Our first destination for the day was Hofn (pronounced 'Hairpin'), and as we expected, there was some spectacular scenery along the way, a lot of it involving glaciers. We stopped for a particular look at this one because of the interesting squiggly line of ash running through it. Yesterday whilst on our boat tour, we learned that scientists can analyse the streaks of ash present in icebergs & tell which volcanic eruption they were from. Remarkable.
I have been researching for this trip for at least the past 12 months. During that time, I came across the most exquisite photos of what could be seen from Hofn. (Admittedly each of those photos were taken on a day when the sky was blue.) So my plan was, that we would spend the morning walking the trails around this GORGEOUS location & then eat their famous langoustine for lunch. (This is a small variation of a lobster & seems to like the waters around here.) HOWEVER, when we arrived in Hofn it was cowering under a heavy grey fog &...truthfully....it didn't look very pretty at all! We decided to go for a bit of a walk anyway & were soon rewarded with a few delights. Firstly, this view! Just imagine this with blue sky!! Four glaciers make an appearance in the background.
The second delight was this painting printed on an information panel. There is a 'planets' trail which we didn't follow up on & I'm not sure what it all means... perhaps the planets can be seen from these locations? I don't know, but what put smiles on our faces was the written inscription that accompanied the painting.
"Saturn was a very small planet a long time ago. The other planets bullied her because she was so tiny. Then she ate heaps of Betty Crocker cream, only to become enormously big & fat, so she was given her own orbit" (Written by a student at Hornafjordur Primary School)
It was worth going to Hofn just for that!
We didn't completely miss out on langoustine either. Instead of eating it, we enjoyed the inventiveness of a local artist!
It was worth going to Hofn just for that!
Back on the road again, we continued driving under that low hanging grey cloud before a new experience came along... a tunnel!! This was exciting because it took us into troll territory, under the mountain & it was a looong tunnel too! I was interested that the walls were very obviously hewn rock & hadn't been dressed with anything like cement or tiling.
We came out of the tunnel into a completely different country. New Zealand???????? It was extraordinary & no grey clouds in sight!
The landscape had changed, & this time the land was covered in a rash of pink spots!
They were, of course, clusters of little pink flowers.
These were not the only flowers we encountered. Before our very eyes fields of lupin spread before us. I was in purple heaven!
We were bound for Djupivogur, and we'd picked up a cheerful little guide to sites around the area & were slowly making our way from one to the other. This was a particularly interesting stop as it marked the spot where the first Christian baptism was performed in Iceland. It was the late 900s,( there was a river flowing here at the time), and Iceland had not yet chosen to embrace Christianity. However, King Olav the first of Norway was keen to encourage that outcome & so he sent a priest over here to convert the Icelanders. A baptism in river water here would have been very very cold!
Further up the road we came across this interesting cairn. Legend has it that a pastor & his deacon met on this spot & had a terrible argument. It was such a violent disagreement ( & they were clearly hot headed) that they ended up killing each other! The deacon is buried under this mound of stones, but no mention is made of where the Pastor was buried!!!!
We arrived in Djupivogur in time for a late afternoon lunch of Fisk og Kranska (aka fish & chips!). Sadly it was the worse meal we've had since we arrived in Iceland, but what a view we had out our window!
After lunch we went for a walk to a very special lookout. This beautiful port was terrified by the appearance of African slave traders in 1627, so they built a lookout to keep watch & ensure the like never reached land here again. Jeff thought he'd do his bit for the local community.... even if they had fed him a poor example of F& C!!
Our last stop of the day was to admire the view of Bulandstindur, the king of mountains who stands watch over the Berufjordur. He made us think of Egypt!
Alas, the day went downhill from there. Our GPS led us to the wrong place for our accommodation & thinking it must still be further on, we kept going on... and on... and on, until at last we came to a small town where we could ask for directions. We found out that our accommodation was another 'Blabjorg' one and a half hours BACK the way we had come. As that road included a rather long stretch on slippery gravel & we were shattered, we cut our losses & booked in to an unexpected accommodation option right here! We have an incredible view over another fjord, the sky is still blue, & the sun still shining at 8.30pm! We knew that even with the best of planning there would be hiccups & this has been one, but even so... it's not at all a bad hiccup to have!
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