All these people with waterfalls in their backyard!
This farm (and region) experienced major hardship when the nearby volcano was active recently. They stay put though because their families have been there for generations and generations.
You can see a picture of the eruption here_
Icelandic horses are quite special (some of these photos aren't the clearest, taken from our moving tour van!). They keep the race so pure, they told us if one is taken off the island, it isn't allowed back.
The landscape was so contrasting. Here, the farms are in between the foothills of mountains (and volcanoes) and the ocean.
Reynisfjara
This is a black sand beach!
Epic jumps, I must say.
From here, you can draw a line to Antarctica without ever touching land!
If I remember correctly, this island (if it's the right one) is referred to as Westman island because the original Nordic settlers brought Irish slaves with them, called "west men," two of whom killed their captor and fled to that island. They were killed by the brother of the man they killed, a man often called the first settler of Iceland, Ingólfur Arnarson. Apparently there were monks living there before him, though.
One thing about Iceland is that the food is very expensive. Since we were at an Airbnb with a wonderful kitchen (see Boricua's post), we mostly did groceries (still really expensive), but here we tried some typical Icelandic food.
Boricua and I are converts to this type of bread. I used to not be into rye bread (what I tried in the states seems so different than this), but we had a similar open-faced dish in Denmark with this type of bread and we really love it! That is some kind of pickled fish that I really wasn't expecting to like because I usually do not enjoy pickles or sauerkraut or other similar foods. It was so good though.
The name for the bread is similar that it was in Denmark, with that "rug" at the beginning. Someone was telling us that Icelandic is the Nordic language that can get you closest to the original works of Norse mythology, as it has evolved less than in Denmark, Norway and Sweden.
A famous and interesting geological formation of basalt sea stacks, called Reynisdrangar.
After that gorgeous view, we went to a glacier called Solheimajökull.
This is a classic face of hers. ;)
Then, another incredibly beautiful waterfall. Skógafoss.
All of these incredibly breathtaking bodies of water made my river heart burst.
