Jökulsárlón Lake and an Ice Cave Tour

When people ask me what my blog is about I usually say, “It is a fashion and lifestyle where five times a week I write about anything that interests me” but I think I really should change “lifestyle” out for “travel” because at least once a week this year I have found myself sharing photos from somewhere I have been.  As you may have seen on Instagram we just finished the family Christmas card and I went to five new countries this year solo as well as a handful of others with family and for work so yes, between that, long weekends, weddings, and family trip I do travel a great dear.

Today’s travel post is start of my specific Iceland posts and I decided to start this series with my second day – my morning hiking an ice cave.  My first day I drove more than 300 kilometers from Keflavík International Airport to in Eastern Iceland with many stops along the way.  I planned my trip that way so that I could easily make it to Vatnajökull National Park early in the morning and timed it so I could be on  the Jökulsárlón black sand beaches at sunrise.  Knowing that it would be hit or miss I only planned for 20 minutes and given the cloud cover it took a while for the sun to rise but when it did – holy crap was it gorgeous . I was actually very sad to leave but I knew I had to go meet my tour group and that they would definitely leave for the ice caves without me.  But I mean, come on, take a look at this gorgeous sunrise with icebergs, some the size of cars! 

After this gorgeous sunset it was time for an adventure!  For most of my trip to Iceland I was on my own but I could not explore certain things on my own so I went on a tour on an Ice Cave Tour of the Vatnajokull Glacier. We departed from Jökulsárlón at 9:15am and went on what was nearly a three hour adventure.  The drive fro the famous lagoon to the cave was only supposed to be 20 minutes but due to a recent flood we had to go to a different part of the glacier than usual.   It was an incredible opportunity to hike on and in the largest glacier in Europe and even in late Fall / early winter it was a frozen tundra! 

I was well equipped with crampons, helmet, light, and an ice pick for both balance and if I got stuck.  I managed to not fall the whole journey but it was very difficult and I held my DSLR like a precious baby. I am a bit sad that I did not get to take a photo of the modified 4-wheel monster truck we took but I did get photos of the gorgeous blue ice.  Now, the cave we visited, as I mentioned, was a bit a-typical as it was covered in ash the regular one on the ice cave tour was flooded but even so, it was quite pretty! 

^ Do ou see how many layers I have on?  It was FREEZING! 

The ice cave tour brought us back to the famed Jökulsárlón Lake and while I snapped a few photos from that gorgeous afternoon. However, it was already early afternoon by the time we were done and I had more than a 400km drive ahead of me and wanted to catch the sunset on the Black Sand Beach at Vik (which I did, but only by three minutes), so I did not have too much time to hang around.  For my next trip to Iceland I will definitely come back here as well as, fingers crossed, getting a chance to see the Northern Lights! 

I had so many photos of this gorgeous day it was really hard to whittle it down for you all but I hope you get the sense.  Oh, and get ready for a few more Iceland posts in the coming weeks including an overflux of waterfalls, a geysir, the famous Blue Lagoon, and the capital reyvkiak. 

Would you go on an ice cave tour?