Grábrók & Glanni @ Norðurá / Wacky Weather
[Photos taken 21 – 24 July 2024, posted online 11 October 2024. A busload of Italians has invaded the coffee house again!]
I was in a hiking mood, so I contacted a couple of lady-friends who I knew were staying close to our summer house, and they kindly let me join them for a day out and about. We fed them dinner in return!
Then the weather turned windy and rainy, so we mostly just hunkered indoors for a few days, but did make it out to fancy dinner with friends.
Sunday 21 July 2024
Ten Lovely Ladies @ Hveradalir & Gullfoss
[Photos taken 14 July 2024, posted online 09 October 2024. It’s pretty out there.]
Our stay at Gíslaskáli (Gísli’s cabin) came to an end as the storm had finally passed. We decided to drive up to Hveradalir (“Fumarole-valleys” or “Geothermal-valleys”), where we’d attempted to hike to the day before.
On the way there we passed by the pretty Gýgjarfoss waterfalls (two rivers merging into one), passed the Highland Base area, and lots of pretty vistas, before finally oooh-ing and awww-ing over the Hveradalir area. It really is quite beautiful.
We then drove back to civilization, again getting thoroughly shaken on the long unpaved road back to paved asphalt. We stopped at the visitor’s center by Gullfoss (“Golden waterfall”) where a husband awaited us, to whisk his wife and another traveler off to a new adventure. We then drove back to the capital area, all quite happy with how things turned out.
Sunday 14 July 2024
Celebrations / Wacky-Weather / Helgafell Circled
[Photos taken 01 – 13 March 2024, posted online 25 July 2024. The weather continues being wet, wet, wet. The plant-life is loving it, but the humans are getting a bit miserable…]
March 2024 would turn out to be a very busy month. It kicked off with birthday parties, a confirmation, a mild eruption threat, wild weather changes, a new pizza oven, a programming competition for Bjarki, a hike, and work-wonderings. Phew!
Friday 01 March 2024
Chef-lings, Graduation-Season, & Outdoors-ing
[Photos taken 20 – 31 May 2023, posted online 14 20 January 2024. An eruption started early this morning last Sunday just outside the town of Grindavík. Three houses were burned down as lava entered the town itself. The protective wall successfully diverted most of the lava past the town, look for insane footage of the machines being rescued off of the wall as lava surrounds it, and then later in the day closing a wall-gap where the main road was. The ground is all cracked as parts of the town sunk by 1 m, and it’s very dangerous being in town. One road worker died as the ground collapsed under his feet a few days before the eruption. The town remains evacuated, and will be for the foreseeable future.]
Finnur transitioned from a soccer-group-trip to Scotland to working from London the following week, getting the royal treatment at my dad’s & Shirley’s! Meanwhile, I assigned-dinner making to the kids, one dinner each, as Mon/Wed/Fri afternoon gym-class cuts into dinner-prep time.
We all survived the lack of true-chef, and then transitioned over to attending junior-college graduation parties. All this was mixed in with some outdoors-ing.
Saturday 20 May 2023
Wet & Windy e-Biking, Trampoline Renewal, & Warmish Hiking
[Photos taken 11 – 19 May 2023, posted online 13 January 2024. It’s foggy outside!!?!]
The weather took a turn for the not-great, but I still decided to go e-biking in the wind and rain.
Thursday 11 May 2023
Kleifarvatn Hiking, Yule-Outings & 7 Habits
[Photos taken 03 – 10 December 2022, posted online 27 July 2023. Been a cloudy few days, very low energy, possibly due to volcano smog permeating my brain. Finally have blue skies again today.]
And then it was December, again!
There was one more organized hike left in the year, this time around Kleifarvatn (lake). It was a super still day, and it was really nice to see the sun come up.
The social calendar filled up with all sorts of yule-related outings, like concerts & buffets, as I also attended a two-day “7 habits” seminar/workshop at work, and two kids played at musical school concerts.
Saturday 03 December 2022
