Going with the Flow

The days are so long here that your body can't keep up with your mind. There is no darkness in Iceland at this time of the year. So your mind thinks you can keep going even though your body is tired, and you lose track of what you have done.

In my post from yesterday I forgot to mention that we went to one more place: Thingvellir National Park, which is a UNESCO World Heritage Site. The park is very big and we got there around 8:30 pm. We were really tired and didn't have as much energy to explore as we would've liked to.

Besides, we were trying to make it to a waterfall that we thought was 40 minutes away and on our way home, when in reality it was 5 and a half hours away northeast. And all because the waterfall and a city have the same name.

Anyways, this park is pretty cool because, as Wikipedia tells us, "the continental drift between the North American and Eurasian Plates can be clearly seen in the cracks or faults which traverse the region" and part of that is in the pictures. It is also very interesting historically speaking.

It was pretty nice. Then we drove to Selfoss thinking we were going to a waterfall, when really we went to the town and  drove back home when we realized that.

The point of a road trip, of course, is driving to get to wonderful places and sometimes that means spending most of the day in the car. The original plan wasn't that, but when I planned the trip my trip times were mistaken. And that is another important thing to keep in mind when road tripping: you have to be flexible and adapt.

We headed to Hvítserkur, which is an amazing rock formation north of Reykjavik. It is quite far, about three hours away. The landscape was very different than what we saw on the south but still quite nice. 

When we got there and it was very windy and cold. The good news is that we were prepared and were able to layer up to be more comfortable. We didn't spend much time there because we had to be back in Reykjavik on time for a whale watching tour.

We enjoyed the scenery, took some pictures and headed back.  When we got about thirty minutes away from Reykjavik we stopped at an overlook to stretch and I checked my email. Bad news.  Our whale watching tour was cancelled because of the rough sea conditions. We were heartbroken. But I have to admit that part of the drive was scary because the wind was so strong that it kept pushing our little car. So I knew they were right in cancelling it.

We went straight to the tour place to get a refund, but since we booked it through an agency we needed to do it with the agency. Reykjavik was really cold and windy. We decided to take the opportunity to sit down at a restaurant and have a proper meal. It was probably for the better. We were almost falling asleep while eating. We also need good rest for tomorrow, which is going to be very exciting!