August 2024

We took an ocean cruise with port stops in Iceland, Faroe Islands and Norway. It’s been a long time since we cruised on a big ship and we enjoyed sailing the Viking Saturn very much. The ship was a year old and had approximately 900 adult passengers.

Our stops in the land of Fire and Ice included Reykjavik, Isafjordur, Akureyri and Seydisfjordur. The port talks taught us how to pronounce the Icelandic names, thank you very much Viking Crew.

We found Iceland to be a land of rugged, breathtaking beauty. The country has a population under 400,000 and roughly the size of the US state of Virginia. The people are happy, friendly and eager to share their culture. The waterfalls, Icelandic horses and fjords are abundant. The weather was wet and cold with most days below 50F with some amount of rain & wind.

We spent a couple days touring Reykjavik ahead of the cruise and drove the famous Golden Circle scenic route with stops at Pingvellir National Park, Geysir, and Gullfoss waterfall. The days here were sunny and well appreciated.

Scenic shots from a photog tour…

This is a picture of me holding up the bridge between the North American tectonic plate and the Eurasian tectonic plate.

There was a volcano that erupted on Reykjanes peninsula a couple days after we departed Reykjavik. We passed by the volcano several times while touring and saw only the steam clouds. The eruption was predicted and well managed.

We stopped at the fishing village of Isafjordur. I fell (photographically speaking) for the man telling the history of fishing on Isafjordur.

Akuryeri was another small fishing village where the weather was wet and cold but the welcome was warm. We visited the highlands and botanical garden.

Seydisfjordur was our final port in Iceland. We did a walking tour in the city center and then explored on our own. Fishing is the main industry and tourism is second, for now.

That’s a wrap from Iceland,

Betty & Brian