The Golden Circle Through an Amateur's Lens Quiz

Quiz Answer Key and Fun Facts

1. Since I had a long day available and was not bound by bus tour schedules, I chose to take in a few side roads into the variable, rugged landscape. In the foreground, we see some volcanic rock being conquered by early plant life. The reddish brown color is actually sand and rubble overgrown with what kind of first-stage plant life?

Answer: Lichen

Iceland, as a geologically very young volcanic region (the Reykjavik area is in many places less than ten thousand years old), is still in an early stage of vegetation development throughout most of the country even though the climate could well support much more advanced forms such as coniferous forests.

Lichen consists of a symbiotic relationship of a fungus (which has the capability to adhere to and break the rock surfaces) and an alga (which provides photosynthesis and thus energy). It is the first stage of plant life on most kinds of rock, preparing it for more advanced growths. As is visible in the picture, this early stage coexists on a very small geographic scale with more advanced stadia already featuring a thin topsoil and grass. The small grass patches between the lichen are really just that - a few grams of soil carried by the wind and the water and resting on the raw rocks but they also help in further breaking the rocky surfaces and creating more fertile land.

2. My first long stop was at the small village of Geysir, the namesake for erupting thermal springs around the world. Unfortunately, the great geysir only erupts a few times per day and without a predictable schedule, so I had to be content with the slightly less impressive but still powerful specimen shown here. What is its name?

Answer: Strokkur

Due to the horizontal image format, I chose to show the Strokkur geyser in a very early phase of its eruption. The hot water and steam from below have just broken through the surface of the pool and are violently being propelled upwards, reaching a height of up to 50 meters and then taking the typical geyser fountain shape. An eruption is preceded by several characteristic oscillations in the pool surface with the water almost draining and rising back several times. Litli is a small geyser a few dozen meters away, Haukadalur is the valley all these geysers are located in and Kj�lur is the adjacent highland.

3. Out of the several dozen hot springs and vents for volcanically heated water at Geysir, only three are of the erupting kind. The still ones are however every bit as fascinating, as this brightly colored specimen here shows. What is the reason for this intense color?

Answer: Blue-green algae

The algae present in this pond, as well as in the world famous "Blue Lagoon" spa using the same kind of geothermal water, are diatom algae. They incorporate silicic acid which creates this intense blue hue best viewed in bright sunlight. The presence of life should however not make anyone think that this water would be lukewarm - it still has a temperature of approximately 60�C (140F).

4. As this image shows, tourists never seem able to resist throwing coins into fountains, not even such beautiful and natural ones as those at Geysir. Also, most of these coins are not worth much, as in the case of the coin most commonly found tossed at Geysir. Which silver Icelandic coin am I talking about?

Answer: 10 Kronor

While there have been some talks in Iceland about joining the European Union and the Euro currency, so far, there have been no movements in this direction. The Icelandic Crown (Krona, plural Kronor) has a value of just under one cent. Icelandic coinage includes the silver-colored one and ten crown pieces (with the one crown being very small and not very commonly used) and the brass-colored 50 and 100 crowns. Don't yield to the temptation to grab a handful of coins from this particular fountain - you'd come out with nicely boiled skin as the temperature of the water is above 80�C / 160F!

5. Just a few kilometers from Geysir, nothing reminds us of the hot water, instead, even on a bright summer day, it can feel quite chilly at Gullfoss, one of the most grandiose waterfalls in Europe. Just how high, however, is the pictured final and largest step of this waterfall down into the ravine?

Answer: 21 meters (69 ft)

Although it does look deeper, the ravine as a whole has only a depth of 32 meters. The water falls in two steps, first an 11-meter step which is not quite vertical and then this massive, practically vertical, 21 meter step creating a huge amount of spray.

At 140 cubic meters per second is summer and about half that in winter, the amount of water falling is only about one fifteenth of Niagara Falls, but in a far more concentrated area. Visitors can get very close to the upper part of the falls, making for several spectacular views.

6. I was already on the way out when Gulfoss decided to show itself to me in the most beautiful way possible - with a bright and color-intense rainbow arching over the waterfall. What is the most likely time of day you can have this kind of luck while standing on the path leading partway down into the ravine, close to the falls?

Answer: Middle afternoon - around 4 pm

When viewing Gullfoss, you are standing on the western side of the ravine (there is no access from the east). To get a rainbow, you need the sun behind yourself in the west or southwest and still sufficiently high to shine deep into the ravine. Your best chances to get all of these and good weather exist in the summer months, May to August, around 4 pm. (Wikipedia has another nice image of the falls with a rainbow, taken from the ravine edge and from a more southern direction)

7. Driving back from Gulfoss, I had the advantage of not going by bus but in a regular car, meaning that from Laugarvatn, I could take a scenic gravel road (number 365) to my next destination. The passage shown here leads to a rather unexpected, breathtaking sight just beyond the hilltop - which one?

Answer: Thingvallavatn, a large, beautiful lake

There are several reasons to do the Golden Circle on your own, in a rental car, instead of taking a bus trip, but probably the best reasons are that you can take it in the far less traveled counterclockwise direction (avoiding the masses) and that you can use the 365 road - a winding, roller coaster-like gravel road that seems to be straight from the imagination of an evil road rally track designer.

The high point of combining these two comes when you, within a few seconds, leave the arid hillscape behind you and the sunlit Thingvallavatn lake appears below, stretching as far as you can look. If you're lucky enough to arrive just at the right time with the sun almost straight in front of you, you'll be gazing at an expanse of what looks like pure liquid gold.

8. Thingvallavatn lies at the foot of a site that is not only of pure natural beauty but also has a historic significance that reaches beyond its extreme importance for Iceland itself. The path shown here is part of the site and less than 200 meters away from the original site of the world's oldest what?

Answer: Parliament

Thingvellir (spelled �ingvellir in Icelandic) was the original meeting site of the Al�ingi - a true parliament in the modern sense with both legislative and judicial powers. It was established in the 10th century and met every year. It was presided over by the Lawspeaker, who had to know the entire law of the country by heart and recite it in entirety, for all to hear, from the so called "Law Rock" over the course of his three-year term. Law Rock is just off the path to the right. Today, there is a wooden platform mounted around it so you can stand at the same place as the Lawspeaker of almost 1,100 years ago.

9. On a historic site like Thingvellir, the national flag is of course being flown. At sunset, the flag has to be lowered just like in other countries. If you could zoom in and see the flag in the man's hands, what main color would you see?

Answer: Blue

The layout of the Icelandic flag includes the typical Scandinavian cross. The dimensions and shapes are exactly those of the Norwegian flag, but the red and blue are exchanged. The colors stand for the three natural forces omnipresent everywhere in the country - volcanoes, ice and the Atlantic.

10. Finally, even the most beautiful trip has to end. I am driving back to where I started from, but in the evening twilight I manage to take one last memorable picture. The body of water seen here is actually the Atlantic Ocean, but which city can be seen on the other side of the bay?

Answer: Reykjavik

While the Golden Circle day tour encompasses some of the most fascinating places in Iceland, the main reason it sees so many visitors is its proximity to the capital, Reykjavik. Over eighty percent of Icelanders live in Reykjavik or one of its suburbs and it is the only city close to a major international airport.

When you come back to Reykjavik at the end of a long day filled with fascinating natural sights, you will at first see the (very clean and idyllic) city skyline over the bay, warmly welcoming you back until you want to set out again and see more.

Source: Author WesleyCrusher

This quiz was reviewed by FunTrivia editor Terry before going online.
Any errors found in FunTrivia content are routinely corrected through our feedback system.

The Golden Circle is a day tour of the most memorable sights of southwest Iceland. I did this tour in Summer 2007 by car, enjoying these places at my own pace and snapping a few shots not always from the same angle as in the tourist brochures.

NEXT>

NEXT>

NEXT>

NEXT>

NEXT>

NEXT>

NEXT>

NEXT>

NEXT>