Ah, this morning was beautiful! Lovely pink-tinged blue skies, alpenglow on the hills and hoarfrost on the ground… Yeah, that lasted about an hour. If I’ve learned nothing else over the last few weeks, I’ve learned that rain + waterfall spray + long exposure = crappy, spotted photos and really wet equipment. But the floorboard of a car with the heat and fan turned up high will dry even the most stubbornly wet camera and memories are sometimes better than any photo.
I have for most of this trip been… Not entirely off the tourist trail but definitely not for the most part in mainstream areas. I’ve met other travelers but they’ve been in ones and twos, traveling independently. Today changed all that. I wanted to hit a couple iconic locations on my drive to Reykjavik today and OMG, was I shocked. I found tour busses today. Lots of them. Some of them opened their doors to reveal screaming pre-pubescent children who, literally, set off on foot races around the location at which they’d stopped. More of them disgorged a slow – very slow – trickle of people who clearly weren’t used to walking in the rain on anything other than concrete. And of course, scads of people had their extendable batons with cell phones attached at the end, the better with which to get their selfies. Ugh…
As I drove from Kirkjubæjarklauster and then west toward Reykjavik, I found the land becoming… Softer? The ground still steams and harsh mountains still abound, but they’re smaller, there’s more arable land and there’s a sense of life being just a bit more settled, just a bit easier. As mentioned, I hit the tourist trail today, checking out a few of the easily accessible (but still phenomenal) waterfalls and geothermal areas before getting into Reykjavik late this afternoon. Arriving in this metropolis after the last couple weeks of mostly farmsteads and villages is as much a shock as seeing all the tour busses today! There are street lights and traffic, buildings more than two stories tall and a multi-block commercial district. My second-floor flat came with street-parking a lá San Francisco (okay, the hills aren’t really that steep and the streets not that narrow), a pocket bathroom (you think I’m kidding) and a lava lamp.
And behind Door #1 is… A pocket bathroom!
Instead of hearing through my window water, either as river, ocean or rain, I have road noise. It’s not noisy per se, but significantly different from the last two weeks.
Ignorant Fench-speaking fuck on basalt columns at Reynisfiara
Evening sun on Route 208, Myrdalsjökull in background
Travelers’ cairns at Laufskálavarda
Arched rocks at Dyrhólaey
Lighthouse at Dyrhólaey
Wow! Blue sky this morning, with just a few powder puffs drifting aimlessly around. I could see what I guess must be Myrdalsjökull through the trees, and once I put binoculars on it I saw fresh snow high up on the hills. Not that I haven’t seen some beautiful views already but it’s absolutely lovely here when a bit of sunlight is added!
I went to Vik today, a village about 55 km from my little cabin in the woods. It’s small, tucked into a relatively narrow strip of flat(ish) land between Myrdalsjökull and the ocean. There are a couple of cliffs nearby and at the base of one is yet another example of columnar basalt. I didn’t expect to be following square rocks from one end of Iceland to another but that is in fact what I’ve done! I climbed the cliffs of Reynisfjall first and had a grand view of Myrdalsjökull and Sólheimajökull inland; Vik on the shore to one side and a long beach leading to Dyrhólaey lighthouse on the other.
I followed that with a visit to Reynisfjara, where the basalt columns rise from the black sand beach to form a cave of sorts. There weren’t too many people there when I arrived and most of them were polite, staying out of other people’s pictures and taking turns moving in close. And then there were the two French-speaking men who jjumped in front of several of us and took turns climbing up the rocks and posing on them. This annoyed me enough that I decided I’d needed to be in their photos and so I moved right on in, standing just next to or below the fat bearded slob on the rocks so there was no way his friend could get a picture without me in it. Rarely have I felt so satisfied. Shades of my mother, I’ll admit…
After a visit to the lighthouse at Dyrhólaey, I had a very late lunch of cured lamb, fresh bread and ice cream, all from local producers, at Halldórskaffi. The lamb here is good. Yeaterday I had some smoked lamb; today was cured… Maybe I’ll find some lamb soup tomorrow. Anyaay, I headed “home” as late afternoon sun hit Myrdalsjökull. About five minutes after I got my gear inside… You guessed it… It began raining. The rain only lasted about 15 minutes and it looks like it might be a nice night to see the Northern Lights again!
Kirkjubæjarklauster and Systrafoss, from Systravatn
Dverghamrar or Dwarf Rocks – more columnar basalt
Sheep corral near Foss farmstead
Fjaðrárgljúfur Canyon, on the Fjaðrá river
Ahhhh, I’m sick of rain. In two weeks I don’t think I’ve had a single day without rain. Not thatbi haven’t had some hours of sunshine but they have been far, far, far out-numbered by hours and days and nights of rain.
Spent today alternating between short hikes and huddling, dripping, in my car waiting for the most recent down pour to pass. This area really is quite interesting, and beautiful when one can actually see it. An enormous lava flow, now overgrown with moss so the lanscsape looks like a lumpy green carpet, covers much of the land from the mountains about halfway to the sea. On one side of the lava flow it’s flat and marshy to the oceans’ edge, and on the other softly eroded cliffs leading up into the mountains. Here and there glacial “snouts” can be seen, each of them with their very own glacial lagoon. Sign after sign mentions farms and churches that were covered by lava in one eruption or another, and the inhabitants of this land were described on one roadside sign as being very serious and always waiting for the next disaster to strike. This was the last part of Iceland to be connected to the road system, because of the difficulty bridging so many enormous glacial rivers with their ever-changing beds and flows.
The nearest town, Kirkjubæjuklauster, has a small fish farming operation for Arctic Char, using a glacial stream that runs right through the village as the water source. I was sorely disappointed to find they don’t sell retail to the general public but was pleased to later find some of their fish at the local farmers market. The market also had local lamb (both fresh and smoked – tasty!), carrots and ice cream from a nearby dairy farm. Rutabagas, like the carrots, are also grown outside here but aren’t in season. I stocked up on a few things, knowing I wouldn’t be able to get more than food for the next two days as after that I have a long day of driving with no means to keep food cool.
