Iceland 2023 Travel Vlog (40+ places to see along the Golden Circle & Ring Road)

hey everyone welcome back to my channel in today's video we're diving into the enchanting world of Iceland a place where glaciers waterfalls and volcanoes set the stage for our dance moves my sister has made this breathtaking country her home for over a year now and will be showing us over 40 places to see in Iceland let's jump right in and see what Iceland has to offer we use Reykjavik the capital of Iceland as our home base for the first two days the first place we went to on the day we landed was the sky Lagoon you can reserve your spot for the sky Lagoon online once you check in you get a wristband for the change rooms you can also sync your credit card to The Wristband and use it for the coolest Spa bar ever the entrance to the Lagoon is an experience in itself as you walk out of the small Labyrinth the view opens up to the Oceanside infinity pool the fee depends on the day and time you go but the base cost is on average 65 US dollars I would highly recommend the 20 upgrade to access the seven step ritual that happens behind this door the sky Lagoon is only 15 minutes from downtown Reykjavik and is a must visit place in Iceland on the next day while waiting for the rest of the group to arrive we decided to check out seven different spots along the Golden Circle which is a Scenic 300 kilometer Loop near Reykjavik I do however think they should rename the Golden Circle to the golden shark the first stop along the Golden Circle was think villa which is a UNESCO world heritage site and is known for its geological significance as it lies between the North American and Eurasian tectonic plates we then took a quick stop to get some ice cream the cool thing about this ice cream place is eating next to the cows so here now Arthur's off the Golden Circle at the gazers so cool it's my first time uh ever seeing one oh that's pretty epic we then headed to golfos also known as the golden Falls this was the first large waterfall I saw in Iceland and I was in complete awe foreign all the way to get a bit closer to the falls [Music] foreign I got pretty drenched but that's a good sign because that means we got pretty close to the waterfall we had lunch at a mushroom restaurant along the route for around 22 US Dollars you got unlimited mushroom soup and a variety of bread spreads and mushrooms our next stop was carrot grater which was formed around 3 000 years ago the contrast between the red slopes and the blue pristine Lake makes this crater a popular attraction my favorite part of the day was the regular hike the trail follows a marked path that takes you through Green Hills Rocky areas and bubbling streams you'll also notice steam rising from the ground and surrounding Hills the Reika de lure hike takes around 1.5 hours and leads to beautiful hot springs River it started raining but we're determined just gonna keep going it's pretty late like I think it's 8 P.M so this is my friend Marco our luggage got lost in our connecting flight so he has to use his umbrella with flower designs and his Crocs you just made it and I'm so excited foreign [Music] walking back to the rain but feeling really good Iceland is something else the rest of the group arrived the next day so we stuffed the cars and started our big road trip to our first Campsite in vic we had an absolutely jam-packed day with seven stops to make with no surprise four of those were waterfalls then the other three were a glacier a plane wreck and the black sand beach so the whole reason we're here in Iceland is to visit my sister [Applause] she lives here with her boyfriend her Icelandic boyfriend yeah she's taking us on the whole Ring Road she's created the whole itinerary so you're gonna see her a lot I shall be introducing a lot of the locations and yeah it's gonna be awesome now that we were all together the first order of business was surprising my sister for her recent engagement [Applause] [Music] Plus at the waterfall you can walk behind the waterfall too and when the sun is out there is an awesome view of a rainbow [Music] now we're entering this Canyon and we will see something but I don't know what but this is what was at the end of the canyon [Music] skogafoss is a beautiful and very popular waterfall with opportunity to walk up and see the falls from the top [Music] all right so now we're heading fast it's a stop after skoka Falls and most people don't know about it it's actually not very touristy so there aren't a lot of other tournaments here as you can see but it was recommended to me by my friend who's a tour guide so kind of like a secret spot on the root of the South Coast so let's see where it's at foreign Glacier um this is a very popular Glacier for ice climbing and Malaysia hiking because it's near the city it's only about less than three hours away and there's lots of really nice crevices [Music] thank you so this is a plane that crashed on this very spot lots of people ask me if people died in this crash and the answer is no luckily [Music] now on the last stop yeah I feel like we did everything today like so many different types of waterfalls we're now at the black sand beach even celebrated my sister's uh engagement so I had a like a little fun engagement party it's so nice to have the whole group together so now we're at rain is Viera Beach we have an awesome Sunset behind us you have to be really careful in this beach because the waves are called killer waves and if you turn your back on them sometimes really big ones can come up and scoop you into the ocean the distinct hexagonal Basalt columns at black sand beach were created by the rapid cooling and Contracting of lava flows we were lucky to see some puffins nestled on the cliff these little sea birds stay faithful to their partner when they settle down they tend to reunite annually at the same nesting site [Music] good morning last night we stayed here at Big camping it's a really nice small picturesque town as you can see it's so beautiful [Music] the campsite is awesome there's showers toilets Wi-Fi like an indoor eating area um like a place to wash your dishes so yeah highly recommend staying here at Vic our next campsite was one hour and 40 minutes away we had four stops to make that day an arch a cave a canyon and a waterfall when we got to the first site I was really impressed with how these arches were carved by the Relentless action of the ocean waves it was also cool to be able to see a glacier and the Atlantic Ocean at the same time we stopped at a gas station to get the very famous Icelandic hot dogs I've heard so much about this let's go try it out okay so Icelandic hot dogs are very popular because they're quite cheap and you can get them in almost any gas station and this is a type of Icelandic mustard and I personally don't like mustard but this is really good and this is a type of remoulade so it's like a Mayo based sauce and then this is just ketchup so you usually get the hot dog with a raw onion and crispy onion and I added potato salad on top of it and then you add all the sauces [Music] can you guess what this cave looks like foreign this Canyon is epic it's gorgeous [Music] pretty funny watching us all walk together with our matching hats we concluded our day with hypedus vartifoss a waterfall surrounded by Basalt Commons next to this waterfall was our campsite scuff devel Campground where we rested our heads and replenished our energy before embarking on another day of Adventure welcome to day three of the Ring Road here we are at skepta Falls Campground really big area and the coolest thing is it's right next to the hiking trails to the waterfalls and to the glacier The Visitor Center is pretty good there's a lot of information of the surrounding area the next stretch of the Ring Road before our campsite in hoffen involved driving beside vatna you call Glacier the largest glacier mass in Europe before we went to see two popular glacial lagoons we first went on a hike that definitely lands on my top three things to do in Iceland I'm going on a hike today uh five kilometers and 300 meters of elevation in [Music] [Music] [Music] anything like that so that's where we started hiked along the Ridge and now we're here over there is the top of the hike gets a little bit steeper towards the end of this hike but I know it's gonna be worth it made it to the summit view with Glacier a waterfall a volcano crater a Yoda cave it's you like that [Music] so this is where you can go see kayaking or take some boat trips to go a little bit closer to the glacier thank you foreign [Music] [Applause] I think my favorite site in Iceland keeps changing [Music] I think before this trip I've seen like one block of uh an iceberg and now you know look at how close they are thank you [Music] approaching the next stop now and it's right across the road from the previous one it looks like there are Iceberg blocks that have floated onto the shore we walked around and admired the Striking contrast between the dark Shore and the glistening ice foreign this next day was more on the quieter side we had three main stops to make before getting to the Campsite in sadist reorder our three stops were a hike a waterfall where we ate our dinner and finally in the spa we took a detour from The Ring Road and drove through one of the dirt roads in Iceland to get a taste of the Highlands [Music] do do [Music] after a hike we stopped by one of these bouncy trampolines you can find in playgrounds across the country [Music] thank you [Music] we paired our couscous and tuna dinner with a soothing Ambiance of the waterfall I'm excited for the spa so this one's called Buck backs the unique thing about walk baths is the opportunity to jump into the cold lake right beside the hot pools we woke up the next morning from our campsite in Sadie's theater where there were induction stoves and an indoor eating area this town was really cute and had a fun Rainbow Road leading to a blue Church thank you we were now about to drive up to Northern Iceland our campsite for that evening was next to Lake miveatin as I'm researching this I can now see that mevatine translates to midges this will be relevant to know in a few minutes but for now let's see the stops we made on the way to miveting waterfall number 10. so it's funny because if this waterfall was at the end of a hike in Calgary like back home it would have been a super epic waterfall super epic site but when you're here in Iceland it's like yeah we took a pit stop at a diner where as usual the boys discussed serious things and the girls danced [Music] we're here visiting a canyon called you so originally we were trying to do a 10 kilometer hike but now that we are here we realized we're on the wrong side of the canyon so behind us is the 10 kilometer right and we're on the side with just two viewpoints we don't have enough time to cross and do the hike on the other side but I was able to fly my drone to see what it looked like so stood legale has the largest collection of Basalt columns in Iceland the river changes color within the seasons and we unfortunately just missed the beautiful blue green color it has between March and July we continue their journey to our next stop detifoss which was a short walk from the parking lot this is Desi Foss the second most powerful waterfall in Europe Daddy and Icelandic means to fall and Foss means waterfall so Daddy Foss translates to the waterfall of the falls we ended the day in the best possible manner this hot springs is called mivatin nature bats and is a great alternative to the Blue Lagoon [Music] we're at this campsite today um it's quite beautiful because it's right by the lake but we're getting attacked by by flies or mosquitoes or some sort of bug Lake meevitin was actually very close to our next stop akarari despite the short distance we still had a busy day as there was still so much to see in the mivathin area this terrain had a striking resemblance to the Martian landscape [Music] okay that's enough fooling around let's learn something about this place this is a geothermal area in the north of Iceland and there's a lot of geothermal activity here like bubbling water which is also where we get our water for Hot Springs it also produces a lot of sulfur which is what causes like the reddish oranges color and it also smells like rotten eggs okay if you ever find yourself here in nivatin hot spring I would highly recommend to eat at the cafeteria here right at the spa they have really good affordable soup um great bread wraps so yeah that's a little hack if you're coming here to this Spa so we're trying to research why there's so many black flies all around us and I found an article on it June 19 2014 an apocalyptic swarm of black flies at Lake meibatin be sure to bring your insect repellent and a protective head nap because the Icelandic black flies known as midges have overrun Lake meibited okay we found the one place without bugs although the heartless creatures only live for seven days the amazing quantity found on the lake creates an apocalyptic swarm that is so dense it blocks out the picturesque scenery of the mountains [Music] then we found a solution oh this is great yeah that is awesome [Music] our friend Alex ran a section of the crater while we practiced her dance moves at least we gave him a nice welcoming upon his return [Applause] volcano has erupted approximately 29 times since the country was first settled [Music] together in one and there was an Icelandic Chief in the year 1000 who decided that Iceland should just adopt Christianity because he took all his Pagan statues and threw them away and then it is known that produces waterfall which is now called go to fost ER [Applause] that night we set up camp in akure which is the second largest urban area in the country we explore the small but Charming downtown and also tried a few of the local restaurants [Music] this marked the final stretch of our road trip we had a long four and a half hour drive back to Reykjavik we had no plans to stop along the way so we just made the most of the little time we had left in akarari so the end has come and here we are at the last spa in Iceland this Lagoon is called the forest Lagoon and I've heard many good things about it the forest Lagoon was my second favorite Spa after the sky Lagoon however at only 50 US dollars it's definitely the better bang for your buck the unique thing about this location is how it's surrounded by trees something you don't often see in Iceland to begin with similar to the other spas in Iceland there was a bar that you could swim up to [Music] despite feelings of melancholy as our Icelandic Adventure was coming to a close we celebrated one last time for my friend's birthday in the Embrace of a hot springs waterfall

Channel: Erika Pablo

Views: 17,393

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Id: cnG0zhROSfg

Length: 24min 28sec (1468 seconds)

Published: Thu Aug 24 2023