Probably one of the most well known "tourist attractions" in Iceland is the US DC-3 plane wreck on Sólheimasandur in the south of the country, which was easily accessible with a 4x4 from the Ring Road.
Photographers love this spot for shooting the Northern Lights, because of the pretty neat foreground element. The road though, is closed now because too many tourists didn't care about the marked streets, that were built by the landowners to make this place accessible by car. This spot especially gained attraction for tourists since it was featured in a music video of Justin Bieber last fall. According to mbl.is the owners had no other choice than closing the road to the wreck site for the simple reason that they want to save the nature and make this place staying attractive for the future.
The plane is still reachable by foot with a walk of about 20-30 minutes, which can be pretty exhausting during cold or stormy days.
I met one of those people who don't care as I visited this amazing place in Iceland, when a guy overtook me offside the road because he needed to be 30 seconds faster at the crash site to make some fast selfies, letting his child play and jump on the plane and get back again to the Ring Road for the next "attraction". This feels like such a crazy ignorance to me, because this is neither my property nor I want to damage it for all the other people who want to visit it after me.
I can't say this often enough: Please respect nature and the properties of the locals, because this is what happens if you do not and everybody has to suffer. Always remember that you wouldn't want to have some tourists that are destroying your dooryard, would you?
If you have also experienced things like this feel free to tell us your story in the comments below!
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