Brákin Monument

After travelling from Reykjavik through Borgarnes, we stopped at a gas station, noticing a unique monument perched on top of a hill. 

The large sculpture, shaped like a gold ram's horn with two wings on each side, sits powerfully atop a hill facing a lake gazing towards the distant mountains. While there is no nod to the artist or meaning of the monument nearby, I researched and found out it was created in 1997 by Bjarni Þór Bjarnason and depicts a tool known as a 'brák'. 

You can spend time walking around the boardwalk and exploring the amazing views. Both times we have visited this monument, it was completely devoid of tourists, making it feel like the monument is an undiscovered gem.

In two of Borgarnes’s oldest buildings The Settlement Center is devoted to recreating Iceland’s earliest days and introduces visitors to one of the best known heroes of the Icelandic Sagas, Egil Skalla-Grimsson.It also houses a cozy licensed restaurant, a café and a souvenir shop. The Center consists of three buildings, the warehouse, the merchant house and the reception hall.

What was a simple pit stop ended up being a discovery of amazing monument which has become one of my favourite monuments I've seen in Iceland. I'd highly recommend adding a stop on your road trip to check this place out.