So disappointed to wake
up to a clouded in Vestrahorn mountain again this morning. Oh well,
a reason to come back to Iceland another time.
The first half of our driving was along the ocean shoreline and fjords. Amazing scenic views.
From Vestrahorn we move on to Djupviogur
which we happen to hit with a cruise ship. This is quite a small
town, but we did stop and get a break from driving. They have what I
call an art exhibit of 34 granite eggs representing the birds of
Iceland. We also went to a pretty viewing point of the town. You
could tell there was a cruise ship in port as there were a couple of
entrepreneur kids that had painted rocks that whey were trying to
sell. Not much time needed to be spent in this small fishing
village, which we may have seen busy with the cruise ship in port.
We had planned on
visiting Fáskrúðsfjörður town next, but as we were getting
closer it really didn’t look that interesting of a town, so a pass for us.
The only real interesting thing we read about was it was the former
French town of Iceland, and there was a museum of the French
fishermen hospital museum, but we were enjoying the outdoors more
than stopping for this museum.
Next on the list was the
beautiful waterfall called Hengifoss, we are back to having to pay
for parking. It was not the best weather here, back into raingear.
It is Iceland's second highest water fall. On the way walking to
Hengifoss you pass by Litlanesfoss, a smaller waterfall and lots of
basalt formation along the way. After walking uphill about 30
minutes we hit a very slippery muddy section. It was no longer fun
any more. We asked a couple of people coming down if it was worth
going any further as it was so foggy/wet we weren’t sure how much
we would see. 2 girls asked us if we wanted to see her pictures,
well it was pictures of fog that she had went over the security ropes
to get. She said you could hear the falls, but you couldn’t see
them. That made up our mind. We crossed over a footbridge and
walked back to the car on the other side of the gorge which was still
very pretty despite not seeing Hengifoss. Another reason to go back
to Iceland.
Next off we head to
Borgarfjarðarhöfn where we will spend the night. We have been
watching the webcam of the puffins here for weeks and knew we were
going at the right time to see them. We arrived in Borgarfjarðarhöfn
and passed right by the campsite at 6PM and went to see the puffins
which were about 5KM from the campground. What a treat, but it was
so cold and windy. This was one day I really wished we had full winter
jackets. Hats, mitts and 4 layers of clothes with our wind/rain
jackets as the top layer were just not enough. A beautiful hill that
is set up for puffin watching. There is a path and steps on the hill
that allow you to be right at the puffin level. There is also a
blind set up which we would take a break in now and then to try to
get warm. The blind gave us great viewing points as well. The
puffins were coming back with their bills filled with fish, but they
dove basically right into their burrows on landing making it very
tricky to get pictures, not sure how successful Andre was at
capturing this.
Back to the campsite to
check in, one of our favourite campsites. Free coffee, nice kitchen
with a stovetop (though hard to figure out how to turn it on), lots
of utensils, and very very clean everywhere.
After dinner we decided
to go back to see the puffins again. So at 9PM we headed out, and
back at the camp at 10:30. If possible it was even colder and
windier. Earlier tonight there may have been 25 people visiting.
Tonight when we left there were 3 cars. You can go to visit at any
time you want, and it seemed like even more puffins were out when we
went later in the night. We did get stuck in the blind as the door nob would not release the latch. Luckily we were not the last people there and one man came to our rescue otherwise we may have had to spend the night there with the puffins.
It is a bit out of the way to get to this
part of Iceland, but it involves driving over an absolutely beautiful
mountain pass, one of our best drives, and of course the puffins at
the end made it even more special.
Day summary:
8:00AM leaving Campground
3 Sightseeing spots
6:30 at Campground
400 KMS of driving
12 KMS of walking
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| Almost all yield signs, even getting on to the busier ring road from side roads. Only saw a few stop signs in some towns, along with quite a few roundabouts thrown in for fun |
s
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| Saw many whooper swans today |
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| Most lighthouses are orange that we have seen do far |
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| Lots of scenic views along the ocean and fjords |
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| Lots of courage biking these roads as there are almost no shoulders. Also the weather can be a challenge, wind and rain. Add in vacationers driving campers that they have no experience driving. Crazy |
Our first stop in Djupviogur
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| The granite eggs |
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| A lonely puffin. Heard someone say there was a island with lots of them |
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| The main harbour |
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| A longhouse that is now a restaurant |
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| Mural in town |
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| At the lookout |
Driving along the fjords
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| Salmon ponds |
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| Traffic Jam |
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| Moving sheep from one side of the bridge to the other side |
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| Lunch spot with a view |
Now at Hengifoss
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| Where we decided to turn around |
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| The bridge that let you come back on the other side |
The mountain pass to get to
Borgarfjarðarhöfn
At the puffin viewing area
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| You can see the blind at the top of the hill |
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| Puffin with small fish |
