Iceland in Autumn: At the End of the Rainbow

Iceland in Autumn

Part 2:

At the End of the Rainbow

Our first hotel was near one of Iceland’s most well-known and largest waterfalls, Gullfoss, the golden waterfall along the river Hvítá. Allegedly named the Golden Falls as the brown glacial water appears to turn to gold during the periods of sunrise and sunset.

Gullfoss sits at the end of a road into the interior of the country at this point the road stops completely so it truly sits in a backdrop of wilderness. There are two steep drops to the waterfall, the first an 11 metre cascade and the second a 21 metre plummet into the sheer-sided canyon below, the bottom obscured from view. 

Gulfoss is awesome, in the traditional sense of the word. Its power and presence leaves you feeling small and vulnerable, a tiny figure at its edge. Spray billows up like steam reaching the top of the falls as the brown water poured into the hidden depths of the canyon.

On the way to our second hotel near Skaftafell we visited another two picturesque waterfalls.

The first was Seljalandsfoss, a waterfall you could walk behind on what stuck me as a rather perilous narrow path. Here fulmars wheeled across the cliff face perching precariously on small ledges and rock doves would occasionally flit across the rock face.

Under the waterfall

We then stopped at Skogarfoss, a beautiful waterfall which reflected in the calm pools around the mountains. 

Its spray illuminated two rainbows in the sunlight which touched the pebbly shores. Sadly no pots of gold though. A trial of steep steps and gappy railings lead up to a platform over the falls form where you can look down to the river below. I managed to snap a photograph of a raven in a backdrop of rainbow spray before the cloud rolled over and the bird decided to fly off.

We finally reached Skaftafell and visited the forests of the National Park. 

What to do if you are lost in an Icelandic forest? 

Stand up - The trees are all very stunted here in fact we'd recognise it more as scrub when compared with British woodland. Birch dominates the woodland accompanied by rowan and shrubs of tealeaf willow and blaeberry. We visited the black waterfall, Svartifoss. It pours over the angular columns of black basalt which were the inspiration in the design of the Hallgrímskirkja church in Reykjavik which we later visited. 

Next week I will be talking about the volcanic side of Iceland, the land of Fire and Ice.