BoyleSports Games Winner Goes Beyond The Wall In Iceland

DL from Dublin was the lucky winner of a once-in-a-lifetime trip to Iceland earlier this year in BoyleSports Games’ ‘Beyond The Wall’ competition.

She shares her incredible experience and memories from her trip in October with us below…

Our first day was a free day so we left our hotel, the Natura Icelandair Hotel, and set about exploring Reykavik with its quirky little shops, bars and cafes. We had a fun day shopping, a nice meal and relaxed for the evening in preparation for the adventure ahead of us!

The following morning we took an early domestic flight to Akureyri, were we landed on a small air-strip in a fjord covered in snow – which was very picturesque! Here we took a taxi to our hotel, which was beautiful. Located only 60 kilometers from the Arctic Circle, the mountains in the area are often capped with snow year round, and in the winter they offer some of the best skiing in the country.

After check-in we walked through the snow down the steep hills to a little fishing village with all its little wooden quaint buildings and spent the day exploring, all capped off with a delicious meal and a few drinks!

Day 3 meant our next stop would be the magical places were the latest series of Game of Thrones were filmed.

Our very friendly guide arrived to take us on our Game Of Thrones ‘Beyond the Wall’ tour. Our first stop in Narourland Eystra was at the waterfall Godafoss, which was really amazing and surrounded by snow.

We were told the history of the area then on to the the mud pots at Namafjall. The smell of sulphur was very strong and we saw the moon-like craters, beautiful glaciers, hot springs and lava stacks of Dimmuborgir and were told the story of the Yule Tide lads.

We were taken to where they shot the series and saw areas that should you watch the programme – you will recognize the Krafla volcanic area.

The weather was very changeable and made our day more effective with our last stop being the Myvatn Nature Baths – a fab end to a fantastic day. Our guide was excellent and the tour was out of this world – we really loved this!

The next day we departed Northern Iceland and flew back to Reykjavik where we had organised a trip to the Golden Circle. Here we saw the geysers, then on to Gulfoss Waterfall another amazing wonder before visiting Thingvellir where we saw the diverging tectonic plates of America and Europe meet. After another enjoyable day we relaxed in the spa with a bottle of bubbly at our hotel!

On our final day we were up early and off we went whale watching! We saw a mink whale, then after returning to the old harbour we went to the blue lagoon for the afternoon. This was another great day which we ended with a Northern Lights tour. Another amazing night to top off our trip!