Iceland - Landscapes

Icelandic horses on the plains to the east of Reykjavik

I'm not going to say much about this series of landscape images from my recent visit to Iceland, only I hope you enjoy them and maybe it will whet your appetite to visit this land of stunning contrasts too. Several of these shots were taken on the move in an attempt to capture the images I would have so loved to have spent a little more time setting up. This is part of the frustrations of being a photographer with someone else in charge of the driving - be it in a jeep or a 56 seater coach. So I guess this visit I have treated as the 'city bus tour' to get the taster of where I would like to return to, and next time I will ensure that I am more in control of the wheels that are getting me around.
I weep at all the stunning missed shots during the 4 days but I'm delighted I was able to capture some images to remind me of this amazing place.

Rainbow over the snowfields on the way to the Langjokull glacier

View from Þingvellir across Þingvallavatn

The Sólheimajökull glacier

The church at Þingvellir

The church at Vik

The stack rocks as seen from Vik

The sea stack and black basalt sand at Reynisfjara

And of course, everyone was asking "Did you see the aurora?"
Well, yes we did but...

On our third evening, following a period of snowfall, we went way out of Reykjavic up into the National Park. However, it wasn't far enough to be able to exclude the lights of the city, being reflected in the low cloud. Coupled with the fact we only had a 10-15 minute 'light show' it was a challenge to commit anything to the memory card. In fact, I only managed to capture three images that night which were worth giving a second look. Considering I had hired a lens specifically suitable for photographing the aurora, it made the (not so spectacular) image below rather a valuable shot!

We found out later, that the aurora kicked off a couple of hours after we had returned to the city, and was also spectacular the following evening when we opted for an early night in readiness for our flight back to the UK next morning.

Being a wildlife photographer too, I understand more than most that you can't just 'turn up and see' any natural happening such as this. It is all down to a series of conditions all aligning and then being in the right place at that time. So despite being a little disappointed with my first ever sighting of the aurora, I remain philosophical that this won't be the first and last, and as always, strive to improve image on image...but I do have a record shot. That will suffice for now, until I return to Iceland for a complete photography indulgence.

Anyone up for a visit to Iceland?!!