Honeymoon - London: Highlights

Since London is a big city, most of the time was spent shopping and some sightseeing. 
There were a lot of  museums, churches and historical sites, so we only picked and chose what we were interested cause there were just too many! 

Highlights were:
Warner Bro Studio Tour of the Making of Harry Potter
Oxford day trip
Tour of Windsor Castle, Stonehedge and Bath
I love the city of Bath!  

Oh, and I only watched Harry Potter only when we decided to go for the tour and I did a marathon the night before, all the way to during flight. We didn't sleep because we immediately followed the Finland timing so we can minimise the jet lag. It helps!

Here's my highlights :)  

The butter beer taste great, although I don't know what's the ingredient! I asked, they say it's a secret.

Oh, did you know - The movies that always show the "London Bridge" is actually not London Bridge! It's called Tower Bridge. The bridge opposite this Tower Bridge is London Bridge which is not spectacular.... 

This marks the end of our Honeymoon blogging. This took very long! 

It is definitely a memorable trip and journey with this boy, he obliged to my one-month honeymoon and he took a lot of effort to plan! Thank you! :) 

Honeymoon - London: Liverpool Legends Charity Match

One of the highlights that I die die wanted to do was watching a live Liverpool match. So we planned our trip around that only match. 

So, we took a train early in the morning from London Euston to Liverpool Lime Street station which is around 2+ hours. Then we toured around the city, mainly the dock area. 

Only did I realised on that day that The Beatles were formed in Liverpool! Being tourist, we took a touristy photo of course... 

After that we had lunch and made our way to Anfield Stadium. There were pre-match activities and when we reached there, there were roadside stalls selling street food and souvenirs. The atmosphere was bustling and hyped! 

We couldn't get the VIP tickets so we bought the best we could... I had goosebumps when the match started because everyone stood up and sang the Liverpool anthem. It was loud and very motivating. It was like NDP except maybe louder.

Soon, the match ended in a blink of an eye. We lingered around to take more photos and savour every moment. 

As we had some time to spare and Everton Stadium was nearby, we decided to walk over and take some photos. 

That was the end of the our day, and we took the train back to downtown. 

It was a memorable experience for me, and I would totally go for another match again if there was a chance! 

Honeymoon - Iceland: Hofn, glacier lagoon, Skogafoss

Our next 2 days we travelled even further, which I think not many tourist did so during winter. Usually what I've heard is people going to the golden circle that's all. 
What I really enjoyed was the relaxing freedom to go a few places and spend more time rather that being rushed around. Plus, having a car is a benefit. 

I know it's just ice, but I feel amazed by such nature wonders, super big ice rock melting as the winter goes away. 
I may not like extreme coldness, but somehow I realise I like winter because it gives a cozy feel and reminds me of Christmas. 

Along the way we saw Icelandic horses! We decided to stop by and take some photos! Icelandic horses are smaller in size, like pony like, but they are called horses. 
Such a beauty.

Our last stop was Skogafoss, and when we went there, it was drizzling quite a fair bit. 

The next day was our final leg, London! Will document some of the highlights instead of a daily post! Please be patient! 

Honeymoon - Iceland: Glacier walk

This morning was our ice cave and glacier walk hiking!
The meeting point was at Skaftafell as well, the same place we went trails yesterday. 
We booked with Iceland Mountain Guides and the guide that day was really friendly and explained everything so well. 

Unfortunately they told us beforehand that the ice cave is unsafe due to weather conditions so we had a refund back of our money. So sad. 

We spent quite a bit of time gearing up and double checking that we put on correctly and the technique when walking on ice. 

Melting glacier creating gaps

Walking on glacier was really an experience for me. How often you get a chance to do this?! And seeing our nature forms, the climate change resulting in the ice structure changes, I appreciate even more the impact of global warming.
Vatnajolull is the largest glacier in Iceland, and one of the largest in Europe, covering more the 8 percent of the country. Under the ice cap are several volcanoes and volcanic lakes. 
This was where the Game of Thrones was filmed! 

Fresh water from the glacier that is totally safe to drink. It's COLD. 

Can't remember what we did after that....
During dinner time, we went to Systrakaffi restaurant along our way to hotel. There's a tiny small supermarket if you need to stock up food, and also petrol. 
The food was surprisingly nice! 

Honeymoon - Iceland: Fjardrargljufur Canyon, Skaftafell

Today was more of an exercise day.... travelling to Skaftafell for some hiking! 
The journey continued further along the coastal, almost to our last leg of the coast.
On our way, we stopped by Fjardrargljufur canyon (abou 1 hr away from Vik).
This canyon is about 2km long, there's a few viewing points for you to see different sections of the canyon.  

We continued our journey for another hour to Skaftafell.

At Skaftafell, there's a few hiking trails you can choose to do. 
We had the rest of the day here so we took our time and slowly walked. 
There's a visitor centre, café, toilets here so don't worry about the facilities. 
In the end, we headed up to the glacier tongue.

The water here is so clear! 

We headed for Fosshotel Napur for our night's stay. 

Honeymoon - Iceland: Golden Circle

Early morning we set off and drove from Reykjavik to Thingvellir that is at the Golden Circle. Today's trip is sightseeing the golden circle attractions, so long day ahead!

Our first activity of the day is Silfra Fissure Snorkeling that the boy booked.
Silfra fissure is located between two continents and it has the clearest water in the world. This narrow opening is created by the separation of the North American and Eurasian tectonic plates cutting through Iceland. 

Diving is available, however, the boy couldn't dive because here diving requires a dry suit certification, not the normal diving in Asia kind of certificate? 

The dry suit was very very heavy. We wore it on top of our normal wear. Dry suit, so you won't be wet underneath. It really keeps you warm on land. But in water, I almost died of coldness. Firstly, I wasn't really good at breathing with the equipment, and the coldness just tensed me up. The temperature is like 2 degrees. I was biting the mouth piece so badly. haha. Towards the end, there was a bit of free time for you to venture around before making your way out, but I went out immediately. 
Underneath the water is really very clear and beautiful, it is an experience, but I wouldn't do it again under such a cold weather.

After going out to undress the dry suit, the tour people (Iceland Adventure Tours) offered hot chocolate and biscuits to keep warm. The tour people are really very nice and helpful, they took care of me while underwater. The whole tour is about 3 hrs, but actual time in water is about 45minutes. It does take time to wear the dry suit and queue to get in. 

After that, we headed for Thingvellir National Park - Oxararfoss. It was a nice walk, the weather was so much better.

The snow cap mountain are just beautiful!

 We continued driving about 60km away from Thingvellir, it was Strokkur Geysir. This geyser is located in the Geysir geothermal area, it erupts about every 5-10minutes. 
We stayed there for quite a while because someone was taking a drone video and the water splashed high up and hit the drone. Quite a sight to watch. 

  
Our last stop was Gullfoss waterfall, and it was getting quite late already. The weather was turning colder too. 
There's a short stairway up to see at high grounds, but be warn in the evening it was super cold and windy. I went up, and down almost immediately. haha

At the top

It was getting late so we hurried back to check in at our apartment. We booked Golden Circle Apartment at Laugrvatn. It was a big and nice apartment! 

Didn't take the toilet and a wardrobe too not in the picture. 
Laugarvatn Fontana Spa was just a stone throw away, so we decided to go try it out! 
It is smaller than blue lagoon, but it has different temperature setting of pools so you can slowly adapt to the temperature. 
There's a small door for you to go outside along the open sea area, if you dare cause it's cold. 
Here there is actually a Rye Bread tour where you get to see bread being baked under the ground as the geothermal temperature is hot enough to bake a bread. Unfortunately it's a fixed timing and we couldn't make it in time. 
It was really relaxing after a day's of cold weather outside plus that snorkeling. 
I could do geothermal baths everyday... 
We walked back and cooked dinner and slept like a baby.