I just spent three and a half months living in a tiny, rural, secluded village in the north of Iceland, and I learnt a lot of things.

Silfra, in case you're not aware, is the spot in Iceland where two tectonic plates are pulling apart, and you can actually get right between them.

Iceland has no shortage of 'hot pots', and they can mean just about anything.  It could be a plastic pool with warm water and slides, the Blue Lagoon its alcohol and masseuses, a hot rocky pot in the middle of (seemingly) nowhere, or anything in between. 

This weekend Skagaströnd saw the first stages of the annual horse roundup or rettír.  The hundreds of horses who spent summer living on the mountains were herded down to a paddock to be sorted and checked on.

I've been in this strange place between being incredibly busy, and incredibly stagnant.  

Let me introduce you to an Icelandic word I learnt recently: Sólarhringur.  With this word in mind, let's say goodbye to my Scandinavian summer.

For the last couple of weeks I had been flirting with the idea of swimming in the sea. 

As you've probably read or deduced (or maybe you're new... hi!), I'm currently living and working in Iceland since late June.  

I've been in Iceland for four weeks now (which seems impossible), but haven't blogged my daily adventures, like I have done over the last few months.  Most days would go something like "I woke up, faffed around in my studio for six hours, collected objects from the beach, watched an episode of The Undersea World of Jacques Cousteau and went to bed."  It wouldn't make the most riveting of journals, but that doesn't mean it isn't magical.

Driving around Lake Myvatn and its surrounds was like driving on a different planet - milky blue pools contrasted with the sprawling orange deserts, and steamy mud pots gurgled and bubbled underfoot. 

Boiling hot geysers, a spectacular waterfall, the magical national park of Þingvellir... all within a days drive - there's a reason that the Golden Circle is the most touristed route in Iceland.  Here are some tips to soak up the beauty without being knocked about by crowds.

This week I spent 48 hours in Reykjavik, and these were (some of) the cats I ran into.

If you've come to Iceland in search of magic, you'll find it in the landscapes of the Westfjords.

Skagaströnd is home to few things.  Its primary claim to fame is a powerful prophetess from the Icelandic sagas, Þordis, and the mountain she climbed daily, Spákonufell: the prophetess’ mountain.

If a road trip around the Golden Circle is on your Icelandic to-do list, you should schedule a few hours at this completely magical, completely free hot river in Hveragerði.

I'm going to come right out and say it - Iceland's glacial lagoon is one of the most beautiful, lonely and strange places I've been to in my life.  I instantly fell in love.

If the Mars Rover footage had you dreaming of visiting foreign planets, then you need to get yourself to Iceland.  We’d hired a car for our first few days in Iceland so that we could explore the dramatic waterfalls and black beaches of the South, but weren’t wholly prepared for the strange scenery we were about to experience.