Golden Circle Classic: Eight Hours, Two Centimetres a Year, Down to Kerid's Lake

Eight hours, a minibus with Wi-Fi, and enough time at each stop to walk rather than photograph and leave. The first stop is Hveragerði, 45 minutes out, for the restrooms. There is a bakery there, and an exhibition about earthquakes, which in this town is a local subject rather than a general one. Gullfoss takes the Hvítá, a glacial river coming off Langjökull, over two steps. Several viewing platforms look at it from different angles, and the Gullfoss centre above has restrooms, a cafeteria and shops. One seasonal note: the path that goes all the way up to the waterfall is closed in winter. The hot spring field at Haukadalur is where Geysir is. Geysir used to be a geyser and no longer performs; Strokkur, which does, goes about every five minutes. Lunch happens here, with time to walk the area, and the Geysir centre has the restaurant Glíma, which caters for most diets. Þingvellir is the long stop. The rift valley runs between the North American and Eurasian plates, which are moving apart at about 2 cm a year under the park. It is where Norse settlers established the Alþingi Íslendinga in 930 AD, the oldest parliament in the modern world, and UNESCO listed it in 2004. There is time to walk into the rift itself. Kerið closes the day: a volcanic formation 6,500 years old, with moss, red rock and pale blue water in the same frame. The path down to the lake is worth taking.