I had a really good night’s sleep and started the day, as usual, with porridge. I’ve had to buy some Icelandic oats as I’ve eaten almost a kilogramme of the Jumbo Oats I’ve brought with me. On the coffee front, supplies are running low and need to be rationed. The plan I developed last night was to cycle to the Secret Lagoon (the secret is it’s really touristy), see if I could get in without booking, and then cycle to Selfoss (a waterfall). However, at the last moment I decided that was too much of a cop-out and headed to the Þingvellir National Park about 60km away, which sounds excellent.

The roads in the south are definitely busier than the north, but not as bad as cycling in southeast England. Generally cars are courteous, but my scientific analysis says small red ones are likely to pass closest, together with people driving Happy Camper camper vans, which uncoincidentally are predominantly red. I cycled the first 25km in a bit of drizzle to Laugarvatn where there was a shop. I was hoping for a supermarket, but it was another N1. It had slightly different food, but nothing appealed as an evening meal. In the end I bought bread, cheese, tomatoes etc as a lunch, but knew there wouldn’t be another shop so was in a quandry what to have for dinner. I also got a coffee, which I drank while looking out the window at the Good Burger restaurant. I hadn’t had much food yesterday, so decided to treat myself to a burger, and save my sandwiches for the evening.

The next 30 km were excellent, a stiff climb up onto a plateau with open land as far as the eye can see. I soon entered the national park and the landscape changed again, with rough and broken boulders all covered in lush greenery, and tiny birch trees everywhere.

I cycled past a exploded “blister” in the rock, and just had to stop to look closer, it’s just a boiling bubble that has been trapped in time – it’s a different world!

The scenery in the national park was superb, and with a backdrop of mountains. I reached the visitor centre/tourist information/campsite, so checked in at the site, had a cup of coffee and found out about a walk to the Oxararfoss waterfall (I’m pretty sure Foss means waterfall). The tourist information guy, said it was a nice walk, which they call their forest walk. I told him the joke about “what do you do if you get lost in an Icelandic forest”, but he had definitely heard it 1000s of times before (the answer is “you stand up”) and in hindsight, offended as there was a small forest, I did get lost and had to retrace my steps.

I pitched my tent, with a bench, no close neighbours and in a car free section (the perfect site!) and headed of for the 30 minute walk to the waterfall. I thought to bring my bread and other foodstuff, but half way there, I realised I’d forgotten to bring any water. It was a cool early evening, surrounded by rivers ,so I should make it! On the way out of the site, I spotted another bike (with the same decathlon tent I used to have), and chatted to a guy from the Ukraine, three days into his first big cycle tour. We chatted for a bit, and I headed off.

I think that, I thought, I was just going to see a water fall. It was far more than that. This location is where the earth’s tectonic plates are pushing against each other (the bad news is that the Eurasian plate is losing). The waterfall tumbles off the North American Plate, then the river runs between the plates before dropping again about 0.5km further along. It was about 7pm and pretty quiet, (based on the size and number of car parks this is a popular place to visit), so I was able to chill out and make my sandwiches taking in the full splendor of the waterfall. I continued the walk to the lower waterfall, and discovered the other reason this area is so popular. It is the historical location for the Iceland parliament, stretching back nearly 1000 years, under Law Rock. It is also used symbolically in more modern times, particularly when Iceland got independence from Denmark in the 1940s, and more recently for anniversaries. Their history sounds much like Ireland, with home rule granted in 1904, and independence later – but it seems the Danes handled it better!

Back to the campsite, but as the visitor centre didn’t close until 10:00 it was a good opportunity to charge the phone, watch a bit of football (Brazil v Serbia), and have a local beer, or two.