DAY FIVE: Glacier Hiking and a crazy drive.
There aren’t many countries in the world where you can drive for hours on end, and genuinely enjoy every minute of it. Iceland is one of the few countries that you can drive around the entire country via the ring road, and have beautiful scenery everywhere you look.
After a super exciting evening the night before watching the Northern Lights, we had planned a pretty incredible adventure for today. As we drove through Iceland, we noticed the hundreds of beautiful snow capped mountains and glaciers that graced the roads, and we wanted desperately to experience them.
Without a proper 4WD and gear to walk on snow, we were stuck. What to do?! That’s when (after some furious googling), I stumbled upon the company Glacier Adventure that offered a once-in-a-lifetime opportunity to actually hike up a glacier and walk across it. All I can say is that the experience was mind blowing beautiful, a great workout and an awesome science lesson. You can read the full review of our Glacier Walk with Glacier Adventures HERE for the full low-down.
After our incredible glacier walk, we were on cloud nine. In less than 24 hours we’d bathed in some of the most beautiful natural baths, seen the Northern Lights and physically climbed a glacier; what next?!
We knew at this stage we needed to make some serious ground, as we had massive plans for the following day and that required a lot of driving. Somehow, we ended up taking the longer route through the highlands than the coastline like most people take. It was TOTALLY worth it. Despite the majority as gravel roads, we were the only car on that road for at least two hours, and that was a very special feeling indeed.
We ducked and weaved through the monstrous mountains, admiring their sheer height and blasting tunes like there was no tomorrow. Here’s a hint for your trip – make sure you’ve got loads of awesome playlists downloaded when you’re driving for some awesome car karaoke. Nothing worse than when you lose reception and have to constantly listen to the same songs on repeat for hours at a time!
After a few hours of driving, we finally reached Egilsstaðir, and let out a massive sigh of relief. We were in desperate need of a hot shower and a decent feed, so we pulled into the Egilsstaðir campsite. This was an awesome campsite, with wifi, outdoor and indoor eating areas, washing machine & dryer (pay extra), hot showers and loads of picnic tables and even a playground.
Day five was truly a massive day, but day six is where we saw what most people only DREAM of seeing. Some of the biggest and most beautiful waterfalls in the world are on the itinerary for the next day, which you can read by clicking HERE.