We awoke in our cozy hotel room to sunlight straining to get in through the curtains. Kris, the staff at the hotel, was busily preparing our breakfast. It was the traditional breakfast, with the added flare of different flavored cheese spreads (much like cream cheese), dark and grainy local breads, salami, cheerios, hot chocolate and cookies added to the buffet options. We ate and chatted with Kris, as she gave us fantastic advice about how best to travel, where to go, the weather condition, etc. She looked up the roads for us, showing which parts of the roads were safe, and which had warnings of any kind.
It turns out that the patch of road with the plows the previous day, is one that gets plowed regularly--a few times a day, she says. While this was meant to ease our anxiety, I think for Mom, it exacerbated it. "I don´t want to travel on a road that needs to be plowed that frequently," she says. Nonetheless, Kris´advice was very helpful, and we decided to head back to Blönðus, since Route 1 was the only was to go further east and its conditions were too treacherous. We were going to try to visit the coast to see some seals. Since this was one thing that I particularly wanted to see, I was excited as we headed off.
Only ten minutes into our drive, we came upon a choice. Take Route 742, a gravel road, to traverse the peninsula, or take Route 1 directly there. Airing on the side of caution after yesterday´s adventure, we stayed on the main road and headed back west. Not but a few moments later, a warning light came on. We searched through the manual to determine what it might mean, and though I was eventually able to locate it, we couldn´t tell exactly what it meant because the entire guide was only in Icelandic. Whoever heard of such a thing? You know in the US everything comes in 29 different languages!? Anyways, we safely made it back to a fuel station in the town. A nice man from the station came out and opened the hood, only to find we were leaking some weird tannish-brown liquid, that had been splattering all through the inside of the engine. He fussed with some nozzles and poked around as we collected our rental forms, searching for a number to call.
Our minds raced with options given our circumstance. Do we get it repaired and get reimbursed by the company, losing valuable travel time? Do we have to wait while someone comes from the company, which could take hours? Before our minds could run through too many options, the man who was helping us said, "I´ll just call the company. They have an office here. I´m sure they can send over another car." Sure enough, it was as simple as that. A mere 20 minutes later, we were driving off in a new car. A better car. In fact, the rental guy even said, "You have a good car now, that one was a piece of crap." Awesome. For 3 days we had been driving around remote landscape in a piece of crap. Hilarious. This new car is indeed pretty remarkable. Not only does it have 4WD and "Sport" mode ideal for mountain roads (it actually says just that in the manual, which, yes, is in English!), it has studded tires. A fact that I found this so utterly amusing, I couldn´t stop laughing for the next ten minutes.
Needless to say, with our new car, we had a new sense of confidence. So, at the same intersection where we had once made a left to go back west to Blönduos, now we made a right, bringing us towards Akureyri, and the same stormy mountain pass we had aborted from the day before. We reveled in the new power and control in our current ride as we climbed in elevation back onto Route 1. We soon found ourselves passing through the very same snowy pass, and crossing the very same line made by the snow plows. Though still careful, now we were confident. The vistas seemed to get more remarkable by the minute. Mountains upon mountains unfurled in front of us. Absolutely amazing. We gawked and photoed... struggling to find the words to adequately explain what we were seeing, and knowing that no words nor photos could ever really do justice to this scene.
We traversed our way through this mountain pass and made it safely to Akureyri, no worse for the wear, but perhaps a little lighter by loss of sweat. The town itself proved somewhat anti-climactic, so we stopped into the tourist center and opted to head straight to Myvatn, a lake region riddled with geothermic activity and wild landscapes. The drive there proved similar to the previous mountain pass--icy roads, blowing wind, and thick, luscious snowflakes. While still careful, we had made it through worse before, so we were less anxious and could enjoy the view more readily.
Once we eased out of the mountain pass, we entered some of the strangest landscape I have ever seen. It truly felt as if we had landed on some other planet. I was actually speechless... (rare, I know). It was so easy to see the volcanic activity surrounding us as craters littered the horizon, piles of black rock, covered every step, and deep cracks cut through rolling smooth black rock. One can easily imagine how each formation came to be... flowing lava here, projectile molten rock there, bubbles bursting through the surface here... Absolutely amazing. The weather had gotten colder and windier, so we had to only take a quick look around before finding a place for the night.
First, though, we stopped for dinner at a totally unusal cafe with direct views of the volcanic crater, called Vogafjoss Cowshed Cafe. It turns out that this place is so named because they have a cow holding area within the building. In fact, you can sit right next to the cows and watch them through the glass as you eat. They escorted us into the holding room, and we pet the calves and the cows waiting to be milked. I left the room, though with a mixture of awe and sadness. A truly special experience, no doubt, but a sad life for a cow, no? There certainly aren´t pastures to roam here, and the cells leave little space to do anything but stand and eat, jammed in next to your cellmates. Despite my animal empahty, I´m very glad to have gone, having sampled some of their homemade cheese, bread cooked in the earth, butter, and cheesecake while admiring the mountains and craters reflecting in Myvatn lake. I would highly recommend it to anyone passing through the area. A true gem. Well fed on once-in-a-lifetime (for a non-Icelander, anyway) meal, we headed towards the "town" and found ourselves sleeping bag accomodation in a guest house for cheap. All in all, for a day that started out rather rocky, no pun intended, it had finished up rather nicely, I dare say!
No comments:
Post a Comment