The bus from alongside Crown Princess took us initially up to Loen, a small village which these days includes a skylift as a popular tourist attraction for those who don’t want to stray too far from where the cruise ships dock. Travelling eastwards from there we drove along the Loelva, the river that connects the Nordfjorden to Lovatnet, a glacier-fed lake, and that would be the first stop on this organised trip.

Our cruise excursion would involve three parts: the first would be a boat trip on the Lovatnet with a snack at the end of that; this would be followed by a visit to a nearby glacier; the day’s activities would conclude with a bus ride back and a stop at a spot with traditional Norwegian buildings. Our boat hadn’t arrived at the lake when we arrived, though, so we had ten or more minutes to stand around and admire the gorgeous scenery in this part of the world.

With the sound of our boat approaching, all of the other passengers on this excursion started to wander back from where they’d been taking a look around. This whole taking a trip abroad thing was still pretty virgin territory for us at the time (there’d been such a long period between our first cruise and this one that we’d effectively reset the clock on it) so we’d stayed close to the bulk of fellow tourists during the wait, not wanting to be those people who stroll off and get lost or cause delays, and even sidled to where we knew the boat would have to stop in order to ensure we couldn’t possibly miss it.

We could see that the boat had seating inside and on top, and with me being the sort of person who likes to take photos of everything (it’s true) I mentioned to my wife that I’d like to head up top for uninterrupted views of the landscape. However, a couple of things scuppered this plan: firstly, there are a lot of selfish people in the world and, without wanting to dip my toes into the waters of stereotyping but being unable to avoid it, the older and whiter and richer American cruising demographic seems to have more than its fair share of them; secondly, I’m introverted (all the time) and polite (when I’m sober). This combination of factors saw our prime position near where the boat was about to tie up get overrun by jostling, careless, more experienced arseholes, and the pair of us shoved away to the back of the queue. We ended up sitting inside.

As it turned out, sitting inside the boat proved to be a positive thing. We could see the people who’d rushed forward and grabbed the outside seating were suffering quite badly with cold, lake spray, and the edge to the temperature in the exposed environment (it wasn’t very windy at all but it wasn’t warm by any means either) was forcing everyone to wrap up as much as possible and bury hands in pockets. It didn’t seem like the best place to take some photographs after all.

Our location in the boat put us close to the water level of the lake and with a window that could be slid open I was able to get some lovely shots of the view ahead and to the starboard side of the vessel.

Our boat trip took around forty minutes and as is the way with excursions we had not only the views to take in but also a running commentary to listen to. This covered geological and historical aspects of the location, and in this particular lake’s case those two aspects were firmly linked. Lovatnet is a glacier-fed lake (actually fed by two glaciers, one of which we’d be visiting next) which accounts for the turquoise colouring, and the surrounding mountainscapes have been prone to landslides in the past.

In 1905 a rockfall triggered tsunamis over forty metres high to travel along the length of Lovatnet. Two villages along the southern shore – Bødal and Nesdal – were hit with the loss of sixty houses, over seventy boats, hundreds of animals, a bridge, and half the population (over sixty deaths). One boat ended up being found three hundred metres inland. A monument was built to honour the dead.

Geologists concluded that such an event was unlikely to happen again so the villages were rebuilt and repopulated but in 1936 a far larger landslide occurred. The tsunamis this time reached a height of over seventy metres, washing away sixteen farms, destroying a hundred houses and other buildings, bridges, a power station, and all the boats. The boat that had previously been deposited three hundred metres inland was moved by the tsunami another one hundred and fifty metres. The 1905 monument was also destroyed, seventy four people lost their lives this time around, and the area was subsequently abandoned.

Our Lovatnet lake boat trip terminated at the southeastern end where a restaurant, Kjenndalstova, was located. This was an opportunity for those who needed to use the restrooms to do so and for everyone to enjoy some waffles. The restaurant itself offers a lot more than just waffles, including trout from the lake, and it’s possible to hire boats to head out and do your own fishing if that’s the sort of thing that floats your boat.

After our snack stop we made our way outside to wait for the bus to arrive and take us on to the next part of the day’s excursion. From Kjenndalstova it’s possible to look across Lovatnet lake and see a pretty impressive waterfall, Ramnefjellsfossen. While its height isn’t known exactly it’s currently considered to be the eleventh highest waterfall in the world.

Time then for the second part of our excursion and the main reason we’d picked this trip, but first an apology.

If you’ve read about our hike in Geiranger from the day before then you’ll already know this and I can only apologise even further for repeating myself. Then again, the likelihood of you having read about our hike in Geiranger from the day before is microscopic because people don’t use the web the way they used to so I feel fully justified in saying this again. Just prior to taking this Norwegian fjords cruise I’d made an impulse buy on the web for some cheap, graduated, neutral density filters as I thought they’d be ideal for getting properly-exposed photos of dark mountains against bright skies. A great theory flawed by not factoring in jagged mountain shapes and choosing the cheapest of cheap options from eBay. The result was dreadfully-exposed pictures with mountains half-under and half-over-exposed, and magenta tones flooding the highlights and shadows. It was also impossible to mount the filter on the lens without leaving a thumbprint somewhere so problems that already existed with a dirty sensor had extra imperfections added to the mix. Anyway, all this is to say that I’m sorry that the photos aren’t better here; I’ve cleaned them up as best I could in limited time and I’ve tried to desaturate the wrong colouring but to do a proper job would take months and the effort’s not worth the result. I’ll just have to go back and take better shots some other day.

Kjenndal Glacier – our destination – is an arm of Jostedal Glacier, which just happens to be the largest glacier in continental Europe. It was also the first glacier we’d ever seen (which, considering this was only our second trip abroad and the first had been to Asia, shouldn’t be that big a surprise). We’ve seen a few more glaciers since then.

There’s not a lot to say about Kjenndalsbreen (its Norwegian name) that you probably can’t guess or that you won’t get told if you see almost any other glacier in the world. The ice is retreating because the world is warming up so if you want to experience glaciers at their most impressive then you need to do it sooner rather than later. Kjenndal’s glacier is actually maintained by snowfall rather than low temperature but that means that any change in climate that alters snow conditions could affect this glacier more quickly than a gradual heat rise over time.

From the point where the bus dropped us off to where we allowed to walk to (we couldn’t get too close to the glacier because the risk of rockfall in the area was too great and the Norwegian authorities sensibly want to keep people a reasonable distance away from natural wonders that are susceptible to tourism damage) was little more than five minutes’ walk and our time in total at this picturesque spot was about forty minutes. This gave us plenty of time to take plenty of photos of the Kjenndal Glacier and the nearby waterfalls cascading over the egdes of the mountains but photography was tricky because the sun was behind the glacier for the most part. Dark rock in the foreground, blue-white ice on the peak, and sunshine diffused through hazy cloud behind was quite a challenge to work with and if you’re keen on taking some great pictures in this part of Norway then take some time to consider where the sunlight’s coming from at the time of day you’re visiting.

You can really get a sense of the difficulty in taking pictures in this video near Kjenndalsbreen, and you’ll also be able to get a sense for how the wind was being funnelled down the canyon leading to the foot of the glacier.

The walk back to the bus took us along a glacial stream. As has already been mentioned, Lovatnet lake is fed by two main glaciers; Jostedal (and its arm here at Kjenndal) being one of them.

While the Ramnefjellsfossen waterfall on Lovatnet had been remarkable because of its height I found the waterfall thundering off the northern face of the rocks near Kjenndal Glacier far more impressive.

With everyone back at the bus on time we then left Kjenndal Glacier behind and started on our return towards Olden where Crown Princess was waiting for us. We wouldn’t be taking the boat along Lovatnet for this as we’d be stopping in a small village along the way and that will be covered in the next post in this cruise travelogue series.

It would have been nice to see the glacier under clearer skies but this wasn’t to be with us instead experiencing the shipboard view of the impressive work of nature under low grey clouds and persistent drizzle. This made for very challenging photo conditions; my telephoto lens in particular struggled with light range and colour balance, persistently adding far too much purple into the shot that had to be removed almost completely in post-processing.

We’d made our way onto the promenade deck rather than seeing what could be seen from our balcony simply because we didn’t know which side of the ship would have the best view. As it was it didn’t really matter as the Star Princess moved into position alongside the glacier then proceeded to rotate on the spot with its thrusters several times ensuring that no matter where anyone was on the ship they would get a decent view.

The Amalia Glacier was the second glacier we’d seen, that first one being the Kjenndal Glacier in Norway. As with the fjords we think that the Norwegian experience was more impressive due to proximity but we’re still incredibly glad we got to see this Chilean glacier and surrounding landscapes too as just how many people can say they’ve seen one, let alone two in different hemispheres of the planet? With the worsening impact from climate change seeing this glacier before it retreated completely out of view from a vessel like the Star Princess was also something worth doing.

Until this point we’d assumed that everyone aboard the bus was on the same excursion but this turned out not to be true. Four people travelling with us had booked a different trip; one that included the waterfalls we were visiting on this tour but which skipped the town and beach coming up for us with a walk on a glacier instead. After leaving Skógafoss we took a quick detour in order to drop these people off at Sólheimajökull where they were due to meet with local guides for their trip and from where we would later return to pick them up on the way back to Reykjavík.

After that we were on our way again and didn’t stop until we’d reached the farthest point from Iceland’s capital city that this tour would be taking us to.

Vík í Mýrdal

Vík í Mýrdal (or Vík for short) is the most southerly village in Iceland. Despite the small number of local inhabitants the village can hold several times its permanent number in hotels and other accommodations in the area as the location is often used by scientific teams because of some interesting features of the town. Drawing a line directly south there is no landmass at all between Vík and Antarctica. To the north lies the Katla volcano, currently covered by a glacier as it has not erupted since 1918. It is believed that when the volcano does erupt it will melt enough of the glacier to flood almost the entire village so evacuation drills are regularly held in order that people know how to get to the higher land in a timely manner. The prominent church in Vík is the congregation point for those drills.

The geology of the area around Vík comprises black basalt giving everything an odd look for a beach if you’re just used to golden sand elsewhere in the world but one that seems so perfectly right in Iceland. A few people from our tour group headed down towards the beach but the majority seemed keen to hit the large supermarket and store near where our bus had parked or wandered into the village to see whether any of the cafés or restaurants or wool shops were open. We had spotted a rocky jetty extending out into the sea and although we’d been warned that the sea conditions were often extremely dangerous in this area we could see nothing but calm conditions and decided to head down to it and see how far out we could get. We weren’t the only ones. We’re suckers for piers and jetties. I can’t exactly explain it but we’re just drawn to them. There’s a wonderful feeling being out from the mainland with sea in most directions and being able to look back and get a bigger picture of what’s ashore.

Due to the village’s sheltered positioning and direct face towards the Gulf Stream it is among the wettest and warmest places in Iceland, the former environmental condition not being a problem at all for us during our clear sky visit to Vík and the latter being something we discussed at the time as we noticed that the deadly chill from the wind we’d experienced at Skógafoss had almost completely transformed into something remarkably close to quite pleasant on the coast.

Once the rocks of the jetty became too large and uneven to easily progress without the fear of slipping off or turning an ankle and after we’d had a discussion about just what we’d do if we saw the distant glacier explode into steam ahead of a flooding event because the volcano was erupting (answer: hold onto a boulder and hope) we headed back onto land and wandered a little farther west of Vík as we’d seen an interesting-looking sculpture in that area.

That sculpture turned out to be one half of the Voyages Sculpture by Steinunn Thorarinsdottir. The sculpture represents the friendship between Vík in Iceland and Hull in England where a matching sculpture stands (although the one in Hull isn’t the original as that was stolen by scrap metal thieves in 2011), both places having a long fishing history together only broken during the Cod Wars. Voyages was jointly commissioned by the British and Icelandic governments. An interesting fact about Steinunn Thorarinsdottir – at least for us as it’s our home city – is that she was educated at the University of Portsmouth.

We headed back to the bus in plenty of time to take a look around a large and well-stocked shop for tourists and make use of the public toilets before it was time to board and head just along the coast to our next stop.

Reynisfjara Black Sand Beach

From the photos from Vík above you can see that there were some basalt sea stacks to the west of the village. Our destination was the other side of them which, because of the rocky headland jutting out into the sea and because buses don’t float very well, meant a drive north, then west, then south to get to where we needed to be. This reasonably short drive gave us a slightly closer view of the Mýrdalsjökull ice cap covering the Katla volcano.

A decent-sized car park was pretty full when we arrived and indicated clearly that Reynisfjara was a popular destination for tourists visiting Iceland. It was very easy to see why, though. East of the beach and beyond the basalt rocks on it were the prominent basalt columns jutting up from the sea while to the west there was a clear view of Dyrhólaey, a peninsula with a couple of very obvious arches of rock visible. Our guide on the bus had mentioned that someone had actually flown through the larger arch on a microlight craft.

We didn’t have anywhere near enough time to head down towards Dyrhólaey but it was the basalt columns that were of more interest to everyone anyway. They are known as the Reynisdrangar and Icelandic legend claims they are the petrified remains of trolls who’d dragged a three-masted ship towards shore but got caught by the sunrise. That’s so like a troll to do that.

The rocky headland that separates Reynisfjara from Vík is also basalt and is also fascinating to look at especially if you’ve never seen basalt rock formations before. We hadn’t. I love seeing geometric patterns and structures produced by natural processes. Just like the Reynisdrangar in the sea the basalt formations on land and the large but shallow cave in the headland were big hits with photographers amongst the tourists visiting this particular part of Iceland’s south coast.

Sea birds circled endlessly above the Reynisfjara headland. This area is home to puffins – a favourite bird of my wife’s for some reason I’ve never delved into – but you’ve obviously got to visit at the right time of year to see them and it didn’t appear that early December was it.

Iceland doesn’t really have rolling landscapes, or at least the bits of Iceland we’ve seen across two visits to the country don’t. The bits that aren’t mountains are flat and there are very few instances where neither feature applies. It makes for a land that often makes you feel small. You’re small against the vast, open flat areas; you’re small against the glacier-topped and snow-peaked mountains; you’re small under the night sky when it’s clear and especially when there are aurorae active. Distances look huge but everything looks within easy reach. We could see some of that very Icelandic view as we came back from the beach to the parking area ahead of our departure. Iceland is a country that gets to you and you can sense how it molds the people who live there.

There were a few buildings around the parking area at Reynisfjara, including a public toilet and a small dining establishment. We had no need of either and waited around to grab a few final photos until we saw members of our tour group starting to appear and board the bus.

In the third and final part of this south coast Iceland excursion we’ll hit the Sólheimajökull glacier to pick up the tour group passengers we’d dropped there earlier before our second waterfall of the day, Seljalandsfoss.

Getting back on the bus after our visit to Reynisfjara our guide told us that we’d all been very punctual and because traffic had been light when we were getting out of Reykjavík thanks to this being a Sunday we were running ahead of schedule. We knew that we would have to take a slight detour on the way to what should have been the last destination in order to pick up the tour group we’d dropped off earlier in the day for their glacier walk but we were now informed that since we’d have additional time there would be a chance for those of us who wanted it to get off the bus at the glacier and get a little closer to it. We were, of course, extremely happy to hear this. I mean, who doesn’t like glaciers?

Sólheimajökull Glacier

It was late afternoon as we pulled into the car park at Sólheimajökull where there were around a couple of dozen other vehicles and some buildings where those who would have been taking hikes on the glacier could get refreshments, drop off bags, and get changed into decent walking boots, etc. Our guide pointed us to a path heading northwards and informed us that if we followed it then we’d get to see the glacier and the river run-off from it, and that we’d be able to follow the path for about 15-20 minutes but that we shouldn’t go beyond where signs indicated guides were required. With only around 40 minutes before we’d need to be back on the bus we knew we’d have just enough time to get as far as it was possible to go, grab some photos, then make our way back so as soon as the bus doors opened we were off and making for the path immediately. Behind us the sun was barely above the horizon and was producing a gorgeous sunset over the Icelandic landscape but we were on a mission to hit the glacier so mostly ignored it.

The path we took was a reasonably easy one to follow. After an initial rise it mostly levelled off and although it twisted a little as it followed the edge of the valley into which the glacial melt was flowing it wasn’t a difficult route. The only problem was that this was December and the temperature was below zero and there were areas where rainfall had puddled along the path so they’d naturally turned to ice. We had to be careful getting past some of these icy patches especially where the path was quite narrow but I’m pleased to say we didn’t have any slips or falls heading to Sólheimajökull or back and we didn’t see anyone else struggle either.

The landscape of Iceland is deceptive. With such wide open spaces and huge natural wonders you can easily lose sense of scale. As we got nearer to the glacier its river run-off became more filled with large chunks of glacial ice. You knew they were large but it was only when you saw people at the ground level rather than on the path providing some context as to sizes that things become clearer as to just how massive everything was.

Sólheimajökull is a subsidiary glacier off Mýrdalsjökull which we’d seen from Vík during our visit there earlier in the day, lying to the east of Eyjafjallajökull which we’d stopped at to take photos even earlier in the day. This was definitely a tour for people who like to look at glacial ice caps. Sólheimajökull is one of the most popular glaciers to visit in Iceland on account of its relative ease of access although thanks to the climate emergency it is retreating at quite a rate so if it’s somewhere that appeals to you to visit or walk on then sooner rather than later would be the best advice here.

We’d seen glaciers before during our travels. The first time we’d seen one had been during our cruise to the Norwegian fjords in 2013 and our visit to the Kjenndal Glacier. In 2016 we’d then cruised the Chilean fjords and seen the Amalia Glacier. Sólheimajökull, to date, marks the closest we’ve been to a glacier and was probably the most impressive to see in real life. I don’t know whether that was because you could get that sense of scale sometimes when you spotted people walking on it in guided groups or whether it was because it was a surprise visit that just changed our appreciation of it in some way. I do know that we liked it a lot but locations in Iceland tend to have that effect, we find.

If you look on Sólheimajökull Glacier on the right of this picture below you can see a line of hikers walking across the ice to give you a feel for the size and majesty of the structure.

We got as far as we were allowed without guides on the path to the glacier. A rope across the path and signs marked this point and it was here that people not just from our tour bus but also from other groups or who had driven there themselves gathered to take some shots of the spectacle from as close as it was permitted.

You know it’s a good thing when the locals are still fascinated by what’s around them and what they probably visit on many occasions. We were acutely aware of how long it had taken us to walk to this point along the path but spotted that our tour guide had also made the walk along to see the glacier and take some photos too so we knew that as long as she was around we couldn’t possibly miss getting the bus back. As soon as she looked like she was about to head off we did the same. Our walk back took us almost directly south which meant that as we rounded curves in the path we were treated to the long, winter sunset of this region of the world.

Seljalandsfoss Waterfall

A fairly short bus ride once everyone was back on board then took us to the second waterfall of our south coast tour of Iceland and also the final stop for the day: Seljalandsfoss.

With a drop of around 60 metres Seljalandsfoss is about as high as Skógafoss that we’d seen earlier but considerably narrower. While it may not have had the impressive power of the other waterfall Seljalandsfoss does boast a walkway behind its fall allowing visitors to step behind the cascade coming off the top of the natural wonder. However, again, this was December and the temperatures were well below zero even at the warmest part of the day, let alone the early evening when we’d arrived, and the spray that was whipped and knocked about by the wind had frozen over the walkway to a quite obviously dangerous level. Nobody from our group was stupid enough to risk either falling or the danger of hypothermia that resided that close to the torrent’s edge and we satisfied ourselves with some more distant views of the waterfall in the rapidly fading light and increasingly freezing conditions.

There were other, smaller waterfalls along the escarpment and with more time and light there were probably some stunning views around the landscape but the sun had pretty much set completely by this time and we were more than satisfied with only a short time at Seljalandsfoss before reboarding our bus and heading back to Reykjavík.

South Iceland Tour Conclusion

Our bus ride back to Reykjavík was completed without any stops and was notable only in that for a sustained period the sky to the north had a long, green band of the aurora borealis across it. There was nowhere for the bus to stop and let us out to take photos at the time but it was clearly visible from inside, a nice end to the day, and marked the third separate occasion we’d seen the northern lights across two visits to Iceland.

Iceland is a country of contrasts. It’s both barren and it’s beautiful. At times you feel small and at others you feel like a giant. Even the prices of things in Iceland are wild with items like food and drink feeling sometimes criminally expensive yet a tour like this one, lasting 10 hours, working out at just 8 euros per person per hour; as people who like to take organised excursions when we travel that is extremely good value and we can highly recommend the service from Gray Line both on the day and ahead of the tour through emailed information.

This south coast of Iceland tour was excellent. If you’re visiting Iceland and its capital for the first time then we’d probably recommend the Golden Circle tour (even though it might feel like the too touristy thing to do) as there’s a bigger mix of things to see but if you’re in the region a second time then you won’t be disappointed at all with exploring the southern coast.

Ahead of the views of the glacier, though, there was a hike to take. We are not hiking people. We’ve been on hikes and we’ve not really enjoyed the hikes. We’ve got knees and ankles and hips and backs that have firm opinions about how much exertion they’re prepared to put up with. But, we were here and no hike has killed us yet so we braced ourselves.

As it was, this particular hike – called The Trail of Time – was very gentle, largely flat, and not especially long. The reason for the name would become evident as we were guided expertly on the broadly circular route that started once we’d disembarked from the bus at a designated parking area.

It was cool, occasionally drizzly, and the guided walk featured a lot about moss. If you’ve ever wanted to learn about the different types of moss and lichen that grow in Alaskan woodland then this is the tour for you. For me it was less about the learning and more about just enjoying the look of it all. Those mossy carpets decorating the trees muffled the sounds from all directions, even muting small waterfalls where they ran alongside the hiking trail.

The Trail of Time’s name can be connected to the giant boulder markers we encountered on the walk through the trees. These boulders were inscribed by how far the glacier reached decades back and, as you’d probably expect, the oldest markers were those we first encountered with newer ones closer and closer to the end. Five minutes of walking could move you back dozens of years of glacial melt and recession. It also made the wooded area of the hike that much more interesting too, because the feel of ancient land wasn’t strictly true given how much of where we walked would have been within the extent of the glacier’s reach and covered in ice a century before.

We reached a spot on the hiking trail where we were told there was a good view of Mendenhall Glacier usually, but the weather wasn’t being too kind to us on this day, at least at this moment. Low cloud had dropped into the valley and bled all the colour and details from the sight. However, we would get more chances to see the glacier at the end of the hike and, weather being the changeable thing it is, our views of it would improve.

By the time we got around to the visitors centre and close to the lake that is one of the benefits to the local ecosystem of the glacier’s shrinkage we could see more of Mendenhall’s majesty.

Those who needed to pee got the chance to do that and when we were all ready to move on we set off for a shorter walk to where our bus would pick us up from to take us to the next part of the tour.

But there was time for a surprise – to us, at least – when someone in our group spotted a porcupine up a tree. You can just about see it resting in the crook of the branches two thirds of the way up the main trunk in the photo below. We had been told that we might see a porcupine on this hike but we hadn’t realised that they climbed trees, assuming instead that they spent their time at or maybe even below ground level. How Porcupines Live just never popped up in any school lessons for us.

In the next post in this Alaska cruise travelogue series we’ll be off on the main thing we wanted to do when visiting Alaska: spotting humpback whales. And this turned out to be spectacular!

Cruise ships typically take on park rangers to provide commentary and answer questions when they visit Glacier Bay, and Koningsdam was no exception, but we mostly kept to our balcony for the hours of cruising and admiring the landscape so missed out on most of that. A viewing deck at the fore of the ship was also opened up and we did head down there for a little while but it was very exposed, occasional drizzle would fall, and even if the speed of the ship was very low and the wind was not strong either, what wind there was carried with it the chilled temperature of all that ice in the area. At least on our balcony we could pop back into the room every so often to warm up.

By far the highlight of all the sights was getting to witness part of Margerie Glacier calving. Amidst near silence to suddenly hear what sounds like a gun shot echoing all around and to then see blue-white ice slide and crash into the flat, frigid water of the bay took our breaths away.

Anyway, you didn’t come here for the words, you came for the photographs of Glacier Bay, and without any more distraction, here they are.

Glacier Bay was stunningly beautiful.

In the next post in this Alaska cruise travelogues series we’ll reach the final port of call as we visit the city of Ketchikan.