Iceland

Thingvellir National Park, Iceland

Iceland was not a place on my bucket list so how did I not only end up there but end up there in winter? Like most 20 something people, my son plays online computer games. One of them is Eve Online. The developers of Eve Online live in Iceland and they were hosting the 7th Annual Worldwide Eve Online Convention – in Iceland – in March. My son wanted to go and wanted a traveling companion. The package price for the trip was good (it was March), there were scenic tours for traveling companions, and there were a even couple of lecture/video shows on computer generated skin and clothing that looked interesting so off we went.

I didn’t take many photos and half of them were taken on the way to or from Iceland. With heavy overcast skies in Iceland (the sun only broke through for half a day) and snow on the ground, photography in Iceland was a challenge. The overcast kept the glare off of my snow scenes but a lot of the countryside looked pretty desolate. Fortunately, the sun broke out just as the tour bus driver stopped to let us take photos of Icelandic ponies.

I had crystal clear skies on the flight from San Jose to Seattle and we flew farther inland than usual. I got excellent photos of three of the Cascade volcanos that you rarely see from the air, Crater Lake, Mt. Theilsen and Mt. Jefferson. I also got some nice photos of the Port of Seattle as we were landing.

You can check out my Iceland trip photos in my Iceland istockphoto lightbox. There are a couple of waterfall videos in there too. They are the thumbnails with the TV icons below them.