Lava Tour (exact price)

Reykjavik Excursions offer many great tours, of which we took three. The lava tour was a Icelandic Horseback Trip, and it was great.

Cost for two tickets
IKR (icelandic kroner cost): 11.800
US (american dollar): $143.16

Averaging about $71.50 per person



We took a bus from Reykjavik, which actually picked us, and others, up at their hotel or guesthouse doors and took us to Ishetar, approximately 25 minutes away. Here there was a stable with 20-30 horses (see past blogs for more pictures of this trip). The leader was a younger girl in her 20s who was very knowledgable and seemed to really love her job, and another helper who was also very helpful.

They give you the cool blue jump suits (you can see me wearing one above) which helps not only with looking cool, but also keeping us warm. The wind is very brisk, even with large coats and multiple layers, so it was nice to get another thick layer. This trip was great for new riders, like myself, as the horses are mild tempered, calm ever, and short and stubby. I really liked my horse, but forgot his name as it was unpronounceably icelandic.

The actual ride was a little more than 90 minutes and we spent the time trotting through lava fields with a group of 12-15 people. We got to dismount once in the middle to let the horses graze and learn a little about the landscape and the horses from the guide. Kelsey and myself had a good time afterwards mingling with all the horses in the stables before they shooed us away and into the little cafe. We thought about adding the meal to our trip, which was an additional 10 US dollar. We were glad we just brought snacks when we found out the meal was a very curious soup and fish. Although, I bet the fish was very tasty. It was also out of our very limited budget to toss in an expensive meal.

The most notable parts of the ride where the stubby and long haired horses personalities. The most exciting part of the ride was when we cross a very shallow stream and one horse did not want to get wet and actually began jumping through the water scaring the bejeezus out of the inexperienced rider. The most relaxing part of the ride was when I figured out I need to use my leg muscles to straddle the horse tighter and stop letting my butt take such abuse, I was sore.... bad form. The most stylish was Kelsey and me looking at ourselves in our attractive full body blue uniforms with helmets and random gloves. The most challenging part of the trip was after I saw the first time rider a head of me riding one handed to take a picture while riding; this inspired me to do the same thing and I'm glad I did as I took some really neat pictures while on horseback even though it was difficult and I thought I was going to drop my camera.

The Lava Tour is listed on Iceland Today's top ten trips in Iceland and amazingly we took trips #1, #2, and #3 on the list. The Lava Tour was listed as number 3, and while I would probably agree with its placement, Kelsey and myself still agreed it may have been the most enjoyable and fun tour of the Iceland Trip. Keep in mind we only visited Iceland for 4 days and three nights. So our time was very limited.

Check back soon for another post. If you have any further questions about this tour feel free to ask.

Geyser war!

Kelsey and myself have now seen Old Faithful and other geysers in Yellowstone's National Park. We can compare these american geysers to the Icelandic Geysers we saw only a few months ago.

I will post duelling videos and let you decide which Geyser is more impressive.

I will tell you right now that in Iceland you can get a lot closer to the geyser's and you can literal feel the water coming down. In Yellowstone you are kept quite a distance away from the actual explosion, but in Yellowstone the geysers last a lot longer.

Since Iceland was my first experience with a geyser I might be a little biased towards how amazing it was to see. We did see a film crew for the Discovery Channel filming a documentary about these natural wonders. Anytime a hole in the rocks you are standing on shoots boiling hot water 25-30 feet into the sky, you must give respect to power of this great earth.

Check back soon to see my Geyser comparisons.

Iceland Geyser videos

geyser going off:




geyser breathing:

these are especially amazing to see live, as the bundled up mixture of tourists scream hoot and hollar in their own languages as the geysers shoot into the air. it is actually quite an experience.

we took 13 videos of the geysers 'breathing' before finally catching the video at the top. we also caught one mid-blow, but it is not as impressive as the first video. the geysers are extremely hot, but the wind was quite chilly. i remember my hands being very cold while i tried to film this.

but VERY worth it.

Iceland photos

so it has been hard to find time to get all the amazing Iceland info up on the blog. I've had less time than planned due to my art as treasure art tour. This will be spanning the next 5 weeks of my life and therefore I will be posting any feature posts from coffee shops across america.

if you want to see all of our videos and photos from Iceland (not all but most), you can find at JumpCut... www.jumpcut.com/billyjay. You might need to start an account to view them....I am not sure. Hopefully not.

You can get a good idea of what kind of awesome Iceland posts I will be doing, with the help of my awesome girlfriend Kelsey. We've got some amazing information to pass on to future Iceland travellers. We managed to visit Iceland for about $1200 each (4 days/3 nights).

Hope you will visit back soon!
William

Icelandic Horses (part 1)

Our third day in Iceland we took a Reykjavik Excursions horsebike riding tour. This was a lava walk, for beginners-expert horseback riders. I myself had never ridden before, and was moderately terrified. Kelsey has a little riding experience in America and therefore was less nervous about the ride.

The bus picked us up at our guest house and took us 25 minutes to a horse ranch, where we were prepped for the ride. We got to wear these spiffy blue jump suits and nifty hats and gloves. It was rather chilly, so it was very delightful to have another layer beyond what we wore. They gave us each horses depending on our level of experience. My horse, whose name I could not pronounce and therefore cannot remember, was great! Very mild tempered and calm.

Icelandic horses are very short and a bit thick, I would consider them to be inbetween a pony and an american horse. The Icelandic Horses also have a lot of hair, and are typically a lot less fussy than American horse (this information was provided by our guide).

We were on horseback on a 45 minute trail over a volcanic landscape, much like the landscape we were introduced to immediately after stepping foot from the airport. The footing was very rocky and the horses would frequently stumble or lose their footing.

I hope you will enjoy these photos, I will upload more pictures to Icelandic Horses part 2 and tell you my overall feelings about the ride and horses in Icleand.

This is ICELAND!

An intro to our journey to iceland and all that we encountered.

Iceland Teaser

Here's a small sample of the pictures and Iceland locales that I will be blogging about: