The Golden Circle

We had originally thought to bypass this heavily-touristed route, but our interest in geology and a recent Zoom class on Vikings convinced us to at least visit Þingvellir. Not only is this an excellent place to view the fault where the North American and European tectonic plates split, it is also the traditional home of the Alþingi, the longest continuously-functioning parliament in the world. From around 930 AD, Icelandic chieftains gathered here at to make decisions ranging from the weighty – whether to switch from Thor to Jesus – to the mundane, such as the number of ells of wool an injured party was due in a dispute. It remains an important site official state ceremonies. We strolled below the basalt cliffs admiring the faults, the old church, and a small waterfall.

We then carried on to Geysir, a heavily hyped but small field of fumaroles and geysers, and then on to Gullfoss. This waterfall was seriously under-hyped. A truly vast expanse of water cascades over a shelving diagonal fault, turns 45 degrees, and plunges over an opposite diagonal fault to disappear into a deep crevasse. Spectacular, even in the wind and rain.