Iceland Food and Travel Adventure

In Part #1 of my 4-part Iceland series, I shared highlights from our flight from Boston to Iceland and our tour around Reykjavik. On our second day, we rented a car with the goal of working our way around The Golden Circle … and then south. Initially, I was nervous about driving in Iceland, but I quickly realized that once you get out of the city, the two-lane highway that circles the country — with a max speed limit of 90 kilometers (about 55 MPH) — is a breeze. That’s my kind of driving! Plus, we had a GPS who spoke Icelandic with an English accent, so getting lost was not an option…

The Golden Circle begins at Þingvellir National Park, the site of Iceland’s Viking Parliament.

From there, we visited Geysir Hot Springs (think, Yellowstone) and the giant, two-tier waterfall at Gullfoss.

Along the way, we stopped for lunch at Cafe Galleri in the town of Laugarvatn, known for its geothermal rye bread. (The bread is literally baked in a geothermal oven underground for 24 hours. The slow cooking yields a surprisingly sweet flavor.)

For lunch, we ordered Hot Spring Baked Bread with Sliced Smoked Trout and Hot Smoked Trout with Fresh Salad and Hot Spring Baked Bread. After we ate, Simon, my growing teenager, asked, “what’s for lunch.” In Iceland, there’s no such thing as super-sized portions; the food is just way too expensive.

Heading south from the Golden Circle, we checked into the marvelous, four-star Hotel Ranga in Hella (south Iceland). To our amusement, they gave us one of their themed suites, which are all designed after each of the seven continents. Coincidentally, we ended up in the North American suite complete with a buffalo head, bear skin, Native American Indian headdress and lots more. Simon said it was the nicest hotel he’d ever seen. Yes, he was like a kid in a candy store 🙂

For dinner, we ate at Hotel Ranga’s restaurant, boasting a menu with local meats, seafood, and produce. Don’t be mad at me, but for my appetizer I chose the Lightly Smoked Puffin served with beer bread and “Cumberland” sauce. I’m not sure I’d order it again (it was a bit chewy), but I wanted to experience something unique to Iceland.

The service was superb. Simon and I loved being pampered, and a highlight of the night (if you could call it “night” since it never got dark) was spending time chatting with Friorik Palsson, Managing Director of the resort. I’ll tell you more about Friorik in Part #3 of my Iceland blog series.