Iceland '16

north Northern Lights golden hour remote drive road trip glaciers auroras dramatic ice

Before starting reading, I suggest playing this piece from Jóhann Jóhannsson's Arrival Soundtrack

This is a retrospective of a trip to Iceland we made in November 2016.

The three of us followed Road 1 from Reykjavik to Djúpivogur back and forth and continued towards west until we reached the north side of the Snæfellsness peninsula.

At this time of the year, there is about 6 hours of daylight, and the higher the sun goes is around 7° high. This means 6 hours of golden hour. The sunrise ends when the sunset begins.

Tourism is at the lowest, and roads are empty.
The first snow of the year fell during our first day.

Since there is such little time to enjoy scenery, we basically spend all daytime on the road craving for some good shots, with not much more than coffee, dry haddock and fish paste as nutritional elements.

There are just a few occasions to drift off the main Road 1 that is the only national road circling around the island from town to town. The cities are kilometers apart, and sometimes you see a indication to what seems to be a place with a name where people live. Most of the time it's just a hamlet, and here we're speaking of a range of 2 to 8 houses top...

The sun has entered its second phase while there's still a long way to Djúpivogur that we have to reach tonight, and people say a heavy storm is coming from Greenland.

Waves are pushing the snow away from the black sand around the monolith of Stapi in Stapavik

It's almost dark although the sun is not set yet. Fog is intensifying, wind is becoming gusty and snow is travelling horizontally. Every bridge we cross is an opportunity to find our car in a river, and seeing no one else on the road is everything but nice at this point.

I've finally managed to like this shot. When I took it and saw it on camera display, I expected it to be awesome because of the perspective lines and symmetry the mountains make. But once displayed on a large screen it just looked noisy and blurry, lacking details and sharpness because of the lack of light and the thickness and moist of the air at that time. Then I've grown to appreciate it little by little year after year, and now I kinda love the eerie, dramatic feel of the image and the fact that the poor definition of ground details make it look like it was painted.
Definitely to be seen on a big screen.

In the morning the storm is gone and light rises over Djúpivogur's harbour. We take the road back from where we came, and stumble upon some gems we crossed the day before while driving in the dark and had no clue existed.

This scene as seen from the curve next to Hvalnes Lighthouse just comes from another world

If there was a definition of a "perfect light" for me, it'd certainly be a natural light coming from the horizon during a sunrise or sunset and piercing below a heavy cloudy sky. And this is Iceland's everyday in this season !

Sunset

Sunrise

Right in time for our meeting with the sun at Fláajökull glacier

This place must have inspired George R.R. Martin...

Wanna see a glacier ? Just pick one !

Textures

Later down the road, for the first time of the trip we see a relatively massive group of cars and people stopping at the same place. It's a famous place down the Jökulsárlón Glacier where there's small icebergs drifting on a lagoon then below a bridge towards the ocean.
This is one of those bridges where we had to be very concentrated on the road on our way out...

Ghosts of ice and Milky Way

A sweet morning in Vík, with the famous monoliths and the infamous black sand beach

Passing by the northern coast of Snæfellsness Peninsula, a ridge of mountains blocks the sun rays all day long and there's no direct light in this region for months.
We can only see light far away over northern mountains cliffs, and a sky in fire behind the southern peaks.

Despite the lack of Vitamin D, the looks around there are quite peaceful.

For our last day before joining back the capital, we drive through lava rock fields across the peninsula towards the southern coast.

A tiny house in the middle of lava rock fields

Finally, on the last night, the reason that made us plan this whole trip happens above our heads.

When we got out of the restaurant, the sky had become clear, though it seems there is some strange clouds hanging there. Our eyes aren't used to darkness yet, and the camera thus has to confirm it : auroras are coming !

We quickly drive back to a pretty spot we saw before the night came.
Búðakirkja is one of the oldest churches of Iceland and was built in the 11th century. It is surrounded by vast plains that offers a 360° horizon to appreciate the show.