Höfn to Vik (Puffins!), Iceland

An amazing day today on the way from Höfn to Vik – a group of Aussies on Le Boreal gave me a tip about a tractor tour to see puffins at Ingólfshöfði, so I booked on the 12 noon departure. It’s literally a tractor towing up to 50 people in an attached hay cart to the bottom of a steep black sand dune. Today there are only about 25, mostly French, German and Italian tourists.

Then a climb up the sand dune to the headland. And it’s fantastic – the puffins are right there in front of you – parents and juveniles, burrows and the occasional egg. And dive-bombing skuas protecting their chicks. Ingólfshöfði is an important breeding ground for skuas as well as puffins, and skuas are like an arctic tern only five times bigger. This is a skua chick…

It’s one of those tours where if it’s sunny at the departure point, it will probably be raining by the time the tractor is halfway across the tidal river. It certainly is today, and I’m glad I packed the waterproofs into the backpack. By the time we reach the dune 25 minutes later, it has stopped again. On the way back in the tractor, it rains again in exactly the same spot. I booked through Local Guides, and thoroughly recommend this as THE place to see puffins on the south coast.

The tour lasts about 2.5 hours, so I decide to double back down the road to the Glacial Lagoon, which I flew past in the car in the morning, without time to stop. It’s one of those freaks of nature where one of the glacial tongues of the massive Vatnajökull glacier calves near the ocean, creating a tidal lagoon accessible by the local seals, that surf into the lagoon on the strong inbound current.  Eventually the larger of these icebergs end up out at sea.

Zodiac tours are on offer, but I don’t have time (and they finish at 17.30) as I have at least another 2 hours driving to get to Vik. It turns into more than 3.5 hours with the combination of unpaved and paved roads, road works, and the ubiquitous one vehicle bridges.

It’s about 8.30pm by the time I arrive in Vik. The Hotel Lundi (Hotel Puffin) is pretty non-descript from the outside, but the rooms in the back section of the hotel are newly renovated, with an ultra modern bathroom (mood lighting in the shower anyone?) and a comfortable bed. The dining options in Vik are pretty limited, so I opt for the hotel restaurant, which turns out an excellent pasta and dessert. All up, one of the better hotels I’ve stayed in so far.