Another rainy day but that won’t stop us. We are off on another road trip. First stop is to find the brewery, but first we had to take pictures of this cool car, an Opel. It has been parked on the road that we park on and thought some of our friends, Fred and Dan, might like to see it.
We went through the tunnel once again. We stopped at this beautiful river by Fossatun. Fossatún is a settlement located on the banks of the river Grímsá in Borgarfjörður along route 50, just 90 km from Reykjavík. The area is known for its beautiful surroundings and there are many marked hiking paths to enjoy the sites. There is supposed to be a beautiful waterfall a short hike but the bugs were terrible, so we didn’t go. You can’t miss the place because of the huge troll face along side the entrance.
As we were standing on the bridge taking photos of the river a tractor came by pulling a trailer full of sheep. I hope they were moving them to another field but I think they may have been going to the slaughter house. I think they knew what was going on because of all the baaing.
We found the brewery but it didn’t open for another hour so we found a small road that looped around. We decided to take that and found Deildartunguhver Hot Springs. This was well worth the side trip.
Situated on a beautiful farm, Deildartunguhver is the largest and most powerful hot spring in Europe with a flow rate of 180 litres (50 gallons) of water per second at a piping hot 97°C (200°F). The scalding water bubbles out of an algae covered rocky outcrop creating a steamy source of power.
Most of the water heating homes and businesses in the towns of Borgarnes and Akranes comes from Deildartunguhver. It travels through a 64 kilometre (40 mi) pipeline, the longest of its kind in Iceland. So, if you take a shower anywhere within a 65 km radius of Deildartunguhver, you have already bathed in the hot water from this powerful spring!
They have a hot tub and huge greenhouse. It cost about $40 to go to the very fancy hot pool. They sell tomatoes for 300 Krona or $2.84 that were grown in their greenhouse.
Now it was time to head back to the brewery. On the way we crossed this very narrow bridge. It was really cool to drive across.
We made it back to Stedji Brewery which is not hard to find due to the big beer bottle at the entrance. We went in the tap-room and there was only one other couple in there. They were from Kentucky and they had rented a camper to travel around in for 2 weeks. They were coming to an end of their trip. Then another couple came in from Dallas, Texas of all places. They were leaving when we were on July 4th. They both got good deals with WOW airlines, so it might be worth checking into.
Anyway back to the brewery. The are located on a farm named Stedji, Anvil, this is where the name came from for the brewery. We had a flight of 5 beers which were all very nice. Then one of the owners came out and said you have to try this one. We brew it with whale testicles which are smoked in sheep dung. David and I, of course, said bring it on. We loved it. He brought out another one which was not smoked, though good we preferred the first one. Don’t worry we are bringing back a couple of bottles of the first one to share with the Midnight Sun Beer Tasting Society. I think my 50 pounds of beer is growing.
Here are a couple more tractors for Fred and Dan to check out. Fred maybe you can get Sam to pull the one. The other one looks like you should race it.
We decided to take some back roads on the way back to Reydjavik, so we headed to Geitland Nature Reserve. I am not sure why they call it a nature reserve because it is really barren, but the glacier is there. We did take a wrong turn but it did look like the main road. I found out where the huge buses go now, to the glacier. We drove to where they start but couldn’t go any farther. If you look close at the one photo that just looks like snow go uphill you will see one of the buses stopped. David went in the shop to check where we were. He pointed on the map to the road we were on the guy says, “Your not lost, you know exactly where you are.”
I decided to let the Flat Ole Hippies go play in the snow. I figure it is all rocks so it will be easy going. Then I stepped off a larger rock on the gravel and my toes went into the mud. No big deal I will wash them off in the small puddle over there. Then the whole top of my foot was covered in mud. I decide that was not a good idea and just kept my foot muddy.
Our next stop was Pringvellir, where we walked up to Öxarárfoss waterfall along the fault lines. The waterfall was stunning. You could see this wonderful green color in part of it.
I did get my feed washed at the waterfall because I found a place I could get in. I wanted David to join me for a footy picture but he said no, so we found another place. Of course, his idea did make for a better photo.
https://guidetoiceland.is/connect-with-locals/jorunnsg/ingvellir-national-park
Now it was time to head back home. We could see it looked like it was trying to break up over Reykjavik.
Next stop was downtown to find some food. Driving in circles trying to find a place to park we realized it is Saturday night. We drove past this huge screen outside where people were watching the World Cup. We actually drove past it several times as we were making our circle. I guess it wasn’t actually a circle because we kept hitting one ways that were going the wrong way. We finally found a spot by the harbor.
Not far from where we parked we could see a place that looked more our style than the fancy ones around. It was call Reykjavik Fish Restaurant. The fish was great.
With our bellies full we headed back to the apartment and to bed thinking about our next adventure.