In the year 930, Icelandic chieftains gathered on a grassy plain beside a rift valley and founded a parliament, the Althing, and they kept meeting here for nearly nine hundred years. Þingvellir, the Parliament Plains, is the place where a nation made its own laws in the open air, standing beside a rock called the Law Rock, and the site is now a national park and UNESCO World Heritage site. The words of the law speaker, reciting the code from memory, carried across the plain.
The setting is as extraordinary as the history. Þingvellir lies in a rift valley where the North American and Eurasian tectonic plates are slowly pulling apart, about two centimeters a year, and you can walk down a long gorge, Almannagjá, between the cliffs of the western plate and the floor of the valley. Beyond lies Þingvallavatn, the largest natural lake in Iceland, clear and cold, and Silfra, a fissure of astonishingly clear water that divers swim through. Birch scrub and moss-covered lava fields fill the valley, with a small white church and farmhouse beside the river.
Þingvellir is also the first stop on the Golden Circle, the standard tourist loop that runs to Geysir and Gullfoss waterfall. The road from Reykjavik, about forty-five minutes away, crosses a heath of lava and moss, with gently rolling curves, and it can be busy with tour buses and rental cars in summer. The surface is good, but the weather is the issue: wind can be fierce, and rain, fog and sudden gusts can make riding unpleasant. Gravel on road edges and sheep on the road are other hazards.
Summers are cool and bright, with nearly endless daylight in June, and the best months are June to August. In winter, ice and snow close the road at times, and the auroras may show. Dress warmly in layers whatever the season, because the wind off the lake can cut through even a summer day.