Icelandic Adventures: Once In A Lifetime Trip To The Land Of Gods, Trolls And Elves

My dream came true when we bought the tickets to Iceland. I was very excited about the journey and hoping that apart from admiring the beauties of the Icelandic landscape we would be lucky to see the aurora borealis.

We drove around the island in a bit more than a week . It was only enough to get a little taste of this exciting world. The island was full of surprises. The sight was sometimes bare, then suddenly we were passing mountains reaching the clouds. I felt that this country can be never explored, as it always have some excitement for us.

We experienced all possible weather conditions during our journey. Apart from dry weather we ran into snow storm and we almost drifted down from the road. The wind was usually extreme strong on the shores. It blew the black sand into our faces that we could hardly walk.

After a week of overcast, it started getting clearer during our last day. The sight changed completely. The snow melt and the light colored the landscape. Fortunately we were driving around Snæfellsnes Peninsula that time. This was the best part of the trip.

As it was getting late in the day I checked the northern light forecast more often on my phone. It predicted 3 Kp value (it is about the middle of possible values). I could only hoped that we could catch a glimpse, or even take a photo of it. Fingers were crossed. We arrived to the spot with a view of Kirjufell around blue hour and I set my tripod up. I was expecting long hours before we could see the lights, but surprisingly after a few minutes the mysterious green light started emerging above the horizon. The aurora borealis got more intense as it got darker. It was such a huge experience, simply out-of-this-world. I felt really lucky! It last all night long. So we got in the car and drove around the surroundings to capture different landscape with the northern lights. I was taking photos of the aurora borealis from 9pm till 3:30am that night.

Enjoy!:)

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#1 Brúarfoss – ‘Bridge Falls’

Iceland’s bluest waterfall.

Icelandic Adventures: Once In A Lifetime Trip To The Land Of Gods, Trolls And Elves

#2 White Walker Ice Cave

Visiting Iceland without an ice cave tour is just half of the trip.

Icelandic Adventures: Once In A Lifetime Trip To The Land Of Gods, Trolls And Elves

#3 Admiring The Ice Cave

Icelandic Adventures: Once In A Lifetime Trip To The Land Of Gods, Trolls And Elves

#4 Kirkjufell With Northen Lights

Icelandic Adventures: Once In A Lifetime Trip To The Land Of Gods, Trolls And Elves

#5 Strokkur Geyser

The geyser erupts in every ~10 mins, its usual height is 15-20m.

Icelandic Adventures: Once In A Lifetime Trip To The Land Of Gods, Trolls And Elves

#6 Unique View Of Seljalandsfoss

Icelandic Adventures: Once In A Lifetime Trip To The Land Of Gods, Trolls And Elves

#7 Vestrahorn, At The Foot Of Giants

The breath stopping view of Vestrahorn.

Icelandic Adventures: Once In A Lifetime Trip To The Land Of Gods, Trolls And Elves

#8 Reflextions

Icelandic Adventures: Once In A Lifetime Trip To The Land Of Gods, Trolls And Elves

#9 Búðakirkja With Its Unique Backlight

That night in Iceland will be a permanent memory for sure! I just couldn’t stop driving around in the countryside.

Icelandic Adventures: Once In A Lifetime Trip To The Land Of Gods, Trolls And Elves

#10 The Sky Is Not The Limit

Icelandic Adventures: Once In A Lifetime Trip To The Land Of Gods, Trolls And Elves

#11 Brúarfoss

Smoothing the water with long exposure.

Icelandic Adventures: Once In A Lifetime Trip To The Land Of Gods, Trolls And Elves

#12 Incredible Cliffs Of Fjaðrárgljúfur

This canyon is up to 100 m deep and about 2 kilometers long, with the Fjaðrá river flowing through it.

Icelandic Adventures: Once In A Lifetime Trip To The Land Of Gods, Trolls And Elves

#13 The Moment, Right Before I Got Soaked

The waves are quite unpredictable on this beach. So ‘luckily’ I managed to capture the wave, which covered me 0.1 sec later.:) It was worth it without a question.

Icelandic Adventures: Once In A Lifetime Trip To The Land Of Gods, Trolls And Elves

#14 Hverir

Hverir is one of the most out-of-this-world sites on the island. It is a place where you feel connected to the power of the planet.

Icelandic Adventures: Once In A Lifetime Trip To The Land Of Gods, Trolls And Elves

#15 Green Flames – What An Incredible Night!

The northern light was so intense, that it reached the opposite side of the sky as well. I was just standing there next to the tripod with remote shutter release in my hand and my breath stopped from the sight.

Icelandic Adventures: Once In A Lifetime Trip To The Land Of Gods, Trolls And Elves

#16 Vision

Incredible intensity of aurora borealis.

Icelandic Adventures: Once In A Lifetime Trip To The Land Of Gods, Trolls And Elves

#17 The View From The Þingvellir National Park

Icelandic Adventures: Once In A Lifetime Trip To The Land Of Gods, Trolls And Elves

#18 Þingvellir National Park

Why is it so special? Well, this is the place where North American and European continental plates collide.

Icelandic Adventures: Once In A Lifetime Trip To The Land Of Gods, Trolls And Elves

#19 Gullfoss – ‘Golden Falls’

Icelandic Adventures: Once In A Lifetime Trip To The Land Of Gods, Trolls And Elves

#20 Skogafoss From Above

Don’t you think that it is an elf on the left?;)

Icelandic Adventures: Once In A Lifetime Trip To The Land Of Gods, Trolls And Elves

#21 Small Church In The Countryside

If you like small, cute churches, then you will love Iceland, as it has thousands of it.

Icelandic Adventures: Once In A Lifetime Trip To The Land Of Gods, Trolls And Elves

#22 View Of The Famous Reynisfjara Black Sand Beach

Reynisfjara Beach is the most famous black sanded beach in Iceland and one of the most well-known in the whole world. This is a place of wild and dramatic beauty where the roaring waves of the Atlantic Ocean power ashore with tremendous force.

Icelandic Adventures: Once In A Lifetime Trip To The Land Of Gods, Trolls And Elves

#23 Vik I Myrdal Church

The Vik church was the only place that survived the 1918 flood.

Icelandic Adventures: Once In A Lifetime Trip To The Land Of Gods, Trolls And Elves

#24 The Harsh Side Of Vestrahorn

This mountain is sometimes called as ‘Batman Mountain’. I think I know the reason for it.

Icelandic Adventures: Once In A Lifetime Trip To The Land Of Gods, Trolls And Elves

#25 Diamond Beach In Jökulsárlón Glacier Lagoon

Ice bergs, breaking off the Kvíárjökull Glacier, drift out to sea where they are polished by the waves before floating back to the black sands of Breiðamerkursandur.

Icelandic Adventures: Once In A Lifetime Trip To The Land Of Gods, Trolls And Elves

#26 Road To The Light

Icelandic Adventures: Once In A Lifetime Trip To The Land Of Gods, Trolls And Elves

#27 The Sky Above Grundarfjörður

This is one of my favorite picture I managed to capture with aurora borealis. I never thought, that light pollution can add that much to a photo. The lights of Grundarfjörður lit the clouds above the village. On the right you can also see the Kirkjufell.

Icelandic Adventures: Once In A Lifetime Trip To The Land Of Gods, Trolls And Elves

#28 Skogafoss With A Rainbow

The waterfall has a drop of 60 m and a width of 25 m.

Icelandic Adventures: Once In A Lifetime Trip To The Land Of Gods, Trolls And Elves

#29 On The Road

During our 8 day trip in Iceland I drove around 2900km on these meandering roads.

Icelandic Adventures: Once In A Lifetime Trip To The Land Of Gods, Trolls And Elves

#30 At The Foot Of Kirkjufell

The majestic Kirkjufell is probably the most iconic mountain in Iceland. After a whole day drive it was great to arrive there.

Icelandic Adventures: Once In A Lifetime Trip To The Land Of Gods, Trolls And Elves

#31 Kirkjufell Sunset

Can you tell, that this photo was taken only one day after the previous one?

Icelandic Adventures: Once In A Lifetime Trip To The Land Of Gods, Trolls And Elves

#32 Gatklettur – Arch Rock

Icelandic Adventures: Once In A Lifetime Trip To The Land Of Gods, Trolls And Elves

#33 …and Finally, Aurora Borealis Over Kirkjufell

After one whole week of overcast, we had incredible luck of clear sky, with a really intense aurora borealis.

Icelandic Adventures: Once In A Lifetime Trip To The Land Of Gods, Trolls And Elves

#34 Interesting Cloud Formation

Icelandic Adventures: Once In A Lifetime Trip To The Land Of Gods, Trolls And Elves

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