined path which made the excursion far less adventurous that I would have hoped. Still – is isn’t very often you get to go snowmobiling on a Icelandic glacier!

On our way back to Reykjavik we passed Geysir – as in the original geyser. It doesn’t erupt very often, but the other geyser ‘Strokkur’ only 50 meters away erupts every 5 minutes.

That evening when arrived back in Reykjavik to check into our apartment. The week that we had decided to go to Iceland just happened to coincide with a huge music festival being held in Reykjavik called Airwaves. Unfortunately by the time I found out about it the tickets were all sold out – but it wasn’t all bad. Because of the influx of tourists, our accommodation had overbooked and we were moved to a brand new luxury apartment closer to the centre of town!

We had booked the car for one more day, and decided to make the most of it by driving south to see some of the coast line of Iceland. Our first stop was Raykjanes – the meeting point of Europe and America. It is the place where the two tectonic plates meet. There is a bridge built over this small canyon which represents crossing between the two continents.

We met a nice couple who told us how to get to the south-west most point of the island. We followed their directions to find huge cliffs overlooking the Atlantic ocean.

We drove back the long way, exploring the back roads back to Reykjavik – and almost getting stuck in the black sand of a lake when Lubo decided he wanted to do doughnuts on the beach.

Our last stop for the day was ‘The Pearl’ lookout above the city. Really a small hill above Reykjavik airport, but you can get a view of the city and there was a nice sunset.

The next two days were pretty relaxing. A combination of the gloomy weather, hangovers and sheer laziness gave us an excuse to live up life in our apartment. That was until the evenings. We were in Reykjavik on Friday and Saturday nights, in the middle of a huge music festival, in one of the nightlife capitals of Europe. Both nights started with pre-drinks at the apartment. Drinks in clubs are expensive in Iceland (about $10 a drink) so the locals usually pre-game at home and head to the clubs after midnight. Both nights we ended up at a club called b5 and had a great time there.

On the crew’s last day in Iceland we headed out to the Blue Lagoon for a relaxing dip. The man-made lagoon is milky blue in colour and unlike anything I’ve seen before. It is quite the experience – first the naked shower down in the change rooms, then the ice cold air before jumping in an opaque warm bath with a few hundred other people. The lagoon is huge, and has a waterfall, massage clinic, sauna, bar etc. Yes – you can drink in the lagoon – and also cover your face in some form of silicon mud. Was a pretty good day actually – but would have been better if the sun had come out to play.

The others were to leave in the morning, and figured that they could party until they had to leave for the airport at 3am. That plan went out the window when we discovered that the little party town of Reykjavik is completely dead on a Sunday night. We had a fantastic dinner at a tapas restaurant and found a pub to have a drink in, but everything closed at midnight. I was flying out a day later and was staying at a hostel in downtown so I had a bed to stay in, but unfortunately the others did not – so they amused themselves until their flight in the morning.

So I had one day to explore Reykjavik on my own, and behold the sun came out for the first time in a week. I spent the next few hours wandering the streets of Reykjavik . The wind picked up and I retreated into a quaint little cafe/art space for a pot of tea to warm me up.It seems I wasn’t the only cold one – I saw a group of joggers run past in ski jackets.

My very last Iceland experience before flying out in the morning was a lucky break. Thanks to the beautiful clear sky, there was now the possibility of seeing Aurora Borealis – the Northern Lights. I booked myself on a bus tour to head out of the city with my camera and tripod in tow. It wasn’t long before we had pulled over to the side of the road and could see a mystical green glow in the sky. Back behind us was the faint glow of lights from Reykjavik and the ‘Imagine Peace’ tower of light, but in front was a strip of green illuminating the sky just above the horizon. The lights dance around and the photos I took do not begin to do it justice. I just feel sorry for the others who flew out that morning and didn’t get a chance to see them.

So that was my random, crazy Iceland adventure. A spur of the moment booking with people I had know for mere hours – but I had a great time getting to know them (and trying to learn Slovakian in Iceland – I’m sure not many people have tried that). Iceland is a gorgeous country full of friendly people and good nightlife – definitely on the list of places I want to return to!

This post is tagged Iceland, Reykjavik