Day 13: 12th October 2009 11:50 PM The final day started in exactly the same way as the first, with a burst of music from my alarm clock at 4.00AM, although this time it was the sound of Mansun‘s ‘Take it Easy Chicken‘ rather than the tuneless noise of my clock radio on Day 1. Oddly enough, two weeks of fresh air and refreshing walks has given me a sufficient burst of energy to wake up at this time and be able to get straight out of bed feeling relatively invigorated. John and Lyndsey must feel the same, Lyndsey having already [View Full Entry]

---

---

8:10 PM Travelling around Iceland, climbing volcanoes, waterfalls and glaciers can be tiring, and there is a lot to be said for sitting in a bath of sulphur, so our final complete day was a much more relaxed affair. We had always planned to end the trip at Iceland‘s main tourist spot, the Blue Lagoon, which sits in the lava fields between Reykjavik and the airport (via a slight detour), gently whiling away our last hours in its soothing waters. The Blue Lagoon is something of an accident, the by-product of the nearby geothermal power station. Like the other power stations [View Full Entry]

---

---

Day 13: 12th October 2009 2:45 PM Just as darkness completely surrounded us and the creatures of the night stared out from the shadows, we arrived in Hella. The creatures of the night were actually the same as the creatures of the day, mostly creatures that say ‘Baa’, or a regional accented equivalent of it. We had originally wanted to keep going and wait until we got to Reykjavik before we stopped for food, but as we reached the roundabout that branched off to Hella’s main areas, the petrol station and the cafe, indecision hit us. We were dithering so much, [View Full Entry]

---

---

10:00 PM We had chosen to stop off in Skogar because of how close it was to Sólheimajökull, but despite being nearby, it took a very long time to get there. The site was a short distance off Route 1, along one of Iceland’s many unpaved roads, this particular one full of rocks and potholes, and yesterday’s storm had left pools and small rivers flowing across the road. Eventually we abandoned the car and walked, realising that we weren’t going to get all the way without a 4x4. As we arrived, pretty much on time as oppose to the 20 minutes [View Full Entry]

---

---

10:00PM As predicted, the ducks turned up around 9.30 looking for food, and the world appeared to be heading back to normality after the storm (talking to various people since, these storms happen a couple of times a year, though not with quite the same ferocity). Not long after the ducks had waddled back to the pond, we were on the road. The landscape had completely changed from a couple of days before, the wind and rain wiping out the snow and ice that had covered the ground for miles around, showing the miles and miles of lava fields that had [View Full Entry]

---

---

Day 11: 10th October 2009 9:10 AM I awoke in the middle of the night to the sound of nothing. No howling winds that had battered us for the previous 30 hours or so, just a quiet calm. I’m not sure if it was the silence that woke me up, but it was the first thing I noticed. I didn’t write a song in the end last night, but John did beat me at chess and we whiled the night away playing games, reading books and eating. It was quiet, but pleasant. This morning it is as still as when I [View Full Entry]

---

---

Day 10: 9th October 2009 1:30 PM After a week of fairly good, if cold weather, with only the odd exception, Iceland has today given us a taste of the unpredictable extremes that we had read about. The winds that seemed pretty strong when they cracked Lyndsey’s head against the car door last night were, it seems, just the beginning. After arriving back at the hostel last night, we decided to make tea out of the leftover remains of everything else we had bought, mainly because we were heading back to Reykjavik after this, stopping for a night in Vik to [View Full Entry]

---

---

Day 10: 9th October 2009 6:40 PM It’s difficult to describe just how strong the winds have been today, but I’ll give it a go. The ducks on the pond outside were blown sideways this morning and disappeared not long after. The pond itself resembles a particularly stormy ocean, the wind whipping up waves that crash against the sides. Even the sheep, those most hardened of weather-beaten animals, have taken refuge outside the front door of the hostel where they are sheltered from the worst of the wind. Perhaps the best way to describe its power, though, is by describing the [View Full Entry]

---

---

10:15 PM There was no big rush for the shower this morning like there was in Vik. There are five people staying in Hvoll, including us, meaning we are actually outnumbered by bathrooms. This meant that this morning I was able to shower and shave without the pressure of thinking that I need to move quickly just in case somebody had to miss a bus or something just because I wanted to be clean. Not that anybody would be catching a bus from Hvoll, as it was a good 5km or so to walk to the main road, after which they [View Full Entry]

---

---

10:00 PM A strange thing happened last night. We were just cooking our tea, having finally got into the kitchen around 9.30, when a bearded bloke came up to me and said “Excuse me, are you from Wolverhampton?” I was slightly confused as to how he might know this, so I gave him a look that said “Yes. Explain” and started chatting to him. It turns out that he is a friend of a friend of mine called Dan who I have met a few times. The last time I saw him I don’t think he had the beard, or at [View Full Entry]

---

---