Be Still and Know

We woke up in our little camping ground pretty early. It was nice to use the camping kitchen to cook breakfast. Most campgrounds provide a kitchen of some sort – at the bare minimum they'll have outside sinks for washing dishes. This one had lots of sinks, stoves, pots and pans. Even had its own car wash. Dave washed Mr. Happy because we'd managed to get him horrendously dirty driving through the rain and the mountains while I prepped breakfast. I'm proud to say that I bet we're the only people in Iceland right now who imported Honduran refried red beans and cooked them up for breakfast! BAM! 

We found a yummy local cheese that I added to it and a bread like substance that was close enough to a tortilla to not be too weird. Dave noticed the camping ground office had a really good hiking map of the area so we bought one – behold, the joy of the Utivist! We've now bought 4 more:)

We're assembling quite the collection of maps. Dave had already bought a really big one made by International Travel. It is a great map – don't get me wrong. But, these Utivist maps tell us what we'll find a various turnoffs in much greater detail. All the hiking trails are marked. Seriously cool.

Anyway, new map in hand, breakfast in our bellies and we were off to the swimming pool. You probably think that is weird. Swimming in Iceland? We thought it was weird at first too – but it is a thing there! Most towns of any size have a pool. For travelers like ourselves, it is a chance to shower quite cheaply and swim, if desired. The pool in Seydisfjordur is right across the street from the high school (maybe the only school??) The kids were sitting on the front steps waiting to go in. We went on in and paid 900 kroner – around 8 bucks and then went to shower. HOLY COW did that feel awesome! We went and jumped in the pool for a little bit just for kicks.

In case you are thinking how much electricity it would take to heat a pool in Iceland, let me put your mind to rest. 99% of all homes and businesses are heated entirely by geothermal heat. The swimming pools, too!

Anyway, back to the locker rooms to rinse off and change clothes and then we felt like a million bucks – ready for the day's adventures. We drove to another fjord – this time cruising into Bakkagerdi which is just north of yesterday's fjord. 

We stopped for a hike on the way – through a sheep farm, of course. This was was interesting because we started up pretty high and ended up on the beach. We walked the rocky beach for quite some ways before getting to a river that was rushing into the sea. Beautiful but not crossable – so hiked back up and to the car!

The little town of Bakkagerdi is just that – little. Not much there at all – that said, just past it is Puffin Island. YEAH! Puffins! I'd been waiting!! We stopped first at a quirky little restaurant called Alfacafe for lunch. They had really cool stones collected from around the island that they used for everything from the tops of the tables themselves to the plates for bread. Gorgeous but very heavy. We both had fish soup and bread. This is a typical Icelandic lunch meal – it is always all you can eat, the bread is homemade and crazy good. And, it is usually the cheapest thing on the menu. Dave also had an appetizer – herring! It actually came out on a thick slice of bread with boiled egg slices on top. Slightly odd, but he enjoyed it. 

We drove on to Puffin Island after lunch. It was a cute but very small area. You park and walk up steps to a viewing platform on either side of this island. There were puffins, but not very many. I took a couple of ok pics – hoping Dave got some good ones! I did learn some interesting things. Puffins nest underground! There were all these holes in the ground and I couldn't figure out why -- then I saw some go in and out of their nests:) Too funny. Also, in April, the puffins first return to this little island (It failed to mention where the heck they've been!) and they spent the afternoons in the water and come onto the island at night. Thought that was funny.

Took this short video of the interesting bird noises!

 

We had a good long drove after that. We needed to cross back over into the north – which required another mountain pass and part of the highlands. It was SO bizarre looking – for a little ways it looked like Mars. Part of it was very snowy. I captured more snow for “ice” later for drinks:) We drove and enjoyed following the rule “turn out in every turnout”. I seriously love the sign board they have here. You can stop and see what is there, read the story of the area and then go look more or keep on going. 

We were determined to get to Dettifoss that night – and we did. Dettifoss is a huge waterfall. It is the greatest volume of any waterfall in Europe! Couldn't wait to get there and see it. We arrived late – which was just fine with us. We're into the groove now of wanting to be at the best places late so Dave has the best light to work with. We had dinner and got ready to go check the falls. You can't see it from the parking lot – there is a short hike. I think .7 km. It is actually possible to view the falls now from either the east or the west side – and Dave wanted the east side (or am I reversing that??) but the road was still impassable with snow and ice. The west side is where we went and the snow melt made the normal WC's an island:) They brought in some portables, so that was fine.

Dave and I walked out to the falls. Wow! Pretty cool! Just a bit further up the trail, another set of falls could be seen too. Dave was trying to find a decent spot without too much spray – the wind was blowing the water towards us so this was difficult. He walked way down from the falls to scope it all out. I walked with him for awhile and then told him I was going to head back to the RV. He intended to stay out for a few hours, of course.

 WC island:)

I got into the RV and cleaned up and got the beds folded down. I was busy enough I didn't notice the weather change. It felt like all of the sudden, I looked up and was in an extremely bad fog. Blindly bad. I sat there for a bit trying to figure out where it came from. Then, I started to worry. It was really bad. And the trail I left Dave on was typical for Iceland – about as wide as your two feet together, right on the edge.

I'm not normally a worrier and I almost never panic – but the longer I sat there, the more scared I got. What if he couldn't find his way back? Ok, not likely. What if he fell? What if he didn't come back in X amount of time? I couldn't go look for him. We didn't have a plan for “if I'm not back in X amount of time.” AND, to make matters worse – this was the only place...the ONLY PLACE this entire trip where the wifi didn't work. No texting. No internet. I was so uneasy.

I sat staring out the front window waiting to see him come walking back to the RV. I saw my little bible sitting there on the dash. We've been keeping it there with great delight in remembering a song our dad used to sing when we were kids, “I don't care if it rains or freezes, long as I've got my plastic Jesus, riding on the dashboard of my car!” We didn't have a plastic Jesus, but we had a paper one and he road on the dashboard. I realized I hadn't yet done my devo for the day. I grabbed my little bible and my phone. Jason took pictures of each day's devo for me so I wouldn't miss it:) I read the words and then looked up the scripture. I kid you not – the verses were 2 Thes 3:16 Now may the Lord of peace himself give you peace at all times and in every way. The Lord be with all of you. And 1John 4:18 There is no fear in love. But perfect love drives out fear, because fear has to do with punishment. The one who fears is not made perfect in love.

These made me think of Psalm 46:10 “Be still and know that I am God.”

So, I thought – ok, I can have peace in all times. God loves me. I need not fear. I can sit here and be still and be confident in God. So, I laid down and forced myself to just breathe. In a short while, not sure how long, I sat up and looked out the window – and there he was! Walking towards the van! HOLY SMOKES! Never been so happy to see my brother before in my life!!!!

Whew! Thank you, Lord, for reminding me sometimes I just have to chill out and trust but thank you also for my AWESOME brother and keeping him (and me) safe on this wonderful adventure. Mercy, after that I was ready to just crash out. The fog made it impossible to go anywhere, so we chatted a bit and then went to bed. What a day! Another 17+ hour day.

Here's a view of the fog still lingering the next morning as we drove out--