Iceland Photos Part III: Waterfalls

Seljalandsfoss Waterfall, Iceland — Seljalandsfoss Waterfall

Iceland is a land of waterfalls. With the glaciers and constantly changing landscape due to volcanic activity, there is plenty of opportunity for waterfalls to form. Some are low (a few feet high) but numerous and wide, while others are tall and narrow. And the most famous ones are both tall and wide!

We visited several over the week that covered that range. Like many places in Iceland, what were once fairly remote locations without a lot of tourists, thanks to social media and Google Maps now have parking lots for tour buses, as well as rudimentary paths to get to them in some cases.

Click any image to enlarge.

Bruarfoss

Personally this was my favorite. Unbelievably blue water, like you would expect to find in the Carribbean, flanked by flat black rocks. It was a very serene place. On the day we visited, it had recently snowed so that added further contrast around the rocks.

We stood on a bridge over the river and photographed in both directions. As with all these waterfall shots, a neutral density filter (which reduces the light into the lens without shifting its color, to allow a longer shutter speed) allowed me to blur the waterfalls a little. One of the other photographers in the group shot on film with an old Hasselblad medium-format camera, which you can see below!

Svödufoss

This waterfall was more about the river, at least on the day we visited, where it was snowing sideways in high winds. There was so much moisture in the air that the waterfalls in the distance were not very visible. So we focused on the beautiful snow and ice blocks in the river itself.

Shooting was difficult here due to the wind and moisture — as soon as you took your lens cap off your lens was wet! Since we were shooting wide angle, a hood didn’t help (unlike with a telephoto where the long hood can effectively shield the lens front).

You really had to pay attention to which way you were standing when switching lenses to avoid blasting the camera sensor with moisture (goodbye camera), or opening the flap on your camera bag to minimize everything getting wet. My camera is pretty water resistant, so thankfully had no issues.

Kvernufoss

A slender waterfall with a large shallow cave behind it that you can stand in and watch the crashing water.

Skogafoss

A tall AND wide waterfall.

Seljalandsfoss

Lastly, Seljalandsfoss, where there are several waterfalls of different shapes and sizes within a few minutes walk of one another.

There was a couple in matching yellow and white rain gear that I spotted walking the path up to go behind the largest waterfall, and I knew they’d make a good visual contrast and scale reference once they reached it. So I waited for them to get behind it and was rewarded with several good shots of them. They were Chinese but living in Germany, and I got their email and sent them pictures later, and they took a picture of me, right before I got soaked!