Honestly it’s been two very very busy days. Today will be slacker since I’m not going on no fricking glacier hike.
Going backwards over yesterday:
spent 2 hours laughing my ass off in the hot tub(s) at the Glacier World hotel… it was a very convivial group
Spent 1.5 hours on an amazing meal. Imagine looking at a plate with ten lobster tails (nephrops norvegicus) and then devouring it. They weren’t boiled, they were oven cooked. Delicious and beautifully served. Then Guinness chocolate cake for dessert. There was salad.
Spent hours on the road… the scenery in Iceland is amazing, but this part of the trip made me want to renounce atheism and take up Ãsatrú.
We got to the top of a fjord (once again large chunks of the road, with stomach churning drops, have no parapets or railings, or they’re ‘fitful’), Saga put on Icelandic death metal, AND WE WENT INTO THE VALLEY BELOW while row after row of weathered green and gray faces (in my imaginings) looked down on us. AND A FALLSTREAK CLOUD TOOK SHAPE — I HAVE NEVER SEEN ONE, AND THEN
there was another
and another
and another
And I tried to get pictures but I thought my camera battery died and shooting out a bus window sucks especially if you’re doing it more or less into the sun and I couldn’t get the professional grade photographers on my side of the bus to pay attention to the fact the sky was doing something very very unusual. aw fuck em
So I do have one pic of the first one on my phone and here’s the best I could do when I realized the camera had been charging on the bus’s two to a seat USB charger long enough to work, so here is my apologetic potato pic.
AAAAND THE HOTEL WIFI BARFED
fml
anyway believe me it’s weird
but that whole drive was amazing; one kind of layered weathered lava was replaced by something completely different, like worn battlements coming out of the turf.
We went to a town where the city parents put up signs thanking tourists for shitting in the right place. also where some guy sculpted the eggs of most of the common birds of Iceland and stuck them on pillars on the outskirts of town. (let’s just say that Julia Finsbury would NOT have approved, they were so…. big…. and so…. you know.) There was a man with a dog and two whale skeletons in his front yard that we were supposed to see but he was away for the first time evar. Took no pictures of any of those things.
Before that we drove along a rushing river with dozens of small falls. Before that we saw the tallest waterfall in Iceland, which involved 2.5 k hike straight up and down and I said screw it as did the only person on the tour my age and we had a lovely conversation in the BRILLIANT warm sunshine, out of the wind and close to the bus and the very nice bathroom and ate lunch instead.
Before that I spent 80 dollars for two pairs of socks and I don’t know how much on a couple of beers (to drink in the hot tub later) and I don’t know how much on a fantastic truck stop sandwich (this is to make Jeff laugh, but it’s true; I don’t think it was sentient) and a choccky bar and another one of those damned Egils sodas because I love them with a fierce unholy love now.
Before that a lot of driving past Icelandic forests and leaving the town of elves. We climbed the hill of the queen of the elves. We were advised in very flat terms to do nothing disrespectful as it might impact the rest of our trip. Given that two enormous ravens circled the hill crying continuously (couples noise, not like their usual harsh croak, much more friendly and musical) you can bet your ass I didn’t spit like the fucking American did on one trip and then they got stuck for three hours and missed connections etc. If Huginn and Muninn are showing up I ain’t arguing.
We saw the turf house and the tiny church in the Town of the Elves, and I have pics of the view from my window. Day started rainy, but oatmeal in mah belleh (indifferent brekky totherwise) was good. And, of course the day started with somebunny having about ten minutes of percussive mattress joy right through the wall into my right ear. No vocalizations, just bang.bang.bang… bangity… bang you get the idea.
THAT WAS A SINGLE DAY The day before was BUSIER. Can I get back to you on that?
