We started our third day with a drive to Kerið Crater (50 minutes). Originally, this was part of our plans for day two, but since we got a late start that day and ran out of time, and had plenty of free time with what we had planned for the next day, we bumped it back. There is a small entrance fee at Kerið crater, but it’s worth the cost. You can walk entirely around the top of the crater and look down into the lake inside, and you can hike down to the lake and view it from inside.
Kerið Crater from above
Next, we drove to Seljalandsfoss, which is another of the more popular spots in Southern Iceland. Plan ahead for this one – prepare to get wet. There aren’t many spots you can stand to try to take pictures without being coated with quite a bit of mist from the falls. Seljalandsfoss is unique because there’s a path that actually takes you along to a little cavern, so you can view the waterfall from behind, which gives a completely different perspective. Within walking distance of Seljalandsfoss is another, smaller waterfall called Gljúfrafoss. It’s pretty obscured, and you can either walk along a trail to where the fall plummets into a pool, or you can do a little bit of rock climbing to get to a vantage point where you can see it from part of the way up, which is what we did.
Seljalandsfoss
Gljúfrafoss
After leaving Seljalandsfoss, we drove to Skógafoss (25 minutes), which is also a very popular tourist site. We walked along and in the shallow river produced by the waterfall to get pictures from in front of it (FYI – if you’re looking for a rainbow waterfall picture, this may be your best bet!). We then walked up the stairs to the right of the waterfall to see the river and crest of the waterfall, which also gives really good views of the coastline to the other direction. We actually took a short nap just laying in the grass at the top of Skógafoss, but if you wanted to and it was the right time of the year, you can hike along a trail that follows the river and cuts between two glaciers.
Skógafoss – complete with a perfect arching rainbow!
Our final stop of day three was to see the black sand beaches of Vík, specifically Reynisfjara (30 minute drive). We both grew up along the white sand beaches and dunes of Lake Michigan, and this was about as different as you can possibly get while still being a beach. We spent a while wandering the beach and playing in the black sand, as well as clambering around on the basalt columns (which provide excellent photo opportunities).
Reynisfjara beach
Ashley in the middle of the basalt columns
We stayed the night at the Vík í Myrdal campground, a camping card site which unlike a lot of the other ones was actually just outside of the village of Vík. We took advantage of that and ate at a real restaurant that night, since there was actually the option of doing so and we knew it would be something we had in most of the places we were staying at.
