In which I walk mirrored black shoals, touch diamond edged ice, and sway in the music of the mountains.
We're down the last few entries in my stream of consciousness travel logs of my recent trip completing one of my bucket list goals: driving all the way around the Icelandic ring road. If you haven't read the series and want some beautiful pictures and some context, no problem — links to all previous entries are at the bottom of each post. This entry has a few more DSLR photos to go with the cell phone photos, but I'm still saving large sets for editorial in-depth posts. I am loving going through my journal and rewriting my thoughts and feelings here to share with you. Thank you for sticking with me, reading my insane walls of text, putting up with my sometimes meandering point of view, and enjoying the ride.
Day Six of the Iceland Ring Road Mission by the numbers.
Around 6 hours of driving.
About 475 kilometres traveled.
- Hopes and dreams crushed after finding out the "Viking Village" I had my eye on was a movie set built of old telephone poles: ALL OF THEM
- Kilometres Hiked: approximately 25
- Current running total of all-soup meals: 16
- Seals seen playing in the ice and glacial water: 6
- Random stops to stand in the middle of the road to gawk: 4
- Times caught in the middle of an Icelandic horse herd movement: 1
- Vikings found: 0
After a fitful nap disturbed by my sobering brush with a very long fall, I set up in a crevice in a mountain pass and spent the night under the aurora.
I didn't actually plan to go much further than the cabin tonight. I still have that bubble in the back of my throat; the one that isn't vomit, but sure as hell isn't sunshine and rainbows either. It's a light pressure, snugged gently all the way around my windpipe, reminding me: you could die this easily... just a little squeeze, and you sleep forever. It's fucking morbid, but so is slipping soundlessly off a cliff into the swirling foam beating against the black boulders knifing up through the rapids because you want to take a pretty picture. I toss and turn for a while, opening my eyes unsure if I've slept, but I feel a bit better when I check the time and see it's two in the morning. Starting over under a neon sky, smarter and better today.
After a slow drive in scattered, blowing snow up into the mountains above Egilsstaðir, I step out of the car and am almost immediately knocked out by the door being slammed back into my body with the force of the wind. I hold it awkwardly open with a foot while trying to stretch my tripod's legs out, but it's aluminum and being blown all over the place and it's like trying to wrangle an exceptionally weirdly proportioned cat which screams wordlessly and mournfully and repeatedly. Wait, screaming? It takes me a minute to realize the curved slice of the road down the mountain channels the blasting air into nonsensical scales, and the bowl of the waterfall is humming long and low. The wind picks up the mist like moist lips blow lightly over a jug. It is one of the strangest sounds I've ever heard. I can't decide if I like it or not, but I'm focused on the sky above; no one ever prepared me for how fast the northern lights move.
At some point, I roll back into bed and wake up much later than I should. Today is the longest remaining section of travel, and I've got some seriously good stuff earmarked for stopping at. A viking village finally. One of the most famous rocky cliffs in the country. Glacial lagoons. Open roads, the most incredible weather, black earth and blue sky and white ice and a gold heart. I practically float to the car.
Each stop puts me behind, and claims a tiny piece of my heart in exchange for the gift of the diverse land and beautiful expanses. I can't adequately describe the trembling bliss I feel standing on the centre lines of an empty road, spinning carelessly and deciding which route to continue at random. No timeline and all freedom. I have to point out here, in the summer, this wouldn't be possible — I was warned that the country gets overrun with tourists seeking the midnight sun. But now, in the forgotten months full of nothing at all special, my trip is extraordinary and full to bursting with everything incredible.
Drive these incredible roads with me here.
In the afternoon, I leave silvered footprints on the soft black sand that runs from the water to the base of Vestrahorn, one of the most photographed vistas in Iceland. I stand still with a childish grin and outstretched fingers as my hair is blown around my face by a herd of the Icelandic horses who course down the path to part and rejoin seamlessly around me. And when I finally hike the length of the outcropping to the 'ancient' village, I realize it's a scrap wood film set and there is nary a viking in sight. For fucks sakes.
I stop at Jökulsárlón — another tourist haven — this one is full to bursting with tour buses and a spread of humanity as varied as the sights I was marveling over earlier, but frankly, I'm officially selfishly conditioned to expect everything be empty, just for me. Instead of milling around in the swarm, I sulk in the small coffee shop at the edge of the lagoon, overlooking the glacier. It happens to be ironically (and infuriatingly) completely empty except for myself. I spend some time tracing F roads with my finger on my phone screen, and find a second lagoon just up the road, even closer to the glacier.
There are some hairy (ugh, sorry) moments as I see a few more sheep out in the rocks heading towards the car (What are they doing on a glacier? Where are they going? What the fuck are they eating? The sheep here are clearly gangsters,) but I hike down the hill and find the isolated, precious haven I hoped for. Aquamarine water, citrine sunbeams, and dazzling diamond ice shards. It. Is. Breathtaking.
I spend so long turning each crystalline chunk over in my gloved hands that only the sinking sun snaps me out of my reverie. I blaze the rest of the way in a race against the fading light — the two most important things I was told by the car rental agent was to always have the lights on, and neverjust pull to the shoulder of the road. With a week of night driving under my belt, how narrow the roads are, and how black the early evenings without the moon are, I get it. There's just enough time to watch the last vestiges of light recede beyond the horizon from the deck of tonight's cabin before I rummage through my suitcase for a few last soup packets and collapse in exhaustion.
All of these photos, stories, and words are my own original work, inspired by my travels all over this pretty blue marble of ours. I hope you like them. 🌶️
Follow this journey: DAY 1 | DAY 2 | DAY 3 | DAY 4 | DAY 5 | DAY 6 | DAY 7