Iceland: Strokkur Geyser

On our third day in Iceland, the kids woke up all excited because they saw SNOWFLAKES. I mean this is May 3rd! Good thing we brought our warmest coats with us. 

Nevertheless we were a bit apprehensive going out that day because the wind was outrageous. It was freezing! We drove to the place only twenty minutes away where we could visit the famous Strokkur Geyser. This area has a few geysers and only one of them is THE original geyser. But it's pretty unpredictable on when it erupts. In 1845 this geyser reached the height of 170 meters! In the 90s, it would erupt sometimes sending water 70 meters up into the air. And then in 2000, after an earthquake, it was reaching the height of 120 m for two days, but then slowly decreased its activity. And I don't think we have seen much since 2003. 

The last point is the most important one.

As we were walking, we were pretty much being blown over by the wind. There was one part on the walk way where we had to run and watch out for any hot water sprays from the erupting geyser. 

First we saw the Littl' Geyser:))

But for real we came to see STROKKUR! The most active volcano in Iceland. 

As we walked up to it, we saw right away this huge pillar of water erupting. 

It was amazing! 

We wanted to get a full experience of watching it erupt from the very beginning, so we had to wait a few minutes (it erupts every 7-10 min).

So we waited. 

And then there was a little false alarm, a tiny spit of a geyser. 

We waited a bit more. Freezing:)

And then this amazing sight! Nothing to compare it to--incredible. 

It went up so high, and the wind picked up, that Alex got a bit nervous it was going to spray him as he was standing pretty close, although behind the barrier line. 

Up to 30 meteres into the air.

And then it started to calm down. 

And back to normal.

As you can see, this is the area with a few of the geysers. I can't quite remember which geyser is right behind us... 

And this is the Original Geyser, the one after which all other geysers were named after. 

After this 25 minute experience, we went inside the visitors' center and did some "shopping", I mean..."window shopping". Iceland is very expensive. We kind of gauge things by how expensive country's magnets are. Here they were around $7-8 each (and normally you can get them for $3-4 in most places).

And that was just the beginning of our day.

Lyana.