Waterfalls and Glaciers: The Eastern Fjords

We had now been traveling in Iceland for five complete days and working non-stop. Someone might scratch their head at the use of the term "working" but for us travel has never been about taking it easy. It's more like a constant quest for new experiences, distinctive sights, and unexpected situations. We find the idea of spending days lounging around a resort with a fruity drink in hand to be gruesome, but there's no question that all the planning, packing, unpacking, navigating, shepherding, dining, and everything else that goes into road tripping with three kids is a form of work. It's very rewarding, worthwhile work but it's not for people who believe that vacations should be relaxing. As far as we were concerned we had done more memorable living in those five days than we did in several months at home. We had walked on a glacier, boated around icebergs, summited a volcanic crater, ridden on horseback, explored a lava cave, and hiked through canyons. We had cleared out of our accommodations early every morning, hustled our way through a demanding itinerary every day, barely made our dinner reservations, and crashed out in a brand new spot just to begin the process anew the next morning. Every ounce of effort and stress had been worth it for the experiences Iceland had given us. It had also been amazing to see our kids rising to all these new challenges and appreciating some of the natural wonders they were being exposed to. They were clearly on their way to becoming intrepid travelers.

The upcoming day would provide a change of pace. We would be driving more miles than any other day of the trip thus far but we wouldn't be visiting any natural sights at all. Instead the day would be dedicated to exploring small coastal villages in a part of Iceland that most Ring Road travelers bypassed entirely. It might not be as exciting as the previous days but it would be interesting to see places where there were actually more locals than tourists for a change.

The best thing about our depressing motel in Höfn was departing from it. We had found the town overall to be a disappointment, much less interesting or pretty than similar-sized places like Selfoss and Vestmannaeyjabær. We drove down to the western shoreline for the view but aside from one cute little rock garden there wasn't much worth seeing. We had spotted some impressive slides at the town swimming pool and we figured we could probably manage a later start so we took the kids there for a couple of hours. We discovered that swimming pools in Iceland are actually a really good deal for us. Small kids generally get in for free and the slides are better than the ones our kids are allowed onto at a water park in the US without the lines. Our only expense was for renting a towel which cost more than buying one in a store but we had all three kids share one. They had a blast and we practically had to drag them out of there.

We had a full hour and a half of coastal driving before we encountered our first village at the end of a long peninsula between two fjords. By most standards Djúpivogur is a little hamlet but it was the largest and most energetic of the towns we visited in the early part of the day. Our first stop in the village was Eggin í Gleðivík, a quirky sculpture by the port that displays thirty-four oversized eggs representing every local species of bird. Apparently the concrete pedestals for the eggs were remnants from a dismantled fish processing factory. Rather than remove the pillars as well the town manager consulted with a renowned Icelandic artist and the idea for the sculpture was born.

As we left the port area we passed a large red house with whale skeletons in front of it. There were prominent signs indicating it was a gallery so we pulled in. We found a lot of whimsical carvings and sculptures made from wood and whalebone. Behind the house there was a steep hill with stacked rocks and carved wooden heads arranged along its face. Spenser immediately started climbing the hill with Mei Ling close behind, while I explored the grounds with the older kids. We found the artist working in the main house and he acknowledged us amicably but didn't interrupt his work. The interior was crammed with smaller pieces and it was clear that the owner had dedicated much of his life to the work he was doing.

We had lunch at Við Voginn, which was a fish & chips type of place but also had interesting choices such as an Icelandic sampler platter. The platter had a variety of quite tasty cured meats and some pickled fish which made a nice break from incessant preparations of lamb and cod.

The gallery we had on our itinerary to visit was JFS Handicraft, which gets a prominent mention in the Lonely Planet. The establishment was strangely similar to the other gallery we'd visited, a house crowded with sculpture and crafts and a steep hill in the back. Here the emphasis was on stones and the artwork was several notches less creepy. JFS is Jon, a very friendly guy whose grey beard belies his youthful energy. It seems that every village in the Eastern fjords has at least one rock collector and Jon must have one of the largest collections. His house and the backyard were filled with colorful chunks of jasper and agate in raw and polished forms. Some had been fashioned into jewelry and small sculptures. Jon told us how he scours the countryside for rocks that bear the characteristic signs of having a crystalline interior. He was amazed that his hobby has brought him visitors from al over the world and caused him to be featured in travel guides written in many different languages. Before we left he gave each of our kids a polished white stone and we bought three beautiful woolen hats that his daughter had knitted.

Djúpivogur had been a very enjoyable little village and we hoped that the ones ahead would be similarly interesting. We drove along the southern edge of Berufjörður enjoying some breathtaking scenery on either side of the Ring Road. The landward side was sealed from penetration by a formidable series of terraced mountains but every now and again a narrow pass gave us a tantalizing view of a green valley within the peninsula. Out in the fjord boats were tending to rows of circular fish farms that looked like a setup for a giant's game of lawn darts. Dense fog obscured the mountains on the other side.

At the end of the fjord we ignored the Öxi shortcut to Egilsstaðir and continued onward to the next inlet and the tiny hamlet of Breiðdalsvík. There were only a couple of commercial establishments here. Kaupfjelagið Art and Craft cafe had a small grocery store and some souvenirs in addition to an array of appealing cakes. There wasn't much to be seen in the way of arts and crafts. We only hung around long enough to get some coffee for ourselves and a snack for the kids. Next door the Beljandi craft brewery was just opening up so I had an IPA while the kids messed around on the pool table. No other customers showed up and the atmosphere wasn't exactly festive. We had been looking for a quiet place off the tourist track and Breiðdalsvík definitely fit the bill, but we had enough of it fairly quickly and got back on the road again.

One fjord further was Stöðvarfjörður. Remember your Icelandic pronunciation? Stuhdth-var-fjuhrdther. Stöðvarfjörður has another famous stone collector but we'd already had enough of colorful rocks and this one was charging admission. Instead we headed to the Fish Factory, one of many decommissioned fish processing plants in Iceland that have been repurposed for artistic use. Despite having minimal artistic capabilities myself I'm fascinated by artwork and crafting and I always seek out opportunities to visit artists in their workspaces when we travel. The Fish Factory was a rather decrepit warehouse-type building near the port that had some cool graffiti-style paintings on the outside walls but otherwise looked abandoned. We finally found the entrance where a sign was hanging that stated that tours were available by advance appointment only. I was a little disappointed since we had nothing else to see in the tiny village but I didn't want to disturb anyone inside who might be engrossed in their work. Mei Ling doesn't have the same Western inhibitions that I do so after I retreated to the car she went to the entryway herself. She reappeared a few minutes later triumphantly and announced we were getting a tour. Our guide turned out to be a friendly artist from Pennsylvania who was in the middle of a residency at the factory. He showed us the different workshops and performance spaces and informed us that artists from all over the world come for periods of up to six months to work on their own projects in the beauty and isolation of the Icelandic coast. At the end we bought a hideously expensive T shirt and a shopping bag to support the endeavor and then got back on the road once again.

At the end of the next fjord over the Ring Road turned inland to Egilsstaðir. There are a couple of other peninsulas in the Eastern fjords with their own tiny villages but the roads on those reach dead ends and my research hadn't uncovered anything in particular worth seeing. Instead we stopped briefly in Egilsstaðir to fill up on gas before dinner. Buying gas in Iceland can be a little confusing. The two options are to use a credit card with a pin or to buy gas debit cards at the N1 gas stations. The problem with the gas cards is that they come in small denominations and most of the gas stations outside of the main towns don't have any attendants to sell cards. We bought one and used most of it on our first fill-up, and never had an opportunity to buy another. My American debit card with a pin didn't work but fortunately I remembered I'd called one of my credit card companies years ago to request a pin and it still worked. We were filling up as soon as we got below half a tank because we didn't want to run out of gas on some isolated stretch of road, but we needn't have worried about Iceland where gas stations seemed to be everywhere.

Our timing was perfect to have dinner in Seyðisfjörður, a famously beautiful town at the very end of the fjord of the same name. It was a half hour drive from Egilsstaðir along a wonderfully scenic and misty inland road that passed right by an excellent waterfall called Gufufoss.

The two things that distinguish Seyðisfjörður from other small villages in Iceland are the "Rainbow Street" in the center of town and the colorful houses that surround the lake at the end of the fjord. The Regnbogastræti was originally created in 2016 to support gay pride and has been maintained as a tourist attraction ever since due to the positive attention it brought to the village. The street is lined by galleries with their own whimsical exterior decoration and ends at a picturesque blue church.

The natural beauty of the tiny lake and the surrounding mountains was more impressive to us than the colorful street. We spent some time along the shoreline admiring the reflections of the houses and the steep hillsides. A land bridge at the far end of the lake separated it from the long fjord that extended eastward to the ocean.

There were a couple of restaurants that seemed decent in the village and it would have been nice to eat in such a pleasant setting. Unfortunately this was the one night of our Ring Road journey that I had chosen not to make a reservation as I had been unsure whether we would be visiting Seyðisfjörður that evening or the following morning. It was a costly decision as all the fine dining in town was completely booked. We turned down the suggestion of one restaurant manager that we visit the local pizza joint and began calling restaurants in Egilsstaðir. The first three places I called were also booked and I started to worry we might end up eating fast food after all, but eventually i found a hotel restaurant that had a table for us. We drove back to Egilsstaðir and had a very similar meal to the hotel restaurant near the glacier lagoons. It was the usual menu of cod, lamb, and beef at even more exorbitant prices than the typical Icelandic restaurant but it was still better than settling for pizza.