Two Days in West Iceland: Snaefellsnes, the Lifting Stones and Vidgelmir

Two days across the west, with a night in Borgarnes between them. Day one is the Snæfellsnes peninsula. Pick-up is between 8:30 and 9:00, and the drive out runs along Hvalfjörður, the Whale Fjord, with a break at Borgarnes. Ytri-Tunga is a farm with a beach where seals haul out. Búðakirkja, the black church, is the one many people will tell you is the most beautiful in Iceland. Arnarstapi is a natural harbour with rock formations and moss in green and yellow, and the feel of a remote fishing village. At Lóndrangar two basalt columns stand on the coast, visible from the road, with cliffs behind them full of nesting birds. Djúpalónssandur is a black beach inside Snæfellsjökull National Park, and it holds something specific: four lifting stones, used to test the strength of the fishermen who worked here. They are still on the sand. The road then circles Snæfellsjökull itself, a stratovolcano under a glacier cap, one of the more powerful in Iceland and not active now. Kirkjufell and Kirkjufoss close the day, and if the mountain looks familiar it has been in a good deal of film and television, Game of Thrones included. Borgarnes is where day one ends, with its Saga Exhibition and, in season, a decent chance of the northern lights. Day two is the Silver Circle: Hraunfossar, where the water comes out of the Hallmundarhraun lava field over ledges of less porous rock and falls into the Hvítá; Barnafoss just upstream, named for two children who died crossing the stone bridge that used to span it; the Viðgelmir lava cave, just short of 1,600 metres and one of the largest in Iceland, on a 90-minute expedition; Deildartunguhver, the highest-flow hot spring in Europe; and the Sturlureykir horse farm, with rúgbrauð baked in the ground and coffee.