Reykjavík was smaller than we imagined, with the main roads shown on Google turning out to be only narrow cobbled single lanes in each direction; but that just added to the small city’s charms. We arrived a little before 7am after a 5-ish hour flight from Newark, New Jersey, and easily navigated our way from the airport to the city. Very easily, in fact; it took us approximately two minutes to collect our luggage, leave customs, buy a bus ticket and hop aboard!

Our lovely AirBnb hosts Hjalti und Hulda offered to store our bags until the apartment was ready, so we set off to get breakfast at the well-reviewed Laundromat Cafe. It was perfect for what we needed; sausages, bacon, eggs, tomatoes and toast, with a side of chocolate butter (there’s no other way to describe it than a butter that tasted chocolate-y) as well as some fresh yoghurt and muesli. Two of those breakfasts along with a couple of pots of tea set us back about 5000 ISK, just shy of $50 USD.

We allowed ourselves a three hour nap in the afternoon before dragging our tired selves out to a local bar to watch the Australia v. Netherlands World Cup match. You know, the one where Australia matched the Netherlands goal for goal for about 60 minutes before losing 3-2. Sigh. The atmosphere was great, though; Lebowski Bar, themed to match the movie, was filled with Aussies and Dutch, plus a few locals. We ate big burgers, huge serves of fries and drank cold Icelandic beer and chatted to people at the bar. The place erupted with every goal, but the Dutch were louder, and rightly so. We hung our slightly drunk heads as we walked out, but I was pretty pleased with how Australia played.

The next day we ventured off the tour the Golden Circle with Reykjavík Excursions. First stop was a tomato farm where approximately 18% of Iceland’s tomatoes are grown; Icelanders are pretty proud of the fact that they produce most of what they consume. Next stop was the Geysír park, where all other geysers in the world get their name, or so we were told. Pretty awesome to see; every 3-4 minutes the geyser would ‘erupt’, shooting boiling, sulphuric water about 20 metres into the air while tourists ‘oooh!’ed and hurriedly tried to get photos. I was a little fast with the shutter and managed to snap it at only about half its height, by the way!

We had a quick lunch there (beer, chips and burger again, but I’m assured that this is actually a pretty standard meal for most locals, too!) before heading to Gullfoss, a massive double-level waterfall about 2 hours inland from Reykjavík. We had no chance of staying dry so we just tried to embrace the biting cold and snap what photos we could of the awesome falls.

Last but not least, we stopped to see where the North Atlantic ridge literally splits Iceland in two. You can follow the ridge, mostly filled with water, and eventually you’ll get to a wall about 30 metres high, stretching for miles in each direction. It reminded me of a mini-version of The Wall from Game of Thrones, except green! It was crazy to see the shift of these tectonic plates up close.

On day three we took the bus to the Blue Lagoon to relax in the warm, blue, mineral pools. The place has clearly been done up for tourists, but in a nice way, with still plenty of private pools to explore and enjoy. The water was a near perfect temperature to relax, although the beers no doubt helped with that! We painted our faces with the mineral mud and had some fresh juices as well, before bundling ourselves up in our robes, showering, and heading back to to the city.

Day four, and our last full day in Iceland, was a long one. We jumped abroad a bus with Reykajík Excursions once more to tour 450km of the southern Icelandic coastline, stopping to see the glaciers, a lagoon filled with icebergs, and a couple more amazing waterfalls, each more awesome than the last. The amazing Jökulsárlón is the run-off lagoon for huge chunks of glacier that fall off and float out to sea. We jumped aboard a boat to see them up close, and even got to eat some 1000 year old ice. Tasted just like any frozen water.

We saw one waterfall on the way to Jökulsárlón, and one on the way back. The first one was amazing, but it couldn’t compare to the second, where you could walk around the back of the waterfall into an open cave. Again, we had no chance of staying dry, but it was amazing, with the perfect evening light on the lands and mountains surrounding it.

We arrived back in Reykjavík at about 10:30pm, with the sun just beginning to set. Our bus dropped us off outside Hotel Leifur Eiriksson and the gorgeous Hallgrímskirkja, which was dazzling in the evening sun. Exhausted but happy, we headed back to get a few hours sleep before our 4am bus back to the airport the following day.