Planning this trip, I only had a couple days before I needed to return to work, so I planned a couple roadtrips around the Reykjanes Peninsula. This is an area near Reykjavik, but much of it is not as well known to tourists as the Ring Road, Golden Circle and Blue Lagoon. The first day, J and A joined me. A, who is Icelandic, had never visited some of these places himself, so he also enjoyed it. Day 1 Our first stop was the Bridge Between Two Continents. Iceland straddles the boundary between the North American and Eurasian Plates, which is spreading. Over this part of Iceland, the boundary is in a roughly NE-SW direction, as you'll see later with some of the geothermal locations. You can actually see it from the plane - dark lines ... read more

Following my refreshing morning hike, I left Flåm behind and first set out to see the lookout point: Stegastein. There is a tourist road to go around the tunnel, but of course it was closed above Stegastein due to snow and season. However, the lookout point was amazing! Aside from the first 36 hours, the weather was absolutely perfect. When i parked, there were only two other cars and five other people. The lookout is a pine and steel structure that extends out from the hillside so you have a full view of the Aurlandsfjordand Aurlandsvangen below. I loved what looked like the interlocked connections. So, I got my initial view then waited until gradually the others had left and I had the whole place to myself! It was so lovely, words and pictures just cannot ... read more

This was the time I was most looking forward to: heading to Flam. I enjoyed my early breakfast, checked out and paid my car parking fees (yikes!) before heading back out of town. This time, I was heading towards Flam, on the E16. First though, I drove along the same road I did two days previously. Nothing much exciting here as it is either city or surburbia. It was a pleasant drive to Voss, about 90 minutes, and here at this tunnel is where the road went to the north and split away from my previous route. So, new territory! My first destination was drive up Route 13 to head to another stave church. I was a bit worried the road would be closed, due to the snow which was clearly increasing. It was a beautiful ... read more

Scandinavian breakfast buffets are fantastic. The one at Hordatun was the least impressive of all the ones I had this trip, but still better than just about anywhere else. I started to head north early and immediately ran into a lot more snow. There was a ski center just above the hotel, but I could not tell if it was closed or just early in the morning. Thru another tunnel, back into the snow, then thru another tunnel - I missed the tourist road above, clearly closed this time of year but there was not much to see anyway. On the other side, there was no snow but was overcast and drizzling. However, I made it to my first point of interest: Latefossen. This is a massive waterfall that falls just near a bridge with the ... read more

My colleague / friend (U), whom I have known since 2014 was celebrating his marriage in his home village in Pakistan and invited me to join them. His family live in a small village about 90 minutes drive from Lahore, so my friend (L) and I (all of us colleagues) flew into Lahore and were picked up by yet another friend / colleague (M). It was late when we flew in. In general, the airport seemed fine, but when we arrived at the foreign visa counter, they were having a bit of an IT issue, so it took about 20 minutes just to get me through. Then the few people behind us went through easily. Driving in Pakistan M and his cousin were outside waiting for us and planned to take us to a late dinner. ... read more