Day 37

July 16, 2018

11:55 PM Iceland Time

Yesterday I didn’t have time to blog since we were out of wifi range. To pick up where I left off, before we went to bead while we were in Stykkisholmur, we took a bit of a walk around because the midnight sun splashed the sky with cotton candy colors and it was gorgeous! There was a little island that there was a bridge to that we walked to the top of and got an amazing view of the city; it was magical. We then went to bed to get rest before our big day.

Yesterday we were going to hike up Helgafell, but it was raining really hard, and we skipped it. I was a bit bummed since that is where most of my family is from, but it would have gotten really wet. We decided to head straight to Eiríksstaðir, the home of Eirík the red and his son Leif

Eiriksson; the man who discovered America. We had a guide lead us into an old replica turf house, who told us some stories about Eirik the red- he wasn’t a very nice guy. He was exiled a few times for murdering people, but he did discover Greenland and his son ended up being the first European in America.

After Eiríksstaðir, we headed to a petting farm. The woman who ran the farm was very friendly, and showed us her goats, artic fox, pig, cows, horses, chickens, guinea pigs, turkeys, and even a talking raven! After hanging out with the animals for a while we ate lunch, and then it started to rain again. We all finished eating inside and then headed out since we had a long drive ahead of us.

After driving for a few hours we made a quick stop at the museum of Icelandic sorcery; which was really cool! They talked about the witch trials in Iceland; most of those who were killed for witchcraft were men. There were replicas of various items used in casting spells, had some ancient sacrificial blood stones, necro-pants, and some old manuscripts with magical staves.

We then set out and drove for a few hours up north to our campsite in Norðurfjörður. It was gorgeous except it was freezing cold, raining and with a lot of wind. I really wish the weather was nicer, so we could see the landscape. Through the clouds I could tell that there were waterfalls behind the campsite, with a good view of the fjörð. We tried to pitch our tents and we all got extremely soaked and really cold. After pitching tents, we ate in a little structure nearby, and then we decided to go to Krossneslaug. Krossneslaug is a remote pool near Strandir; right on the coast. It was a gorgeous pool, but unfortunately, we couldn’t see much because of the fog and rain. It was really nice to warm back up! It got really late, so we headed back to the campsite and tried to go to sleep. None of us got much sleep though; most of our tents ended up leaking, it was pretty cold, and the wind made a lot of noise.

We woke up pretty early, ate breakfast and packed up since we had a lot more driving to do. We drove for a few hours, stopped and ate lunch and then went white water rafting in the West Glacial river. It wasn’t raining as much as the night before, but it was still a bit cold. The river was a class 2+, so it was a calm river run from previous runs I’ve done. My favorite part of it was when we stopped off the side of the river, and they made us hot chocolate from a hot geothermal hot spring!! Even though it was really cold, and I was soaked, it still was fun and gorgeous. Everywhere you look there is vibrant green moss clinging to anything and everything!

After rafting we drove for a bit longer and came to Skagafjörður. We had a nice salmon dinner at a small restaurant, and then we did a little talent show. So many in our group are very talented! Some read poetry, some sang, some told stories, and some told jokes. Even though we had been cold and soaking wet for the past little while, we all were cheering each other up and enjoying everyone’s company!

We will be heading to Drangey island tomorrow to see some puffins, so I am headed to bed. Stay tuned!