Chasing Waterfalls around the Diamond Circle

Continuing clockwise around the “clock face” traced by Route 1, Iceland’s Ring Road, Akureri is just a little past midnight. This post follows the Ring Road only briefly as I veer off headed north again along the fjord to Husavik, then zig-zag back across headed south of the Ring Road toward the Lake Myvatn area, then back north again to Ásbyrgi Canyon.

I did more bouncing around in this stretch than the others because I stayed two nights in the same campground, so there was backtracking involved. Basing myself in the Continue reading

The Northwest: Borgarnes to Akureyri

Driving Iceland’s Ring Road, aka Route 1, is every bit as beautiful as I anticipated, though I must say not as isolated as I anticipated. Yes, there are long stretches where I have the road to myself, but it’s rarely more than 10 minutes until I meet another car, or one is overtaking. While Iceland appears to be having quite the tourism boom, sources say it’s still significantly less than what it was back in 2017 and 2018, peak years. Tough to imagine. Continue reading

The Snæfellsnes Peninsula

Whenever you see the letters “a and e” butted up next to each other like “æ,” that is pronounced as “eye.” So the peninsula is pronounced “SNEYE-fells-ness.” It translates, to “Snow Mountain.”

My goal during the two weeks in my camper van rental is to drive the Ring Road. Most complete it in 8-10 days, but I am already wondering how I am going to complete it in two weeks. I have a day by day itinerary mapped out into a an excel spreadsheet so I stay on track to see all I hope to see. But what initially seemed like a reasonable pace Continue reading

No Lovah from the Lava

Back on the 19th March of this year, a new volcano arrived on the scene in Iceland. A recommended video popped up on my youtube home page announcing the birth of a brand new volcano, complete with a live webcam feed from the eruption site. I’m still unclear of the name. I often see it referred to as Geldingadalir. Other times, they call it Fagradalsfjall. Doesn’t really matter, as I cannot pronounce or spell either one. So I’ll just refer to it as “the eruption site.”

Continue reading

A Tale of Two Lagoons

I have heard of Iceland’s famous Blue Lagoon since I first heard about Iceland as a travel destination. It’s likely Iceland’s most famous attraction. As someone who has joked before about needing a bumper sticker to say “I Brake for Hot Springs,” it’s a place that has long intrigued me, and high on my “must visit” list.

But there’s a “new kid in town,” the Sky Lagoon, just opened in May of this year. It’s getting a lot of press as being a leading attraction of its own. Neither of them are cheap, Continue reading

The Camper Van

Whenever I have thought about travel to Iceland in the past, I couldn’t imagine a better way of exploring than to do so in a camper van. My desire is to complete the Ring Road, a 1,332 kilometer, 828 mile circumnavigation of the island. Doing this trip in a camper van will allow me to “gunk hole” it, similar to how I did in the Winnie back in 2017 around Newfoundland. Drive until I get tired, then stop for the night, picking back up where I left off the following morning. Anything else would necessitate backtracking Continue reading

Valhalla, I am Coming!

To some, “Valhalla” in that subject line might refer to the Norse mythology, a realm of the afterlife that Vikings aspired to enter upon their death. A form of heaven, if you will.

However, if you are like me, a musically influenced child of the 60’s and 70’s, you will instead recognize it as part of the lyrics of Led Zeppelin’s “Immigrant Song,” written during Led Zeppelin’s tour of Iceland in the summer of 1970 which opened in Reykjavik, Iceland’s capital city. The song was written by Robert Plant while a guest of the Icelandic Government touring Iceland on a cultural mission. This visit inspired the lyrics, Continue reading

My Pandemic Paradigm

I often see articles written asking, “What would you would say if you could write a letter from the present you to your younger self?” I have lots of things I would tell myself such as “Learn as many foreign languages as you can, as early as you can, because the older you get, the harder it gets.”

Also, I would encourage my younger self to take more risks and embark on more strenuous adventures while the body is young, resilient, and flexible. “Move, you must! If you stop, you’ll rust!”

But the one thing I wish I could go back and tell my younger self, something I have tried Continue reading

Unprecedented!

It’s been an unprecedented amount of time since I last updated this blog. In fact, it took a couple of minutes for the WordPress process to come back to me. As always, thanks to those friends and family who have touched base via email and messaging.

Here we are with well over half of the summer gone…well over half the year gone. And I’ve got nothing to show for it. After having lost almost a year in 2020 with no goals achieved, I didn’t anticipate being halfway through 2021 in the same boat. In future years, I am going to look back on this time and wonder, “Why don’t I have something to show for the entire half of the year?” It was understandable in 2020. However, 2021 takes a bit of explaining. Or at least rationalizing. Continue reading

It’s A New Dawn, it’s a New Day….

Warning: Political Post Ahead. If that sort of thing offends you, I understand. Either scroll through and just look at the photos and captions of the amazing Catwalk Recreation Area in New Mexico’s Gila Wilderness, or pass altogether. But this is my personal blog, meant to be a personal account of what I am feeling at any given moment. And today, Inauguration Day, January 20th, 2021, as the song goes, “I’m feelin’ good.” Continue reading