Longest Hike Yet, Concert & Quiet Halloween

2021-10-17Us Standard

[Photos taken 17-31 October 2021, posted online 30 January 2022. Snow on the ground, it keeps coming and going, just a little here and there.]

The latter part of October was dominated by the first the thought of, then the doing of, and then the recovery from, the longest hike (16 km) of the hiking group yet, which just happened to end up quite close to house #2. Rarely has a hot tub soak been more welcomed!

There was bowling, Anna and I went to an actual concert, Emma went in for dental surgery, our internet was upgraded to fiber, shopping happened, farm animals were visited, we went ice-skating, and Anna discovered the power of driving her sister around to collect candy for Halloween (85-ish images total)

Sunday 17 October 2021

We awoke to snow! Probably a good thing the plants had already begun preparing for winter!
By late afternoon we were back in town, and the bored kids whined out a trip to the bowling alley!
Cheerful after a successful throw!
Feeding the animals.

Monday 18 October 2021

Back at the office, now seeing fewer leaves, but enjoying the last of daylight at 8:30 am.

Tuesday 19 October 2021

Anna agreed to join me in going to an anniversary concert of Adda’s string-less orchestra (it’s not a brass band!).
The food hall at Hlemmur was pretty packed! So. Many. People. From. All. Over!
The food there is consistently very good!
The concert was in Harpa, and the wind was too cold for thin jackets!
We’d miscalculated how long dinner would take, so we arrived quite early. We walked around the building and found a couch that was hidden away in some empty hall, and hung out there for a bit.
70 years is an impressive age for an orchestra in Iceland!
The concert was highly enjoyable, and it’s sort of amazing just how good they are considering this is not a professional troupe.
Post concert image, in super harsh lighting!
It’s always a treat for the senses to be inside Harpa.

Wednesday 20 October 2021

Waiting to be called into dental surgery to remove an extra tooth-sack which was preventing the real adult teeth from coming down.
The operation took about an hour, so I wandered over to the next building to eat at the bakery. This is on the way back to the dental office.
Thankfully, she woke up gently from the anesthesia, in sharp contrast to another younger kid in the wake-up room who came out of it in a fit of rage. I sent a lot of “been there, done that, it’s ok” vibes to the poor mom.
As promised, we stopped at the toy-store on the way back and Emma coaxed a bit more stuff out of me than I originally planned. Thankfully, her recovery went well, and this was a success overall.

Thursday 21 October 2021

Thursdays are dessert days in the cafeteria at work. This is called being spoiled rotten!
Getting hooked up to fiber! A few years ago one company put fiber optic cables into all the houses in the street that wanted it, free of charge. We couldn’t make use of it at the time because our internet was being provided to us by another company (courtesy of my company). In August news broke that the two fiber companies had reached an agreement, and that we could now finally sign up for fiber!
My desk got a second job for a bit.
Because it rains when it pours, a couple of carpenters showed up the same day to switch out damaged wood by the edge of the lower roof.
Too much water had gone where it wasn’t supposed to go for too long… I’m glad this finally got fixed!

Saturday 23 October 2021

On board a bus at 8 am on a Saturday morning, mentally preparing for a 16 km hike.
The route, and the elevation profile below. That long flat walk at the end was gorgeous for the eyes, but my feet weren’t fans.
Group check-in with the question of ‘what is your favorite yule-tide song?’.
The weather was ridiculously perfect, especially considering that the forecast the night before had been “pouring rain”!
And off we went at 9:30 am! This route is an old “national road” from before there were cars.
The route is a steep-ish ascent in the beginning, then a loooooot of flats, before descending into the valley where house #2 is in.
Selfies to catch the illuminated cloud-whisper at the bottom of the bottom-valley. (This is the Botn=’bottom’ of a fjord called Hvalfjörður, aka Whale-fjord.)
A selfie looking out the fjord (mirrored). The weather was so warm that the first few stops were all about tearing off clothing layers!
Being a well known hike, there are cairns along the path.
About as high was we were about to go, stopping to drink some water.
On the flats above, including a human for scale. We sat down and ate second breakfast.
Down below is the (old) whaling station, and the mouth of Hvalfjordur. We trudged onwards.
A cairn shows the way.
A small river gorge.
Happily, all the streams were easily fordable without having to take shoes off.
Imagine being up here is crappy weather?!?!
The sides of the next valley over visible in the distance.
Another river crossed.
This river runs to the valley we were heading to, Skorradalur, valley of Skorri.
Classic Icelandic scenery. The ground was pretty wet, and I’m not sure I would have made it had it also been raining.
Peanut butter and jelly sandwiches are somehow perfect for hiking trips.
Druring lunch, many in the group tried (and probably succeeded) to name the mountains/glaciers in the distance.
Muddy mud is muddy.
By 3 pm, we started descending into Skorradalur for real. You can see the little pockets of evergreen trees planted by various “summer” cottages.
The eastern end of Skorradalsvatn, the lake of the valley of Skorri. The dam lake is 15 km long, and house #2 is by the western end. By this time, my old ankle breakage was beginning to ache a bit, but there was still a ways to go to get to the bus, which was parked on the far right side of the picture, by the trees.
The guides are pretty good at stopping every now and again to gather everybody together. For some reason, I’m darn slow walking downhill, not so bad going up.
First signs of civilization.
A sad house.
But, it had a modern toilet!
Agnes, feeling a bit tired.
The bus! The bus!
Thankfully this last river was bridged!
Oh, a sight for tired feet!
Still alive, and standing! So happy the rain forecast didn’t come to pass!
The absolute hero of the trip was the one who forgot her hiking shoes in her foyer and walked the whole 16 km in wet sneakers!
The rest was wearing something like this.
The hillside we came down.
We rode in the bus to the road that our house is on, and then Finnur came and picked me and Agnes up, and we went straight to soak in the hot tub! My phone was completely out of batteries, so there are no photos of the scrumptious dinner!

Sunday 24 October 2021

Two chicklings playing outside.

Thursday 28 October 2021

Back at the gym!
That looks like a somewhat leisurely 2500 m row.

Frida 29 October 2021

Anybody need some toothpaste?

Saturday 30 October 2021

At the mall with Emma and Anna.
We decided to go ice skating, but when we got to the rink it turned out it was “closing early” because a “Halloween skate” was starting up soon. We decided to go to the Halloween skate, and waited for it to begin by visiting the next-door farm-animal park.
Reindeer eating.
I would not want to meet these head with nothing between us!
The classics are classic for a reason!
We were there at the right moment to see the cows getting milked, up close and personal.
Finally the rink re-opened, and Emma showed us her backing skills.
There were quite a few people in costume.
Anna had a friend with her, and I decided to skate too for the first time in years!
Still standing!
Emma chasing lights.
6 pm sunset.
The upside to darkness: northern lights!

Sunday 31 October 2021

Halloween was back “on”, in spite of covid. Finnur came down with a cold though, so he got to hide in a room until his covid test came back (negative), but out of an abundance of caution, I put the candy in a bowl outside, with directions that people could take one piece per person! We were also too late to try to buy pumpkins, they were sold out!
Emma with a friend, about to go trick or treating! Anna later “borrowed” Emma to go trick or treating with a friend of hers, and they gathered up an obscene amount of candy with Anna dropping them off by the start of a cul-de-sac, picking them up at the end of a cul-de-sac, and then driving to the next street!
I decided this was a good time to switch out this light fixture, which was there when we moved in, and has been sinking lower and lower over the years.
It was also a good room to be in to keep an eye out on the candy dispensary.
Success! And yes, it worked!
Moving the “fix the light” ticket, that’s been sitting there for months, to the “Done” side was very satisfying. Thus endeth October!