On the road to Seyðisfjörður

If you are getting weary of photos of waterfalls, you may want to skip this post.  We can't help it; Iceland has so many spectacular waterfalls that we can't stop taking photos of them!  This one was just by the roadside; it didn't even have a sign or a name that we could tell.  There was a pull-off on the side of the road and a short path leading up to it:

We stopped for a picnic lunch at Gugufoss and had the whole place to ourselves for about an hour before another carload of tourists came by.

We have left the ring road for a slight detour to the small town of Seyðisfjörður on the Eastern edge of Iceland.  It's tucked in a valley between two high mountain plateaus with a fjord that serves as a harbor for the weekly ferry coming from Denmark and the Faroe islands.  About 700 people live here year round.

Tourism has really been increasing in Iceland in recent years, and the country is creatively trying to keep up with demand for hotel rooms.  So far we have stayed in lodgings at two converted former post offices, a converted university dorm, a working farm, and tonight we are staying in a hostel that was once the town hospital.  They built a new modern hospital right next door, and converted the old one into Halfaldan Hostel.

Can you guess which is the hostel and which is the hospital?

Just on the edge of town we took a hike up the hillside where blue lupines were growing like crazy.  It's an invasive species that was brought to the country to stop soil erosion.  Unfortunately they take valuable real estate away from the native wildflowers and plants...they sure are pretty, though.

And in case you haven't seen enough photos of waterfalls, here's the one we were rewarded with at the end of our hike: