Spa Day at Isafjorour

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At our campground in Isafjorour; a badass camper from Swisszerland next door. He drove that beast over from the ferry. Him and his wife were sipping whiskey by the stream when we came home last night from our hike.

Today is our well earned Spa Day. Spa Day for us is best defined for what it ain’t. We ain’t walking up any hills today. Not taking down the tent (before yesterdays hike we planned on shipping off today). I sure as heck ain’t waking up Corey right now (it’s about 8:30 and I just crawled out of the tent a few minutes ago). Spa Day for us is sitting still and spending time at the local pool. A worker at the campground, an incredibly nice Canadian earning her Master’s at the satellite school right here in Isajafoir, recommended we actually drive about fifteen minutes to a much nicer pool. Will most likely follow that advice.

The waterfall by our campground. 24 hour light means you can hike whenever you want. This photo was taken after dinner around 8 PM. Last night we saw people climb to their waterfall just before heading to bed.

Our guide for the hike yesterday (and that hike is the reason for our needed Spa Day) is also a student here at Isafjorour. A very cool Britt, his plan is to never leave this island nation. And maybe also the Westfjords. In-between him sometimes literally pulling us over the trail (if you never crossed a snow line on a vertical angle then you are not allowed to judge) he talked of a workers utopia where every Icelander is in a union that ensures high wages and a high quality of life. Which is true. A superficial internet search finds Iceland and Norway vying for being the happiest country in the world.

From our guided hike in the Hornstrandir Reserve. Never a populated area, this roadless region was completely abandoned by the 1950s. A dozen people or so now live in this massive region of the country but only in the summer. To get anywhere you need a boat and then a Zodiac to get you on the beach. Our daylong hike was to this restored farmhouse where our guide cooked us some soup. Among our many highlights was seeing an Artic Fox.

There is one not so perfect thing here in Isafjorour. Parts of the six kilometer tunnel heading into the town from the south are one lane. Those coming into the town have the right of way. There are no signs indicating such a fact. So after a rather long and treacherous drive from Brjeidafjorour Bay that involved a lot of blind turns, gravel and limited guard rails you drive a tunnel that suddenly narrows to one lane with headlights coming right at you (there are turn offs for cars leaving the tunnel). And no signs explaining what to do.

At the campground’s communal kitchen. Every campground offers something different in Iceland. In Isafjorour they have a very nice but crowded indoor space with stove tops and lots of cooking tools.

The people of Isafjorour barely notice this inconvenience. One credible source though blames the elves. I guess that when this tunnel was built in the late 90s there were several terrible accidents. So the elves were exorcized or something by public officials. They held a big ceremony to do so. And also for some reason they decided to not widen the tunnel anymore. If only the elves had a union then maybe they could have stalled the whole project.

In a country of waterfalls the Dynjandi Waterfall still is an incredibly impressive sight.

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