News

Glaciers, horses & volcanos

 

Did you know that we are located next to the highest peak of Iceland?

 

 

 

Glacier Horses has its home on the foot of Vatnajökull which is the biggest glacier of Europe. Vatnajökull as a national park is about 12.000 square kilometers and covers around 12 % of Iceland.

We think this area here is truly amazing since so many diverse elements of nature are creating the landscape here. If you weren’t fascinated by nature before you came here, you definetly will be after you have left! Like in the picture below you just realize here among all these stunning mountains how small you actually are.

Iceland is often described as the land of fire and ice. Infact under the icy glacier surface is often a crazy volcanic activity going on.

Also on top of Öræfajökull that is located next to Glacier Horses you can see Hvannadalshnúkur what is with 2110 meters the highest peak of Iceland. At the same it is a massive volcano. The last eruption was in 1727. You can sometimes hear a heavy thunder and rumble sound rolling down from the mountains. But no reason to the scared of a volcanic eruption, these are big pieces of ice and snow breaking down from the glacier in summer!

 

 

 

The horse rental & Iceland as a travel destination

The horse rental of Glacier Horses has opened its doors for visitors again! In this beautiful summer week we took a lot of icelandic families on horse back riding tours. Since the country was pretty quiet due to Covid-19 Icelanders were obviously using their chance to travel the country!

The horses are already pretty fit and all of our precious tour horses were giving the guests happily a great experience. We are always stunned how loveable and patient the horses approach even people who never sat on a horseback before. This is an essential part of the character of the icelandic horse. Although they can be spirited and agile in challenging situations, they might turn to being soft right away when they sense a rider doing his first steps. This makes it possible to always choose the perfect horse for every rider.

 

Sophia & Glóblesi spotted trough the ears of Röskur

 

Sophia & Glóblesi spotted trough the ears of Aska. The glacier Hvannadalshnjúkur infront of them

 

Iceland has opened its boarders with regular flights again since the 15 th of June! While travellers needed to go into quaranteene for two weeks straight before the 15 th of June, there are now many people from the Schengen area travelling already again. At the moment, you can choose between two weeks of quaranteene or just do a quick Covid-19 tests straight while arriving at the airport. Until first of July, the test is paid by the government and costs apprx. 80 Euros after that point of time. The test results are delivered within a few hours via text message. Icelandic authorities don´t like to put strict rules on people, so they allow tourists to leave the airport and take care for themselves and others while waiting for the test results.

Since Iceland is now the perfect travel destination to practise “social distancing” more or less automatically we already got happy guests from the Netherlands. Marquella and Marit were happy exploring the area around the foot of the glacier in perfect weather!

 

 

Lupines and midnight sun

June is a very special month in Iceland. It holds all the light and the  midnight sun, that paints the country in magical colors.

The 21 th of June marks the longest day of the year. While continental europe still has the change between dark nights and bright days the sun in Iceland shines trough the whole night.  Here in the southern parts of Iceland the sun might hide behind the mountains that lay in the northern direction for a little while. This is for sure a magical time and often seems surreal for people  experiencing the country for the first time. We try to soak in the constant brightness as much as we can and enjoy every moment to the fullest.

June is also the month of the lupines! The lupines are a special plant and can be found all over the country. They start to blossom end of may while painting the fields in shiny purple colors. We used this night to catch our Hráfn in these beautiful sea of lupines ! 🙂

 

Riding on ice!

I took a mare that I am training, Glóð from Litla-Hof (M: Ósk from Bitra, F: Örn from Efri-Gegnishólar) to a frozen lake just a 10 minutes drive from here. It was getting dark and I was alone so I didn´t get very good photos but I will take her there again and have someone with me to get better photos. But here are just a few photos 🙂

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Nice september weather

It is a pretty nice job training horses when the weather is like this here in Svínafell 🙂

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The horse rental =)

Great day today. Good weather and some people coming for horseback riding. These French girls came with me and Sandra on a nice riding tour. They have often ridden horses before but never out in the fields like that. They were very happy with the tour! 🙂

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Construction going well!

The riding pen is finally ready! Here are some photos from last days. And what a beautiful sunset in Svínafell tonight 🙂

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Future staff starting early…

My goddaughter Guðbjörg Dalía (1 year old daughter of my brother Björgvin) is already starting training of 2 weeks old Röskur…

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Last but not least…

Today the last foal this year was borned. That was a male horse (all five foals this year are male!), son of Góa from Þjóðólfshagi and Dynjandi from Þjóðólfshagi 1.

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Introducing the new members =)

This morning I and my sister´s daughter Sandra (a valuable member of the Glacier Horses company! ) went to visit the foals and get to know them better. I always try to approach the foals sometime during the first days of their lives. I think it is important to teach them early in their lives that I am the good guy! 🙂 

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