Where We Meet Iceland’s Weather Head On And We Finally Get To Sleep In Our Own Bed – After We Find Where We Parked The Car
Day 19 – The Golden Circle
Our second day in Iceland showed us what the weather is actually capable of – 45+ mph winds and torrential downpours. And then it would suddenly stop. And then it would suddenly start again. Basically all day long.
When we boarded the bus, our tour guide, Elin, broke into song – Oh What A Beautiful Morning! we sang, as the rain came down.
A bit of a drive to our first stop – the spot where the North American plate and the European plate meet and are in the process of separating, one of the many reasons Iceland is a hot spot for geothermal activity.
I was wearing my rented raincoat. Unfortunately no photo of it, but it was amazing.
I made a brave attempt to climb up the hill to the railing overlooking the valley below and begin the walk down to the rift, but I never made it to the railing. The wind and rain/sleet/whatever that was blew right in my face. I tried zipping up the jacket’s neckline above my nose. I tried putting on a mask under the jacket. No matter what I tried, I could not take a deep enough breath to be able to move forward.
A lot of this is because I have asthma – ever since I was very small, I’ve not been able to walk into cold, gusting winds. I just flip into hyperventilation, and that’s about it. After the 3rd try, I was so hopelessly behind, I just gave up and went back to the bus. The bus driver keep joking that this was a mere breeze! This is nothing! But to me it wasn’t nothing. It was a non-starter. A bunch of other people came back as well, not willing to deal with the downpour.
Of course, 15 minutes later the rain stopped, but the group had vanished down the trail. There was no catching up with them.
The bus drove about 15 or 20 minutes to the meeting spot at the end of the trail. The scenery is other-worldly beautiful, there’s really no other way to describe it.
At the end of the trail, the sky cleared for a moment.
Some photos of the walk that Andy took
Our next stop was at a geyser park. One of the geysers spurts about every 10 minutes, give or take, billowing out a sulfurous cloud.
I was at least able to do this walk – the wind had died down and it was merely drizzling.
After the geyser park, we were steered toward the huge, crowded, and expensive gift shop. Though our real target was a completely different building where we had lunch. Quite frequently, meals served to large numbers of people are not good. This was the exception. The buffet was excellent!
Onward to our next stop on the Golden Circle: the Gullfoss waterfall. As luck would have it, our bus passed by a massive sheep round-up, as sheep farmers begin the process of bringing their flocks to winter pastures. This is a communal thing – groups of farmers bring all their sheep at the same time.
When we arrived at the falls, the wind and rain kicked back into high gear. Without the wind, I would have been able to walk to the top of the short hill to look over the falls.
The wind gusts once again stopped me in my tracks; I only got partway up, just barely seeing the falls before I had to turn around. My new friends, Cathy and Carl, came up behind me – Cathy and I grabbed Carl’s arms from either side, and the three of us trudged back to the bus. With my raincoat collar zipped up above my nose from below, and the hood flopped over my face, I had a narrow slit to watch my feet. We dashed back into the gift shop and walked through it to an exit closer to the bus parking lot.
Meanwhile, Andy took on the challenge of walking down the 100ish steps down to the bottom of the falls for an even more spectacular view.
When Andy made it back to the bus, he was soaked through.
Our last stop on the Golden Circle was the Kerid crater – a volcano crater filled with blue water. I didn’t even try this one. Photo credit is all Andy:
One last photo stop on the way back to the hotel – the Sun Voyager sculpture, with the mountains in the background showing off the otherworldly scenery that is Iceland:
We had our last dinner in Iceland – and on this vacation – in the hotel restaurant (again), with Cathy and Carl and another couple from the ship. What a blast!
Day 20 – Homeward Bound
All good things must come to an end.
The weather was absolutely beautiful! If only it had been like this yesterday, I might have been able to do so much more!
Our time slot to depart to the airport was 1:40 p.m. Plenty of time to pack up, check out and have breakfast. After breakfast, Andy walked over the coat rental store and returned the raincoat and gloves.
We walked to a burger place next door for lunch. Not so exciting.
I can’t begin to explain how wonderful it was to have Elin escort us to the airport. Unlike other experiences, where the bus dropped us off a huge distance from the terminal, this time the bus brought us right to the terminal door.
Elin went with me inside the terminal to this odd device (I should have taken a photo) to call for my assistance. If Elin had not been there, I’m not sure I would have figured it out. It was more like an intercom system, with terrible sound quality. With Elin’s help, the assistance showed up in just a few minutes.
I had read reviews about the Reykjavik airport. Iceland is a victim of its own marketing campaign – it worked so well, that the country is flooded with (mostly American) tourists. The airport is way too small to handle the volume. Because I had assistance, I was able to go directly to the gate. The rest of the flight’s passengers weren’t notified of the correct gate until 20 minutes before boarding, because there was no room for all the people of multiple flights leaving at about the same time. For our flight, we had to take a bus to the plane on the tarmac, and walk up a flight of stairs to the plane.
Apparently some connecting flights were delayed, so our flight was held. It left an hour late and made up about half of that. We landed at 7:30 Eastern time, and then drove around for another half hour until a gate was secured. We should have been off the plane shortly after 7:00.
It was another while before we were able to make our way to the pick up location (Federal Circle off the AirTrain). Then the confusion began.
I had made a parking spot reservation with what I thought was a Crowne Plaza. But none of the phone numbers on the receipt worked. The people around us said the Crowne Plaza had been closed for 3 months, taken over by the city to house immigrants! Then where was our car?
Stapled to the printout was a receipt for the car with a QR code – when I scanned it, a website for a Radisson came up – but no phone number. We googled the Radisson to get the phone number, and called it. Bingo! Twenty minutes later, a taxi subbing for the courtesy shuttle showed up for us and three other people.
By the time we were on the road, it was 10:30 p.m. We were home shortly after 2:30 a.m.
A very, very long day.
Stay tuned for Amy & Andy’s Excellent Adventure 2024 Part 1, coming next May!
Maryland Meshugas 