Anyway, enough of that rambling. Here's what I've been up to over the past week.
The Ring Goes... North
I took a 6 hour bus around the Ring Road to get to Akureyri. This is Iceland's second biggest city after Reykjavik, although city is being generous - there's only about 18,000 people living there. It's a lovely little place though, all spread out down the side of Eyjafjordur and surrounded by mountains.The drive itself was pretty cool too, given that the weather held out all the way there so I could actually see the scenery. It feels a bit like driving through New Zealand - the landscapes here are huge for such a small island.
FOUR HUMPBACK WHALES!
My first real day in Akureyri, I'd planned to go to the city museum and then to the Botanical Gardens in the afternoon. The gardens are the northernmost botanical gardens in the world, so that would have been good.However...
Akureyri and the nearby town of Husavik are supposedly the best places in Iceland from which to go whale watching. So, on my way down towards the museum I stopped in at the whale watching companies, thinking to book a trip for the next day. The first place (and the cheapest) turned out to have availability for that afternoon, so I jumped on that instead.
That didn't really give me chance to go to the museum, so I headed back to the hostel, grabbed my cold weather gear and went back down to the harbour.
We spent about an hour motoring down towards the mouth of the fjord in search of whales and were rewarded with sighting 4 humpbacks over the hour or so we spent down there. Unfortunately, I'm still getting the hang of my new camera, so all of my photos are really bad. Here's the best of a bad bunch.
The highlight of the trip, though, was the moment we turned to head for port and caught sight of this.
That, is a pair of humpbacks breaching. Repeatedly. I think they did it 2 or 3 times each. Fortunately, the guide on board the boat filmed that, because I managed to miss every single breach with my camera and eventually gave up in favour of just watching this amazing spectacle.
I didn't get much done for the rest of that day... too busy buzzing about whales.
Wait, I fib. I went for a walk down the fjord. I had intended to walk down as far as the airport, because the runway sticks out into the fjord. I got as far as the end of the runway and gave up because it's actually quite a long way and the wind is very cold and I was wearing the wrong shoes and I should just stop making excuses, right?
Anyway, the fjord is very pretty and full of little families of eider ducks. The ducklings are adorable and I was very tempted to steal them all.
Here there be monsters...
My second day in Akureyri, I did make it to the city museum, which had a fascinating exhibition about the history of Iceland maps. That is, there was a room full of maps of Iceland and I was in heaven. Here there be monsters and a koala called Harold.
Then I went for lunch at the Nordic Bistro and finally tried Icelandic lamb soup. Really delicious and the bread that came with it was just as good. I'm not normally a fan of lamb, but it was so warming and just what I needed after walking back from the museum in the strong winds which blow down the fjord.
As with all things in Iceland, not exactly cheap, but worth it.
I had intended to spend the afternoon exploring the Botanical Gardens that I'd missed out on the day before, but the wind was picking up and as I left the bistro, a huge black cloud had settled over the length of the fjord and I didn't fancy my chances of a dry afternoon so headed back to the hostel to lounge around - midnight sun isn't entirely conducive to good sleep patterns.
Sure enough, it pissed down all afternoon. I made up for the wasted time by heading back into town in the evening to catch Finding Dory at the tiny cinema. It's one of those little local places where they still put an interval in, even when it's not needed. Funny seeing the film with Icelandic subtitles and I had great fun trying to work out what all the Icelandic adverts were for.
The Ring Goes South
(and if you're not singing the Lord of the Rings theme... shame)Tuesday morning I got back on the bus and headed down south to Reykjavik. Fairly uneventful, save for the 5 minutes we had to stop the bus because a huge herd of Iceland's famous horses were crossing the road. They just kept coming! Beautiful animals and my photos don't do them justice.
Oh, and then there was the drunk woman who got on the bus and sat next to me for the last hour into Reykjavik. Very drunk, very loud and at one point randomly burst into tears. I didn't know what to do so I just left her to it.
I then had great fun trying to explain to the bus driver on the local bus that I wanted to get off at Rauðarárstígur. I can't pronounce Rauðarárstígur so I tried asking for the stop before Hlemmur, which it is and at least I can pronounce Hlemmur. He just thought I wanted to get off at Hlemmur. Fortunately, the ticket's the same price regardless. Phew.
It's bigger than me...
On my final full day in Iceland I took a wander to the Phallological Museum. Yes, Iceland has a museum dedicated to the penis. It is bizarre. This is a sperm whale penis. It is definitely longer than I am tall. Which is sort of terrifying.
Perhaps more terrifying is the fact that some crazy Icelander actually donated his own... bits... to the museum when he died. No photos of that. Too freaked out. Also, boar penises are curly. Like pigs' tails.
Moving swiftly on. Having weirded myself out with the museum, I decided to take a walk around the bay to Grotta, which is either the lighthouse or the island the lighthouse is on. Either way, it turned out to be quite a lot further around the bay than I'd anticipated. I did make it though, just in time to see the lighthouse vanish into a fog bank. Going...
Going...
Gone.
It's amazing how quick that fog rolled in. Fortunately it was still quite warm and at least it was dry. Due to this, I was getting thirsty and also hungry because I'd just walked 4 miles and my breakfast had gone a long way down. Lucky for me there's a whole bunch of little cafes and the like down at the harbour.
The harbour was 3 miles away.
So by the time I got there I was starving. Which meant when I crossed the road and a wave of delicious smell hit me, I headed straight into a tiny burger bar. And I mean tiny.
There I had the most deliciously greasy burger and skinny McCains chips. Yes, Iceland uses McCains chips. And while the burger was greasy, it was definitely proper meat. Yum. Not like MacDonalds, which reminds me...
Having stuffed my face and with my legs protesting that I'd just walked a lot further than I have for quite a while, I decided to head back to the hostel. And I finally found where they're keeping it.
See, the Bus Hostel in Reykjavik is the proud owner of the last Big Mac sold in Iceland. They keep it on the bar. Ta-dah!
And then I watched the Iceland-Austria match and cheered when Iceland scored a goal in the closing seconds to set up a meeting with England in the next round. Oh, the conflict - Iceland are the underdog and I love an underdog, but I'm English. Who the hell do I support? Guh.
Nothing to declare
So dawned my final day in Iceland. It began with an argument with the Delta Airlines site when I tried to book a flight from Calgary to Anchorage, just in case I was asked for an onward ticket at the airport. Got that sorted eventually, but I nearly gave up and would have risked it.Fortunately, the rest of my day in Reykjavik went much better. I had a stroll around the city and finally had a look inside Harpa, the funky looking concert hall on the bay.
Also bought myself a little souvenir in the form of a funky little luggage tag, because I realised after the debacle at the airport on the way in that I should probably have some sort of ID on my rucksack.
Then I grabbed a delicious falafel and feta pita for lunch before heading up to Hallgrimskirkja. This is a huge church on a hill in the city centre. You can see it from all the way across the bay in Akranes. I'd been up it when I visited last year, so I wanted to see whether the view was any better with clearer skies.
Sort of. It was a pretty cloudy day in Reykjavik. After that, it was off to the airport again.
Uneventful airport times (save for a slight delay), uneventful flight in which I finally watched Deadpool (awesome film) and then about 45 minutes later than scheduled, I arrived in Halifax, Nova Scotia.
And promptly had to go and talk to Immigration. Which would have been fine, but my brain thought it was about 1am by this point. I had to show the nice lady my online banking to prove I had the funds for my trip, tried to explain that I had no firm plans except to be in Vancouver on August 12th and that I'd booked a flight that morning to leave Canada on August 29th.
It probably didn't take as long as I think it did, but I was getting seriously concerned they weren't going to let me stay as long as I needed. And I could feel myself going pink, guilt complex kicking in. Maybe I had done something wrong? What other proof did they need? What the hell was I going to do if they didn't let me have my 2 and a half months?
Yeah. That wasn't a great way to arrive.
Fortunately, after much babbling about my very vague plans ("how're you getting around?" -"umm... I'm going to take buses and trains. I think... I'm told they're all right. Umm... I don't drive."), the nice lady finally stamped my passport and let me in.
Phew.
Then I just had to wait another hour to get the shuttle into the city. Lovely friendly chap gave me directions, just in case the driver couldn't drop me outside the hostel. And then I drank a huge cup of tea because OH MY GOD I NEEDED THE CAFFEINE.
And so, I am now in Canada for 2 and a half months. Ish. More adventure awaits.
Anyone else had fun with Immigration before? Do share!
At least you have escaped the mayhem in Europe :-)
ReplyDelete