This guy was in the lobby of our hotel
The next morning we walked round Akureyi again waiting for
the swimming pool to open. The pool complex was huge with different pots at
different temperatures and a steam room. The locals seem to do their stretches
and yoga in the steam room which was a little disconcerting at first. Then back
to Reykjavik with me trying to take pictures of the hundreds of Icelandic
ponies from the moving car. We tried to take a lot of photos from the car
strangely enough they haven’t really come out or we’ve got some cracking photos
of the windscreen wipers or side mirrors!
On the way back South we tried to sort of go to Glymer.
Glymer is Iceland’s tallest waterfall. First you need to get along the
incredibly bumpy gravel road to get to the head of the walk – this is
terrifying when you’re not supposed to take your hire car on gravel roads and
when you haven’t taken out the windscreen cover or chipped paint cover
insurance. So we got to the start of the walk about 4:45 and expecting that
it’d be dark on the way back we took a torch with us. We walked quite a way
crossing a smallish stream following the marked path. I don’t do too well with
too much walking and my back was quite sore.
We then came to a huge hole in the
ground which basically took us under a huge rock and down the side of a cliff –
it was pitch black here! We came out the other side unscathed and kept going
(should point out I’m also a huge wuss and have no sense of balance so I don’t
do well with scrabbling over rocks and jumping streams. I’m the one on my bum
to go down the smallest of slopes).
Eventually we came to a rather full river with a wire across it. There were stepping stones to the centre of the river and then a log for the rest of the journey. This was my breaking point and thankfully O’s too. We were not crossing the river in the dying light to see a waterfall. Especially when we could see where the path went on the other side and that didn’t look like much fun either. I told O he could go on if he wanted to but I’d had enough and would meet him at the car. (in contrast to me being a wuss and having no sense of balance my husband is like a mountain goat and can bound up hills at the drop of a hat). However, we decided that neither of us was going to cross the river. I suggested to O that he climb the hill in front of us and see if he could see the waterfall from there at least to get a picture. He decided we should both climb the hill to have a look we might have had a small argument, I might have had a tantrum but somehow I ended up climbing the bloody hill. YOU CANNOT SEE THE WATERFALL FROM THE TOP OF THE HILL. We stomped back to the car practically in silence. On the way back we passed a couple just setting out (they’d been in the car park when we’d set out, not sure what took them so long we assumed they’d already been to the falls). We gave them fairly honest advice – are you mental it is dark, don’t do it, you’ll never make it. They went on regardless but O saw them turn almost as soon as we were out of view. My advice is don’t try and get to Glymer falls!
Eventually we came to a rather full river with a wire across it. There were stepping stones to the centre of the river and then a log for the rest of the journey. This was my breaking point and thankfully O’s too. We were not crossing the river in the dying light to see a waterfall. Especially when we could see where the path went on the other side and that didn’t look like much fun either. I told O he could go on if he wanted to but I’d had enough and would meet him at the car. (in contrast to me being a wuss and having no sense of balance my husband is like a mountain goat and can bound up hills at the drop of a hat). However, we decided that neither of us was going to cross the river. I suggested to O that he climb the hill in front of us and see if he could see the waterfall from there at least to get a picture. He decided we should both climb the hill to have a look we might have had a small argument, I might have had a tantrum but somehow I ended up climbing the bloody hill. YOU CANNOT SEE THE WATERFALL FROM THE TOP OF THE HILL. We stomped back to the car practically in silence. On the way back we passed a couple just setting out (they’d been in the car park when we’d set out, not sure what took them so long we assumed they’d already been to the falls). We gave them fairly honest advice – are you mental it is dark, don’t do it, you’ll never make it. They went on regardless but O saw them turn almost as soon as we were out of view. My advice is don’t try and get to Glymer falls!
a grumpy me trudging back to the car
This time we checked into an apartment for two nights. We walked from
the apartment into the centre of
Reykjavik and ate at a really nice vegetarian
restaurant. On
the walk into town we passed a couple of red cross charity shops and some
second hand shops which we planned to visit the next day however we hadn’t
planned that very well and it was Sunday the next day.
Finally getting round to finishing these posts off.
all photos by O or me
