TAYLOR ON EARTH

My next grand adventure to talk about on this blog is my return to Iceland. As a preface, I visited this country two summers ago solo and loved it on a deeper level than usual. The extreme landscapes, the cool summer breezes, the folklore and history; all of these things affected me in such a way that I rushed to find my way back there and breathe in the country’s air.

Now that I’m past my minor romanticization of this place, here we go. My girlfriend and I arrived on a Sunday in August and briefly ran into a hiccup. For anybody that wants to check a big backpack like a hiking bag (which is what I did), be aware that it will not be with your typical luggage on the conveyor belt but in an area called odd-size baggage. So after panicking for several minutes about where all of our camping gear was, we spoke to an airport employee and found it quickly.

Once we left the airport and received our rental vehicle, we left Keflavík and headed to meet a couple of friends from the Czech Republic in Reykjavík. We drank coffee and visited for a couple hours learning what they had already done on their trip and told them our plans as well and exchanged travel advice. Only too soon it was time to part ways for they needed to catch the bus to the airport and we needed to continue our journey to the town of Vík.

Once we started driving to Vík along Route 1, otherwise known as the Ring Road, the city landscape began to fade away and the Martian terrain became drastic and more evident. As a side note: on my first visit to Iceland, I had only experienced Reykjavík and Þingvellir National Park, so driving myself and seeing the mountains, streams, and ocean were a brand new experience. About an hour and a half into our awe-stricken drive, we came across Seljalandsfoss and immediately came to a halt. Seljalandsfoss is a massive waterfall and the only one in Iceland that you can actually get behind the water. We spent the better half of 45 minutes here reveling in the majesty of our first Icelandic waterfall, though there were many more to come. The roaring sound of the water and bright green grass contrasting with the overcast clouds felt surreal. This was the first moment that I began to understand how the Vikings believed in their old Norse gods. I took dozens of photos, however not noticing that my lens was drenched from the water that the wind had sprayed onto us, leading to the unfortunate fact that I don’t have many high quality photos of Seljalandsfoss.

Once we left the waterfall, we continued on towards Vík. On our left heading eastbound, we passed the famous and widely unpronounceable volcano Eyjafjallajökull. This is the volcano that erupted in April 2010 causing all air traffic in northwest Europe to stop for 6 days as well as the evacuation of as many as 800 people. The evacuation was not in the fear of magma however, but violent flood waters from the heating of the glacier that the volcano lies beneath. Eyjafjallajökull is now considered dormant and can be hiked, although due to the binding restraint of time, we had to miss this hike and save it for when we return (yes, again!) in the future.

Once we finally arrived at our quaint yet cash-only guesthouse, Ársalir, the first thing that each of us did was shower since we had not been able to do so for nearly 24 hours. Sharing one shower upstairs with four other rooms with at least two occupants each was a bit of a challenge, however we arrived early enough in the afternoon that we could get in and out pretty quickly without running into other travelers. Shortly thereafter we collapsed around 8:00pm Icelandic time totally exhausted yet eager to start the next day.