First thing, of course, was to disembark the cruise ship and since Crown Princess was at anchor in Geirangerfjord this meant the use of tender boats was required. As luck would have it we were able to sit up top on this occasion which on days as gorgeous as this one was turning out to be offered not only the benefit that we’d be allowed off the boat first on land (for safety reasons) but that we’d have some uninterrupted views of the staggeringly beautiful landscape around Geiranger.

The tender boat ride to shore allowed us to see the other ships visiting Geiranger that day – Celebrity Eclipse and P&O Adonia – plus some lovely departing views of our home for the week cruising around Norway, Crown Princess.

Geiranger is a small village, highly reliant on tourism and at constant threat of disaster should there be a large landslide anywhere along the fjord leading to it. Part of the port guide provided by Princess stated that Queen Sonja of Norway camped in the mountains around Geiranger and wrote a book about her experiences. She and future husband Crown Prince Harald dated secretly for nine years on account of her being a commoner and it was only the threat to his father that he would never wed at all and end the royal family dynasty that allowed Harald to marry Sonja in 1968.

All safely ashore we boarded the bus waiting for us. From the description of the excursion:

Your tour begins with a scenic drive through Geiranger, passing the small, octagonal Geiranger Church and the largest hotel, the Union, some 300 feet up the hillside. A series of hairpin bends brings you to Hole camping site.

This duly happened and we gathered at Hole to await the start of our hike. In the map below you can see Crown Princess at anchor (marker A) and Hole where the bus dropped us off (marker B) as well as the two destinations we would be making for on the hike, the waterfall (marker C) and farm (marker D).

There was plenty of opportunity for us to take some photos back along the fjord to where we could see Crown Princess and all around us at the rolling and jagged hills and mountains.

It’s at this point that I need to make an apology for the state of these photos. So, here’s what happened: We’d booked this cruise at fairly late notice for us and knowing that there would be a lot of incredible landscapes and vistas to photograph I thought it would make sense to put some effort into it. Landscape photography isn’t really my thing but you hope that nature can do most of the work for you in these situations. However, I’d seen some people recommending a graduated, neutral density filter when taking landscape pictures in order to get more saturation into the land colours without blowing out the white levels in the sky. This sounded sensible so I ordered some filters and an adapter for my camera and right before our holiday they turned up which meant I didn’t really get much of a chance to test them out. I tested them out on this trip and… ah.

Graduated filters work well when there is a mostly distinct line between the land and the sky. Mountains, though, especially when you’re close to them, form large peaks and troughs and what you end up with is sky that doesn’t have blown highlights (good) but rock that’s essentially all in shadow (crap). Recovering detail is an expensive waste of time afterwards and introduces noise into the picture, halos will inevitably form between light and dark areas of the image, and when your filter is the cheapest of the cheap you can also discover that far from being neutral you’re going to introduce horrible amounts of magenta and purple into the blue levels of the image. In short: yuk.

So, yes, the photos will look a bit weird. There may be purplish hues, the blues will look all kinds of wrong and will leak into the shadows in the middle third of pictures, and I really, really need to go back to the Norwegian fjords so I can take some better photos. A plan exists to do this in 2021 but the world has a way of tossing spanners around so we’ll just have to wait and see on this.

Back to the excursion description:

Now your adventure begins as you hike for Hole to Storseterfossen Waterfall. […] The hike to the fall is at times somewhat steep and strenuous and takes approximately one hour. Dress appropriately, sturdy footwear, layered dress and windproof jacket are recommended. Bring a bottle of water.

Right. Let’s start with the word strenuous. The Crown Princess Norwegian Fjords cruise was the second cruise we’d ever been on. Cruises had been recommended to us originally by my in-laws and my wife’s uncle and aunt. Our first cruise had been the staggeringly awesome Diamond Princess cruise in Asia. Our experience on that cruise was that, yes, we weren’t fit, but we still climbed steps and took part in the moderately active excursion events while most of the ship’s passengers, like our cruise-suggesting relatives, were all far older than us, less mobile, and in many cases asleep by early evening. We made a bit of an assumption that when a cruise line therefore says “strenuous” they really mean “might take the old folk a little longer” and we’d be fine. A terrible assumption as it turned out. We had our first suspicion things were not going to be quite how we’d anticipated when we’d met up in the Princess Theatre ahead of the excursion and spotted nearly everyone else with backpacks, hiking sticks, rugged boots, and the determined look of seasoned fell-walkers. We glanced at each other. We grimaced. We shrugged.

Secondly, our day before this stop in Geiranger had seen us arrive in rain in Bergen. It hadn’t been warm. Norway is not known for being warm. We would be hiking into the mountains. Mountains are not known for being warm either. It had been recommended we wear windproof layers. On the day of our visit it was ridiculously warm; it was seven degrees warmer than Bergen had been and the hiking guides who met us at Hole remarked just how lucky we all were to be getting such lovely weather with blazing sunshine to accompany us all the way. Well, lovely weather unless you’re just about to exert yourself far more strenuously than you’d thought up a mountain.

We started the hike.

If you’ve read other travelogues on this site where we’ve gone off on a hike – we do it more often than we should – then you’ll probably already know that my wife has a long-standing set of injuries to her ankles and knees that make certain angles of walking painful. She perseveres because life is about experiences and just putting up with discomfort is part of the package. This did mean, though, that we very quickly started to lag behind the main group of hikers. I would frequently stop to take some photos of the Norwegian landscape and to check with my wife that she was okay (she wasn’t but showing concern infuriates her to the point of continuing anyway) and offering to turn around and head back on our own (and if looks could kill I’d have been blasted into atoms on a hill in Norway in 2013).

There were a couple of stops on the hike which mostly served to just let those who’d romped ahead have a break while we would clamber up a few minutes behind for a handful of seconds’ respite until the group all set off again.

We weren’t the only couple who were holding up the pace, though, and one couple had already realised the Geiranger hike was going to be too much for them and had notified the guides they’d head back to the ship. Since we had two guides and there was a core of hikers who could ascend with no difficulty at all one lot went on ahead with one guide while the rest of us took more time heading up behind them.

Almost exactly one hour after being dropped off at Hole (marker B on the map up the page) we caught our first sight of Storseterfossen Waterfall (marker C) across a narrow gorge. We could also see people above and walking behind it down a ledge to give it a sense of scale. We would soon be doing the same thing.

We had to walk a little farther up before crossing over the gorge and coming back down towards the waterfall. It was here that we caught up with the rest of our fellow hiking tourists from the cruise ship, sitting around on the grass and admiring the view. As numbers of people who could get behind the waterfall were limited and there were other hiking groups ahead of them it wasn’t us who’d held them up which was something of a relief. “Well, that was worth you all hurtling up the hillside at a breakneck pace then!” I thought, but didn’t say out loud because I don’t like talking to strangers – especially fit, active ones – and I was still a little bit out of breath.

My wife very much appreciated the chance to sit still and reduce the pain in her legs while I snapped photos from this high point of the hike, of the tree-covered hills, of the rocky peaks, of a mountain stream feeding the waterfall, and of the people we’d joined on this strenuous trek.

We finally got the signal from our guides and took the chance to head behind the waterfall. This involved a walk down a narrow and rocky ledge, not too tricky, not too steep, and with poles and a chain to prevent anyone from getting too close to the edge. Behind Storseterfossen there was a shallow cave, large enough to get a decent number of people in at once, and incredibly noisy as you can tell from the video below. It was also quite shocking just how fast and powerful the torrent of water cascading down the mountain at Geiranger was; when you see waterfalls at a distance they can mislead you as to how much force they hold.

From the hiking excursion description one last time:

After taking in the view, you’ll head downhill towards Westerås Farm, perched on a ledge above Geiranger. You’ll take a break at the farm for complimentary coffee or tea and waffles before your return hike to Hole where your bus awaits for your drive back to the pier.

We started on the downward return leg of the hike, covering part of the same route up. This was not considerably easier than it had been on the upward leg simply because my wife’s old injuries are actually more affected by downward angles when walking. In addition, the steps that we were able to use at points, which had been laid by Sherpas from Nepal (a task only completed the year after our visit to Norway), seemed to be at just that awkward height that makes every step down slightly jarring.

We eventually angled away on a different trail and it wasn’t too long before we came to Westerås Farm (marker D on the map). This was a small grouping of attractive, wooden buildings and plenty of sheep grazing on the hillside. One of the buildings housed a restaurant in which we could get the drink and snack we’d been promised, rest our feet for a bit, and take the obligatory handful of photos of the surroundings.

The “hike” back to Hole and our bus meeting point was, I’m happy to report, more aptly described as just a “walk” with the ground being mostly flat and only slightly downhill. Perfect for the end of a more-strenuous-than-anticipated excursion in our opinion.

I snapped a few photos on the walk back and a few more as we waited for the bus in our spectacular surroundings with its lovely views down onto Geiranger and along Geirangerfjord.

Reflecting on this excursion, we had a wonderful time and wouldn’t hesitate to recommend it. Yes, it was harder than we’d thought and that’s certainly something you should consider if you’re thinking of booking this during a cruise to Geiranger yourself, but it was all worth it. If you’re fit and you like hikes and you don’t have any impediments then you’ll love the views, and if you’ve never stood behind a waterfall before then it’s a fabulous place to do it. It helps to have nice weather, naturally, and we’d have appreciated it a smidge more if it had been a few degrees cooler but that’s such a small thing to mention.

We hopped back on the tender boat – an inside trip back to Crown Princess this time – and after freshening up (and we really needed freshening up) we enjoyed the early evening sailaway from Geiranger from our balcony. Yes, we’d seen most of these views on the cruise through the fjord earlier in the day but they’re not views you could ever get tired of seeing. We had another chance to see the Seven Sisters Waterfall and the perfect amount of calm beauty to observe to totally smooth out any stress aches and pains from the day’s hike.

The evening on Crown Princess was one that followed the same sort of pattern we enjoy on most cruise ships: food, drink, quizzes, and dancing (or people-watching) in the disco until the early hours. The next day of this Norwegian fjords cruise would see us dock at Olden where we were looking forward to a boat ride on a lake and a visit to see a glacier for the first time.

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 was incredibly windy during our visit, especially up on the viewing platform above the waterfall. Hoods were being whipped off if you turned the wrong way and just holding my phone up to try to record some video of Gullfoss (removed for now) from a good vantage point required two hands and me leaning hard against the railing for support.

Gullfoss is a waterfall along the Hvítá river in Iceland formed from a series of turns and drops into a canyon. While it had been intended at some point in the past to tap the waterfall for energy production it is now a protected, natural monument and open to visitors throughout the year. A wooden staircase allows everyone to descend and walk along the river then back up some the waterfall’s drops. Although it didn’t rain while we were in the canyon alongside Gullfoss the fierce wind often whipped the spray from the crashing water into us leaving us almost as wet anyway. Still, I managed to take some photos of the waterfall when I could.

A pseudo-HDR processed photo of Gullfoss emphasising the darkness of the day.

And I even managed a little bit more (removed) video of Gullfoss from a slightly less windswept position in the canyon. The short video shows the viewing platform on the cliff edge right at the end.

The conditions may have been calmer but the general weather was dull and overcast with occasional rain. The overall effect was to drain the colour from the surroundings which was a shame although pretty atmospheric.

As we got deeper into the channels the surrouding rock faces loomed larger and there was more low-lying cloud rolling between the peaks. The geology of the rocks was quite nice to look at but in terms of fjords the ones in Chile cannot compare to Norway’s offerings (or Alaska’s from what we’ve heard).

Most of the photos of the Chilean fjords were taken from our balcony as the cruise along them coincided with a period where there was nothing of interest to us taking place on the ship. We’d been informed over the tannoy when we were expected to arrive at the glacier so knew that we could get an afternoon quiz in just before then. We took advantage of this fortuitous timing to take a walk around the promenade just prior to this in order to get some fjord photos from a different perspective.

At times as we cruised along the fjords we would see distant mountains lit by the sunshine and we caught glimpses of other glaciers too. Waterfalls were a common sight as well and although they appeared small this was probably quite illusory on account of our distance from the rock faces down which they poured.

When the low clouds did make a reappearance they flowed softly around the tops of the very craggy rock faces we were cruising past and were fascinating to look at.

Our arrival at this part of Chile had been to low, grey cloud and poor visibility and with our day’s planned activities to include a trip up a volcano we were initially disappointed. However, as our guide pointed out, it was early in the day and the sun had not yet had time to burn off the cloud that had come down from the mountains and the mist that had come up off the sea and lakes in the area. He was proven right as just minutes before our arrival at the waterfalls the conditions seemed to completely change and blue sky lit the area.

The waterfalls are not your “thundering down the edge of a cliff”-type of natural feature but are, instead, described as “chute-type” which makes them far lower-lying. Nevertheless, they and the river were very pretty, with striking blue colours. With some sheer cliff edges around the area of the river and its falls we were in deep shade for a lot of the time at this viewpoint which allowed some of the cool mist to still be present just above the water. It also made light metering for photographs a bit tricky.

Probably more impressive than the waterfalls were the views of the relatively nearby volcano, Osorno, which was to be our next stop. Against the clear blue sky the volcano looked incredibly impressive.

We’d been told by our guide when we left the coach that because of the limited time at the tourist stop we should walk directly to the waterfalls and view of the volcano, then we’d have a better idea for how long it would take us to get back and so we could visit the souvenir shop and take in the landscape without being too rushed. As it was we had plenty of time looking at the Petrohué Waterfalls and Osorno Volcano so could saunter back at some leisure; we didn’t find anything at the souvenir shop here with much of it appearing mass-produced which doesn’t really appeal to us.

There were four good reasons to choose Fountains Abbey as a destination, those being its proximity to where we were staying, the fact it’s a National Trust property and we’re members, it’s an ancient ruin and we’re fond of them, and it – along with Studley Royal Park in the vicinity – is a UNESCO World Heritage Site and we love ticking them off the list.

The abbey and gardens are about ten minutes from the centre of Ripon by car, well sign-posted and easy to get to. As National Trust members we didn’t have to pay anything (the same is true for English Heritage members) but general admission adult prices are about £15 with children half that and family tickets available too. On the walk to the abbey itself we first came upon Fountains Hall, an early 17th century country house built from the stone of the abbey ruins. Its 20th century history is quite interesting with it undergoing some modernisation in the late 1920s and it housing guests such as the future King George VI and Queen Elizabeth, The Queen Mother, friends of the owners at that time, the Vyners. During World War II the building was co-opted to serve as housing for evacuees and was used as a sanitorium.

As you exit Fountains Hall there is a distinctive memorial window above a stone staircase leading down. Elizabeth and Charles were children of Commander Clare George Vyner and Lady Doris Hilda Vyner. The lower inscription reads:

Elizabeth Vyner WRNS [Women’s Royal Naval Service] Died on Active Service June 3rd 1942 Aged 18 years. Also her brother Charles De Grey Vyner Sub Lieut (A) RNVR [Royal Naval Volunteer Reserve] Reported missing from Air Operations Off Rangoon May 2nd 1945 Aged 19 Years.

From the hall we made our way the short distance towards the abbey ruins but decided to take a look around the small area of land to the west of it first which contained some streams with attractive, stone bridges crossing them and assorted buildings. Of odd interest was the Chinese-like dragon bas-relief we found at one of the buildings; the reason for its presence eludes me.

To Fountains Abbey itself now which was founded in 1132 on the back of a falling out in the Benedictine abbey located in York which led to 13 monks seeking to form a new abbey for themselves. After initially being granted land by the archbishop the monks sought to join the Cistercian order whereby they received instructions how to perform the various rituals specific to that Christian group as well as how to build religious buildings in accordance with Cistercian architectural practice, that being a more simple layout with no distracting features and very limited religious adornments. Originally built from wood, Fountains Abbey was soon replaced with stone from the region, some of it mandated following an attack on the building in 1146 by a group unhappy at the religious and political decisions of the abbot at the time.

After a few years of struggling Fountains Abbey attracted generous donations from wealthy benefactors partly on account of its good work for the poor in the area and it was able to buy additional land, set up granges, and employ labourers to work the more outlying areas that the brothers could not easily reach. The River Skell through the land made an ideal spot to set up a mill which could be used to mill the grain brought in from the granges. By the late 13th century Fountains Abbey had an efficient connection of estates under its ownership and was turning a handsome profit.

In the early 14th century a reduction in the number of labourers that could be employed, perhaps attributed to worsening relations with Scotland and Scottish raids as far south as York, led to a change in the way that Fountains Abbey was run as it could no longer adequately control farming. Laws that had prevented the leasing of religious property had been relaxed in the centuries before so the abbey started doing so with its more distant land and consolidating its nearer assets. By 1535 Fountains Abbey was the richest Cistercian monastery in England. Sadly for the monks, within four years they would surrender the abbey as part of Henry VIII‘s Dissolution Of The Monasteries. Some of the materials of the site – stone, timber, and lead – were sold by the new owner to offset his purchase of the land and Fountains Abbey began its decline into ruin.

The UNESCO World Heritage Site doesn’t just consist of the ruins, though. To the east and north of Fountains Abbey is Studley Royal Park which provides for a pleasant walk along the route of the River Skell. This area mainly consists of green lawns running alongside the river with paths that lead to it and also out to the deer park. Trees in the park include limes, oaks, and sweet chestnuts.

Studley Royal Water Garden was created by John Aislabie in 1718 who had inherited Studley Royal through his mother’s family. Aislabie had a passion for garden landscaping and set about introducing a natural look to the grounds of the estate as well as incorporating the water garden: an elegant series of canals, ponds, cascades, statues, and follies.

Aislabie was an interesting character who had been a notable MP, achieving such positions as Lord of the Admiralty, Treasurer of the Navy, and Chancellor of the Exchequer. It was in that lattermost role that he was partly responsible for the famous South Sea Bubble that eventually saw him resign, get expelled from the House, and spend some time imprisoned in the Tower of London for accepting money from the South Sea Company to push the bill through parliament. MPs getting imprisoned for taking money from private enterprises that screw over the country? Whoever thought such a thing was even possible? Good times, people, good times.

On the west side of the river through the park is a tearoom, ideally located for a break after exploring the abbey and wandering the park paths, where we enjoyed a drink and a cake which I’m sure was delicious but which I neglected to take a photo of. We then followed the riverside path back for some last views at Fountains Abbey before leaving.

Fountains Abbey and Studley Royal Park is just our sort of British historical site to explore; some old architecture, some lovely history, and beautiful views. You can easily spend several hours there and there were parts of the estate that we didn’t even touch on such as the church and the deer park. It’s definitely worth a visit and we’re probably overdue a return trip to the lovely location.

Gray Line tours depart from their main office to the north east of the capital city just across the water from the island of Videy. It is possible to make your own way there for the departure time but free pick-ups are provided around Reykjavík too using minibuses. Our pick-up was just a few minutes walk from our hotel at Bus Stop Number 1 – Ráðhúsið/City Hall. It’s worth noting if you’re looking at a map or arriving at the location that there are bus stops on both sides of the road but as far as we could tell – and certainly as far as we were concerned – tour buses were picking people up only from the southern side. Our excursion was due to start at 09:00 which meant pick-ups were commencing from 08:30 and when we arrived just before then there were a lot of people already waiting and trying to find somewhere that the wind wasn’t striking them quite so violently. We initially thought everyone was going on the same tour as us but it soon became apparent that there were at least a dozen different groups getting ready to explore the Icelandic landscape somewhere with different companies.

Of course, with this being Iceland in December it was dark at 08:30. And cold. Very, very cold.

Our minibus eventually turned up, our names were checked, we got aboard, were whisked across to the main office, transferred to the big bus, and very soon after 09:00 were on our way eastwards out of the city then south towards the coast. It was still dark but the sun was starting to create some lovely colours on the horizon.

Hvolsvöllur

The first stop was at the small town of Hvolsvöllur. This was strictly a toilet and refreshments break as there was very little else to see or do where we parked. But that’s a relative term when you’re talking about Iceland because the views are always spectacular in some way wherever you are, and since we neither required the use of the loo nor picking up anything to eat or drink, having sensibly done the latter at the shop near our hotel before we left, I snapped a few images of the Icelandic landscape while everyone else sunk some coffee and grabbed snacks.

Eyjafjallajökull

We passed Seljalandsfoss on our left hand side – this would be the last place we would visit during our return to Reykjavík later in the day – then made a stop by the roadside a while after, a photo opportunity to take pictures of Eyjafjallajökull. The almost unpronounceable Eyjafjallajökull is an ice cap which feeds several glaciers in the region. It’s far more famous, though, as being on top of the stratovolcano that erupted in 2010 and caused huge disruption to air travel around Iceland.

The long shadows cast by the sun slowly creeping into the sky were fabulous.

Skógafoss Waterfall

The next stop on our tour of southern Iceland was the first of the two waterfalls we would be visiting, Skógafoss. Its 60 metre drop makes it one of the largest waterfalls in Iceland and even if you’ve not visited it in person you might have still seen it anyway as it featured as a location in the movie Thor: The Dark World.

With the low, weak sun coming from the south our view of the waterfall and the huge amount of spray it was throwing up was accompanied by a rainbow. The waterfall area formed a small valley and the wind was bitterly cold as it thundered down it. Taking photos was a case of removing gloves for the briefest of seconds to take the picture then immediately replacing them and rubbing the fingers for warmth. That spray and the wind were the reasons we didn’t want to venture too close to Skógafoss although plenty of people did. If I hadn’t had my camera with me then I might have done so too. But when don’t I have my camera with me?

There are steps to the right side of Skógafoss that lead up to a viewing platform and form part of a walking route that heads as far back to the west as Eyjafjallajökull. Because of our tour duration limits we would only really have had time to climb to the top then come back down and with the light falling on the waterfall the way it was I decided we’d get better views from ground level. At a different time of the year or even day I might have made the ascent.

All that water cascading off Skógafoss has to go somewhere and it was into a river that flowed surprisingly slowly to the south of us. You can see just how cold it was from the lumps of ice floating downstream and the shallow edge closest to where we were was frozen over completely which encouraged some people to even walk on it and take photos.

In the second post covering this south coast of Iceland tour I’ll include the next two stops – the village of Vík and the black sand beach at Reynisfjara – and the third post will conclude this excellent Gray Line excursion with an unexpected stop at the Sólheimajökull glacier before our second waterfall of the day and the place we’d passed a little earlier, 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.

Although it’s called a palace it’s really just a country house, albeit one on a huge scale and with sprawling grounds and gardens to explore. At the time of our visit it wasn’t possible to take photographs inside the building itself so the pictures accompanying this post will simply cover the exterior spaces.

After you’ve parked your car there is a walk of around two hundred metres until you reach the East Courtyard where you can find the ubiquitous tourist attraction souvenir shop. Proceeding through that courtyard you then reach the main courtyard and main views of the building. Built in the very early part of the eighteenth century in the not-very-well-known and short-lived English Baroque style, Blenheim was designed by Sir John Vanbrugh and intended as a reward for military successes against the French by the First Duke of Marlborough whose family name of Churchill (later Spencer-Churchill) you’ll likely be familiar with. Indeed, Winston Churchill was born in Blenheim Palace.

We briefly headed away from the palace building where a long road stretched out ahead, crossing over the River Glyme and leading towards a distant monument. After consulting the map we had at the time we ultimately decided not to make the walk to see what was in the distance but if we had then we would have discovered that it was the Column of Victory and the wording on its base (source: Wikisource) reads:

Most Gracious Sovereign, Whereas the Eminent and Unparalleled Services Performed to Your Majesty and the Crown of ENGLAND by the most Noble IOHN Duke of MARLBOROUGH are well known not only to Your Majesty and all Your Subjects but to all EUROPE, who will always Remember That the Alliances which Your Majesty’s Royal Brother King WILLIAM the Third of Glorious Memory, had, in a little time before His Death Contracted by the Ministry of the said Duke of MARLBOROUGH as His Majesty’s Ambassador Extraordinary and Plenipotentiary to the STATES-GENERAL of the United-Provinces for Preserving the Liberties of EUROPE against the Ambition of FRANCE, were immediately after Your Majesty’s Happy Accession to the Throne by the said Duke, then Imployed by Your Majesty in the same Character, Confirmed and Improved, and others were Contracted, whereby the Confederacy which had been Dissolved at the End of the last War, was Reunited in a Stricter and Firmer League; And that in the First Year of Your Majesty’s Reign, the said Duke of MARLBOROUGH did so well execute the Commission and Orders which He received from Your Majesty as Captain-General and Commander in Chief of Your Majesty’s Forces, That He not only Secured and Extended the Frontier of HOLLAND by Taking the Towns and Fortresses of VENLO, RUREMOND, STEVENSWAERT and LIEGE, but soon obliged the Enemy (who had been at the Gates of NIMEGHEN) to seek Shelter behind their Lines.

Yes, so let’s not hear any more crap about me writing long, run-on sentences on this site any more, okay?

There is another reason to head towards the column, though, and that is that just beyond the bridge, among the trees to the left, there is a tree called the Harry Potter Tree as it featured in one of the films. If you’re a fan of the franchise of books or movies then you might enjoy the experience of seeing it in real life but we didn’t know about it at the time and sufficed ourselves with some simple landscape views from near the courtyard gates.

We headed back to the main building of Blenheim Palace and me being me, photos were taken. The weather during our visit threatened to rain for the entire time but never quite managed it, thankfully.

As stated near the top of this post we weren’t able to take pictures inside the palace during our visit but as we entered through the main portico we noticed some highly unusual artwork adorning the ceiling: three blue eyes and three brown eyes. These were at the behest of the second wife of the ninth Duke of Marlborough and their combined history as it pertains to Blenheim Palace is very interesting indeed.

The ninth duke was Charles Spencer-Churchill who inherited Blenheim and his title in 1892 at a time of near-bankruptcy for the estate. His solution to those financial problems was to marry into money, and the wealthy Vanderbilt family liked the idea of having a duchess in the family so a marriage of not-quite-convenience was enforced upon Consuelo Vanderbilt. There was no love in the union even though it did produce two sons (referred to by their mother as “the heir and the spare”), by 1906 Consuelo had left her husband, and by 1921 they were divorced.

However, during the late 1890s a French-American woman who had become friends with Consuelo also moved into Blenheim Palace. This was Gladys Deacon and she was destined to become Charles’ mistress then wife for a short time from 1921 to 1926. Gladys had a reputation as something of a beauty with many men said to fall in love with her, and she had an artistic eye too; and it’s her eyes in blue that decorate the portico of the building. It’s not the only striking presence of Gladys you can find in the grounds of Blenheim, though, as you’ll see in pictures from the water terraces later. The marriage became strained when Charles converted to Roman Catholicism and Gladys reportedly carried a loaded gun with her to protect her from the duke.

After our visit inside the building we headed outside to explore the gardens and grounds surrounding Blenheim Palace. Adjacent to each wing of the building is a formal garden. We started on the southwestern side of the palace which held the Water Terraces. As the name implies these were a series of ponds and fountains set over a couple of levels leading down from the building to the river running alongside the property.

The central, paved area of the lower terrace was flanked by some interesting sculptures: sphinxes with the head of Gladys Deacon. She was most certainly a character.

From the Water Terraces we followed a path along the River Glyme and this led us in short order to the Rose Garden.

I’m not the biggest fan of flowers in general – they’re pretty, they serve a useful purpose, but I just don’t find them particularly interesting beyond macro photography of their petals from time to time – and for some reason roses are amongst the flowers I like least. That’s just the way I am. This is my way of explaining that we didn’t stay long in the rose garden although if it’s something that excites you there looked to be plenty of varieties of rose growing.

We continued in the direction we’d been taking and this brought us to the Grand Cascade. The cascade is one of a number of cascades in the grounds and was created when the river was dammed during the fourth Duke of Marlborough’s ownership in order to create the lake at Blenheim Palace and transform the landscape into a quintessentially English one under the guidance of Capability Brown.

We made our way back to the main building, passing briefly through the Water Terrace garden area once more where I amused myself taking one of the photos of the statues, then onto the Italian Gardens off the northeastern wing. Overall, this was a much more subdued garden with all the showiness present in the interesting topiary of the hedges and of the somewhat gaudy fountain in the middle of the central pond.

Next stop on our tour of the grounds of Blenheim Palace was the Secret Garden, a pleasant and secluded area with pond and a small waterfall and some stones with interesting markings on them.

Leaving the secret garden I was clearly possessed of the urge to get some photos of statues and patterns amongst the tiles and pillars and columns of the nearby buildings featured heavily too. When you get the urge, you get the urge.

The East Gate of Blenheim Palace is worth a quick mention from an architectural point-of-view as you might notice that its upper half tapers slightly. The effect isn’t noticeable from a distance but as a person walks towards and through the gate this design helps to create an illusion of taller and thus more impressive edifice.

Our final stop was at the Marlborough Hedge Maze. Basically, if there’s a maze in a place then we’re going to have a go at the maze. If there’s a choice of visiting two places and one of them has a maze then the maze place will win a visit from us. We’re fond of a maze is the gist of what I’m getting at here. The hedge maze at Blenheim Palace is made from yew trees and while I can’t remember precisely how we did on our visit I can be fairly certain we didn’t get trapped.

If you get decent weather that doesn’t prevent you from enjoying the grounds and gardens as well as the main house then you can easily spend half a day or more at Blenheim Palace and it’s well worth paying it a visit to do so.