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Published: November 24th 2009
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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, in fact, that we drove around the roundabout four times before we finally decided to pull up at the same truckers cafe that we had stopped at for a drink on the way down (there wasn’t a great deal of choice on the food front; Hella is one of only four or five towns between Hvoll and Reykjavik that have anywhere to eat).
Wanting to fit in with the truckers (there weren’t actually many trucks around here, but it looked like the kind of place that anyone driving a big juggernaut would stop), we all ordered a huge burger each and washed it down with one of those extra large cans of coke that they sell in Iceland. Refreshed and refuelled, we hit the road to Reykjavik again with the intention of not stopping again until we got there. Stop we did though, although only after realising (10km after we had done it) that we had taken the wrong junction at the roundabout in Selfoss, and were heading back in the general direction of the Westman Islands yet again. This was a particularly difficult feat considering that all we had to do was stick to the main road, but somehow we managed it.
We finally arrived in Reykjavik about 10.00, checked in and sorted out how to get back to the airport for our flight back (as luck would have it, the bus picks up from city hostel on the way, so we booked an extra night here). By this time, after a long day driving 175 miles or so (which takes a lot longer on Icelandic roads than British roads) and climbing waterfalls and glaciers in between, it was probably time for bed, but instead we got back in the car and headed north, in search of a quiet, dark place to look out for those elusive northern lights. This was likely to be our last night of being able to see them, as the forecast for the next few days was cloudy. We drove 15km or so up the road towards Þingvellir, and stopped at a particularly dark and clear point, where we saw hundreds of stars, but no sky tinged with unusual colours. Seeing the northern lights is completely down to having the luck of being in the right place at the right time, and down that dark, empty road we finally realised that this holiday just wasn‘t going to be that right time. Maybe it was Iceland‘s way of saying “Come back next year“. After such a realisation, we decided it was now time to head back to the hostel, drink another hot chocolate, and head for bed.
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