Iceland 2016

Vik Beach, down closer

Here's a huge wave hitting the rocks below a granite cliff. The water on the black sand acts like a mirror. This is my favorite shot so far from the trip.

Historic village near Reykjavik

nice snowy day in a local National Park

A walk in the snow

The same local park as the village, this was the pathway down to the river and the buildings.

Skogafoss waterfall

Convinced Gloria to act amazed at the waterfall. It was actually the idea of our photo guides.

Vik beach, sunset visit

One of many black sand beaches on the south side of Iceland. We would visit this one several times. The image was an early attempt at wave painting.

Aurora experience

Our first night we had an amazing aurora borealis display. As it turns out, it would be the only one we had, so we were pretty lucky to have a really strong one. It lasted about 40 minutes, came out of the north and danced totally overhead and disappeared into the west.

Aurora ribbons

Further shot of the aurora. A several second exposure, which was much shorter than usual due to unusual brightness of the lights. As you can see, we were right back to the Vik beach area.

Glacier view

We took a short hike near a large glacier. There were so many glaciers, I couldn't keep the names straight.

Glacier Lagoon

This is a large lake fed by one of the glaciers. Pieces of ice break, float around and exit the lake into the Atlantic when the tides change. I took this shot as the tide was coming in, making some large pieces of ice swirl in a large circle.

Vesturhorn Mountain

An extremely scenic mountain group that runs right down to another black sand beach. This was our only day of consistent sunshine. An early morning shot over the frozen black sand dunes.

Vesturhorn Mountain

The higher tides leave ripples in the sand that were all frozen the morning we were there. I would love to come to this area and stay 2 or 3 days, but you would need a camper van, and there is really nothing out there.

The ice cave

Fortunately, we were able to make the last day the ice cave was accessible. It is usually much larger than this, but it was late in the winter season and it had shrunk down a lot. This cave is always there, but the shape and configuration change constantly.

Glacier Lagoon beach

When the ice pieces wash out of the lagoon, they drift back onto the beach. A great place for some longer exposures, making trails of the waves around the ice.

Glacier Lagoon beach

More wave painting around the ice.

The ice keeps much of it's cold blue color when it hits the beach.

More ice and wave painting.

Glacier Lagoon beach

An idea of the size of some of the ice pieces.

Vik Beach, again

On the return trip to Reykjavik, we stayed another night near this beach. This day the wind and waves were really strong.

Vik Beach wave spray

Small rainbow captured in the spray from the large waves.

Seljalandsfoss waterfall

Dramatic waterfall, probably more so on a sunny day. This is one where you can walk behind it. See the folks on the right side of the falls.

Gullfoss waterfall

This is a huge waterfall, and difficult to get great shots in the winter as they close the lower access to the area.