The next leg of the trip was a bit different. There's a huge bay called Breiðafjörður between the Westfjords where we had been staying and the western peninsula where we were heading. There are hundreds of islands in the bay but only one is inhabited all year round - Flatey island. There's a ferry that crosses the bay and stops at Flatey en-route and they have a cool system with the cars. Visitors' cars aren't allowed on the island so if, like us, you want to stay the night, you put your car on the ferry, hand the keys in to the cafe on board and get off at the island. Your car continues onto the other side of the bay where someone unloads it and hands the keys back to the cafe for you to pick up when you're ready. It's a fabulous system and it worked really well!
So we went to Flatey Island. What an incredible 24 hours we had there!
We arrived and walked 15 minutes to our hotel. There were a few vehicles around, mostly tractors.
I'm guessing that there were only 20 to 30 buildings on the island. Many of them are over 100 years old. They're heritage listed so they can be renovated but not changed. The main part of the town was a smorgasbord of colourful historic houses as we approached it.
I wanted to walk around the island but a section of the island is closed for two months as it's bird breeding season. Birds were everywhere! We saw more puffins but also many other sorts including snow buntings which I'd bever seen before.
The birds were very territorial. The Arctic Terns would dive-bomb anyone who ventured near their nests. As their nests were everywhere they were a bit hard to avoid. We watched as one dive-bombed John. This was an exceptionally clever tern though. When John didn't move it dived again and shat on him! That worked!
There were a few cute little earth-covered buildings. I tried to get close to one but there were heaps of terns there and I simply couldn't get any closer than this!
We visited the church and saw a group of people there as we approached. They were having a small drink outside the church so John made a comment about joining them. They were a chatty lot and it turned out they were an Icelandic choir and had just been singing in the church to see what it was like. They then offered to sing for us! It was amazing!
Did you notice the painting behind the singers? Jesus is wearing one of the local knitted jumpers! They are very much like the Fair Isle jumpers that were the craze at home in the 80's.
They choir group were a great group of people and were all staying the night. We seemed to have timed this visit very well as a famous Icelandic singer was playing in our hotel that night. When we asked if we would need earplugs to sleep we were told, "Don't worry - it will finish at midnight"! We're usually well tucked up into bed by then. The Icelandic Minister for the Environment was also there to sign a policy that has something to do with the bird sanctuary there. Needless to say our hotel, which is the only accommodation on the island apart from camping, was booked out. I'm glad I booked this ages ago.
Nearby was Iceland's oldest library and it's still operating today. I've heard that Icelanders are big lovers of literature. The library was in such a gorgeous building.
John was struggling with a cold so I went for another walk while he got in out of the cold weather. I saw lots of birds. A woman I met showed me where a seal pup was waiting for its mum to come back from fishing. I was amazed that it was a white colour. I'm guessing it's a grey seal.
We had a sensational dinner then had a drink while we waited for the music to start. We got talking to the Icelandic woman who was working there and she was passionate about Icelandic horses ( they're horses, NOT ponies we were told!) She sometimes helps run horse riding trips where they spend two months riding right around Iceland! People can join in at any stage. They take maybe 100 horses so each rider can ride several horses a day to give the horses a break. Most of the unridden horses just follow freely along and we saw a video of them all trotting along a path. I don't think I've ever seen that many loose horses just freely following along before.
We were shown a fascinating YouTube video showing the unusual gaits of Icelandic horses. For our horsey friends, you can see it here. It's amazing!
The show started earlier than we were told so by the time we got there, all the seats were taken except for a few in the front two rows. Consequently, there were the two Aussies front and centre at the intimate concert of an Icelandic pop icon. Her name is Ragga Gisla.
The show was fantastic! She didn't speak a word of English during the show but we managed to sing along with a few bits here and there. "Ohhh, ohhh, ohhh" is the same in any language, haha. There were only about maybe 80 people in the room and the show was free for everyone. The hotel puts on shows like this so people come to stay.
Ragga is apparently nudging 70 years old but you wouldn't know it. She was funny, entertaining and genuine. She's liked by young and old and is very much adored in Iceland. She's even been knighted!
She had an amazing range in the way she sung and she sang everything from pop to blues to an Elton John song in Icelandic. The crowd got right into it, singing along. Most of them were only on Flatey to see Ragga.
Afterwards, we got talking to people and found ourselves getting on very well with an Icelandic guy who turned out to be Ragga's husband. We talked for ages and only stopped because it was late (about 12.45) and we were standing outside under the light midnight sky and it was freezing. It wasn't helping John's cold at all. We learned the next day, after another long chat when we bumped into each other on a walk, that the husband used to be a famous football player, playing for the Icelandic national team. I think they found it refreshing that we were unaffected by their stardom as they're not famous to us.
Flatey was a really special place. It was small, windswept and isolated yet it was still easily accessible by ferry. It had a lovely feel to it but I think it was meeting so many wonderful Icelandic people that made it extra special for us. We really haven't met that many Icelanders on this trip which isn't that surprising as there are only about 350,000 of them, and most of those live in Reykjavik, the capital.
We kept bumping into the same people on Flatey as there is only one way to get on and off the island, and that's by the twice-daily ferry. Not surprisingly, we ended up on the same ferry with Ragga and her husband and by the time we finally separated, we were all good friends. At last we had met some Icelandic people that we could be friends with!
We also met an Indian lady who runs Reykjavik's best Indian restaurant. We were only a few days away from the capital so we booked a table. We might as well eat at places where we know someone!
When we travel, we rarely seem to time these events right but this one was perfect. It was such an incredible visit and one we won't forget in a hurry.
We approached the mainland again at a town called Stykkisholmur. Grey clouds loomed over the pretty old buildings that surrounded the harbour.
Nearby was a small hill, called Helgafell, which is of great local importance. Local legend has it that if you climb the hill without speaking or looking backwards then get to the top and look east, you can make three wishes. I did this and looked to the east and was gobsmacked by the view over a maze of small islands in the fjord.
The weather soon turned for the worse. The wind raged around our cabin and the rain, although not heavy, was persistent. We hunkered down inside, snug and warm in our lovely cabin.
At one stage, in desperate need of some exercise, I decided to brave the elements. John dropped me off near the next town and I walked back. I walked through an area full of nesting terns and got bombed again and again. I held my camera over my head and filmed.
Two days after we arrived, we left, having not seen a mountain or gone for a proper hike at all. Oh well, this is Iceland!
Our next day was only an hour or two's drive but I had a number of things picked out to see along the way. First stop was a walk between one village and another. We drove to the car park and I took one look at the weather and changed my mind.
We drove past some photogenic volcanic plugs. I like to think the rain added atmosphere!
Next stop was a canyon that looked like it would be fun as it was really narrow and you had to squeeze through it. The weather hadn't improved and I saw someone returning from the canyon to their car so I asked her what it was like. It turned out that she was Australian and was totally fed up with the weather. She only had six or seven days in Iceland and had had weather like this every day! It made me grateful for the first two weeks of reasonable weather that we had. She told me that the canyon was roped off as water was running through it so we gave up on that excursion too!
There was a large museum there with great info about the settlement of Iceland. The thing that blew me away was that when the first settlers arrived about 1,100 years ago, Iceland was covered in trees! Yes, it was the settlers, and those who followed, that cut down the trees for firewood, building and ship building. We think it's really strange how there has been so little attempt to plant more trees. Most houses have no trees or even gardens around them. It's perfectly normal to just stick a house on a barren tract of land. The trees in the photo above were an anomaly.
It was Friday night and John was keen for a night out so we found a local bar. The meals were massive - they were fit for a hungry Viking!
There was a fabulous lady serving. She introduced us to the local liquorice firewater. It was a bit too much like cough medicine for me but John liked it.
As we were sitting there, we watched in amazement as three cyclists parked their bikes and came inside. It was so wet and windy! It turned out that they rode around Iceland in the same time as we drove around it. They had ridden until 2am the night before to avoid the worst of the wind but sometimes they simply couldn't ride. We had commented before on the number of crazy people riding bikes around Iceland. The Ring Road is narrow, busy and has no shoulders. Gusts of wind could blow you into the path of a car. I wouldn't do this in a pink fit but these young Americans looked happy.
A group at another table, locals I think, brought their French Bulldog into the bar with them. They sat it on a chair. Not just on a chair, but on a cushion they got for it from another chair. When their meals came out, there was a plate for the dog too. Not a dog bowl though - it was the same wooden platter that our meals came on and it had sliced meat, presumably lamb, on a bed of lettuce. The dog ate the meat off the plate on the table but left the lettuce. Oh my god!
We packed the next morning and headed to Reykjavik, our final destination in Iceland. We dropped off the car and sought out Asian food for lunch as we miss our Asian food and we don't think we're going to get much of it in Greenland. Over the next two days we ate Indian, Nepali, Thai, Vietnamese, Korean and Indonesian food!
We mostly just caught up on things like getting John a haircut and buying some wet weather gear for Greenland.
Our Icelandic singer friend and her husband had recommended a place to see live music. The bar was in a bookshop. It looked amazing! The band was an Icelandic cover band and they soon had the place rocking. John wasn't up to dancing so I asked a girl nearby if she wanted to dance. She was Spanish and said she didn't dance but offered me her partner! So a Spanish guy and myself hit the dance floor. It was fun! The next song was our wedding song so John had to get up for that one, haha. It was a great night but the place had large windows and it was weird dancing in daylight at nighttime.
Amazingly, our "window weather" the next morning held and it turned into a cool but sunny day. It was our last day in Iceland. We checked out the ships at the port. I assume this strange-looking ship is an icebreaker.
Hooroo!
Heather and John
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