Returning to the US

 We head to the changing rooms a couple of hours later all rested and

relaxed before a big flight.  The going out of Iceland part feels way better than how we came in.  We return the rental car and apparently I didn’t kill the transmission, so we’re good to lug our luggage to the terminal

because shuttles aren’t running due to COVID.  We get in to the terminal and have no trouble checking in, getting the bags checked and the attestation for the US Government gets completed by IcelandAir because we’ve shown our proof of

testing.  John gets some Cuban cigars at the duty free while he can, Oscar and I run into Kim and Rodney to hear about the end of their trip.  We also find out from a fellow traveler that US flights are leaving from some hidden terminal and gate that they announce right before the

flight and people can’t make it in time.  So, we’re suitably warned and head to the cafeteria for food.  Fish and chips seems to be the big item and can I just say….maybe the best fish and chips I’ve ever had is at Keflavir airport.  I’m serious.  Maybe the bath made us all hungry, but we

 inhaled that food like there was no tomorrow.  Again, it feels reassuring that everyone around us has also had to test to even be on the plane or most likely in the airport at all.  We head down to the secret terminal to get close to it because you go through customs again.  They announce

that the flight is indeed down here, back where we deplaned in the bottom of the airport.  We’re the first ones through and Oscar gets to play with a car down there while we talk with our fellow travelers heading back home.  The flight home is uneventful until Oscar falls

deeply asleep.  It’s 10pm in Iceland by the time we land in Chicago at 6pm and it’s understandable, but he is deeply asleep.  I’m not sure how we’re going to get him through customs.  I’m already thinking ahead to when the last train in Chicago leaves Millennium

station to get back to the car, how long customs is going to take….blah, blah, blah.  Well, customs is a breeze.  We go straight up to an agent and get waved through no problem, they don't even check our negative COVID test results.  We’re through to baggage claim in the

time that it takes to walk there, which is a miracle.  The luggage is taking a while though…..and taking a while, and taking a while.  Finally, some cases come down for the IcelandAir crew and first class…..and then nothing.  After an hour and several upset passengers including me….they tell us that lightening has shut down the airport.  Really?  Lightening.  After getting through customs in

O’Hare in 3 seconds flat, we wait two hours for our bags.  I want to just leave them, but we brainstorm what to do from here because we’re not going to make our train at Millennium station.  I ask John on a lark how much a taxi or Uber costs out to Indiana Dunes train station and it’s not

 that bad.  To get straight back to our car….it’s worth it.  We finally get our bags, bid adieu to our new friends from Green Bay and head out to our Uber.  And when we get outside, we finally understand why the baggage is so late.  They were not kidding about lightening.  I have never seen the sky light up so much, so often, and for so long. It’s crazy and our Ukranian driver has a moonroof in the car that makes it practically a convertible.  A panoramic roof that we get to watch the light show around the

Hancock building, around Willis tower….Oscar is awake now for the whole drive back to the train station.  The rain starts in Indiana and we’re going to try to head home since we beat the train even leaving Millenium Station.  The rain is awful though and the

lightening continues.  There’s some kind of stoppage on the interstate and we find out when we get there, that it’s because the interstate is flooded in one spot.  It shocks the crap out of us, but we’re through it and Oscar is unconscious in the backseat now.

I can’t do anything but concentrate on the driving in this storm, but it keeps me awake and I tell John to sleep for the next leg of the drive.  I finally have to wake him up to ask when the hell the rain is going to stop and it’s right as we split to go toward Grand Rapids.  And it does stop

finally.  John wakes up in Grand Rapids and we push through to hit the house with our new floors in it exactly 24 hours after waking up this morning in Iceland.  Which means I need another dip in the Blue Lagoon to make up for the travel….

So, Iceland.  The food was expensive, but not horribly when you only really eat one meal out.  We had breakfast at the farmhouses which were phenomenal....ate lunch on the go from the store bought stuff and then had dinner to pay for.  Our farmhouse stays were really bed and breakfasts that you would spend a ton more money on in the US and the car rental

included when the pandemic has caused cars to skyrocket was a super good deal.  Every tour we did we loved, every bath and pool we did we loved, emailing and getting responses from Hey Iceland immediately and having the wifi hotspot in the car all the time with the itinerary was great.

   The weather for the majority of our trip was amazing.  Can't really complain about much of anything.  Be aware that you will swelter in the rooms from all that geothermal heat coming in.  If you can drive a manual car, you're golden.  We went into this trip with high expectations 

because everyone has talked up Iceland and it actually exceeded those expectations.  We got to see almost everything we wanted to, got a good feel for what we need to come back and do again, and found out that we need a hot pot in the backyard.

I know it's called the land of Fire and Ice and we got to see both, but what we saw most was rainbows.  I think that will always remind me of Iceland now.  So, our hot take: run, don't walk

to Iceland.  Especially during the pandemic.  No crowds to fight and a really safe country to feel good about visiting right now.  We can't wait to go back, next time in winter to see the Northern Lights.  
   

Blue Lagoon

  

We head out to Gullfoss and see another waterfall….the glacier should be visible from here, but you really can’t see much today and we enjoy getting another great view of a thundering waterfall…..it feels  like every waterfall in Iceland is a natural wonder.  I guess it’s

the height, the weight of the water, but they are all spectacular it seems.  After Gullfoss, we head to our farmhouse stay, driving really slowly past Stokkur to see if we can see it erupt from the car, but no dice.  Oscar gets to hang with the ducks and the hotel keeper takes us

to see how the chickens hide in the bushes with his two dogs when we check in.  We have a huge room with a huge bathroom and it’s perfect for our last night in Iceland.  We hit a great restaurant, Cafe Mika, on the way in and had the best lamb gnocchi, fries, langostine

 ravioli to end our trip.  There’s also gourmet chocolates that we bring back to the room.  We are checked in for the flight and actually ready to go home.  It’s amazing how a week somewhere will feel like not enough, but once you reach that 12 day point….it’s time to go home. After the baths up north and Hofn’s pool, Oscar had encouraged us to book the Blue Lagoon before we fly out.  We

don’t fly out until 4pm and the Blue Lagoon is right by the airport.  It’s not as expensive as we had thought and you get a towel, silica mask, and Oscar is free.  We booked it several days ago because the tickets sell out fast.  We’ll get to spend a couple

of hours there before our flight, but the incredible fog the morning we’re flying out makes driving a pain.  At least it has nothing to do with the manual car and the roundabouts once we hit Reykjavik feel like not a problem now. I'm mindful of the 

speed cameras around the Blue Lagoon this time (probably have a 1000 euro ticket waiting for me) and we head in on the windiest, rainiest day you can imagine.  Oscar has to literally push himself into the wind to get to the doors.  But once we get in,

shower, change and get out into the Lagoon, it's magical.  Don't care about the rain, don't care about the wind, you're in a warm cocoon of silky blue water.  At Myvatn, we were told to take off copper and silver jewelry because those minerals would damage it.  Here, we're told to leave conditioner in our hair after showering because of the minerals.  We put on our silica masks, check out the entire lagoon to find the hot spots and our favorite spots, get our drinks that are included and just enjoy.  They even have Krap for Oscar and he's happy about that.  A perfect way to end a great time in Iceland.  Especially when we're a family of 3 with maybe 150 other people in the Lagoon.  
  

Golden Circle

The next morning we attempt to print out the results of the negative

covid test just to have it in hand, but it doesn’t work out with the farmhouse.  So, we have our results on our phone and that will just have to be good enough.  We are doing the Golden Circle today, which is the main to do sites that everyone does as soon as they land in Reykjavik.  We get to skip Skogafoss

because we did it yesterday, it is cold and rainy today again.  We decide to skip getting out and actually walking around Selfoss which you can go behind.  We don’t want to get that wet again this early in the morning.  And we’re waterfalled out at this time.  We head on

 to a tiny town that has Bobby Fischer’s grave in it.  He came to live in Iceland after his last tournament was here and it’s like seeing Babe Ruth’s grave in the middle of nowhere.  This was the US’s only chess champion that was the best in the world….and he’s in a tiny churchyard in Iceland.  It’s weird, but we’re glad we get to see it.  I mean why rent a car and

do it yourself if you’re not going to go to out of the way places that you can’t do on a tour?  We head to the Kerio Crater which is a volcano that you can walk the rim of above a crystal blue lake like Crater Lake.  But it’s raining so hard, it doesn’t look very blue and we have no

   interest in walking around the rim….so, a few pics and moving on to Thingvellir.  Can’t actually spell it the Icelandic way because my keyboard won’t make that weird P unless I change it and will most likely never be able to change it back.

  This is the National Park in Iceland where the tectonic plates moving apart run through and where all of their government used to happen.  We get several waterfalls here, Law Rock, and beautiful scenery.  This is a place that you could spend weeks exploring….it’s sacrilege to see it in one hour….but can’t be helped because we’re on to Geysir.  This is the geyser that all of the others are named for.  The original Geysir doesn’t erupt much anymore, but the Stokkur geyser erupts every 5

minutes or so.  There’s hot springs around it and we make it into a two hour stop when it probably takes other people 10 minutes.  There’s a huge parking lot and plenty of things to walk around, climb up, but John says that he is done with climbing

stairs….I think Skogafoss did him in.  Oscar and I leave him on a bench at the geyser while we walk around and see all the hotpots.  The wind is up and it’s not raining, so sulphur smell isn’t overwhelming.  Oscar and I walk around and catch the geyser erupting from multiple viewpoints.  It’s kind of cool to try to catch it

on camera, but it seems like every time I actually catch it, it’s a dud eruption that doesn’t go high up into the air.  I finally get a good video from the side and we circle back around to John, hoping that he hasn’t moved.  He states that he has been

people watching and it’s fascinating.  He’s been watching some guy who isn’t happy with the way that his girlfriend or wife is taking his pic with the geyser.  A family where the mother wanted to catch the geyser behind her kids, but they kept

    turning around to look at it when it explodes….it’s funny to watch.  We stand right by the pool to see if we can tell when it’s going to explode and while the water heaves and lurches around, the eruption still always takes us by surprise.  We stay way longer than probably anyone else in this area and then head to their huge souvenir shop and go to the bathroom, buy all kinds of reminders or our trip to Iceland.  We leave tomorrow, it’s finally time to figure out what is going home with us.  

Skogafoss

 We head down to the ferry to get in line and try to take the cough

syrup.  We knew when we bought it that the likelihood of Oscar wanting to take it and taking it were slim, but John and I try to model taking it for him.  But it’s awful.  It’s one of the old school couch syrups that tastes like the worst cherry or

something.  It would be cherries in your nightmares and I don’t blame the kid for not wanting to drink more than a sip.  I tell him that there is another way to not get sick and it’s going to be sitting in one chair with your head back and eyes closed.  And

he has to do it.  We load up on the ferry, go upstairs and as we pull out of harbor watch another kid get to release her puffin off the back of the ferry.  We get to see this as we pull out and then we sit down and both close our eyes for the trip back.  Successful

staving off of motion sickness accomplished.  I ask John about the waterfall we passed on our way to the ferry and he says it starts our day tomorrow.  But, we have time tonight and can knock something off our to do list and if it’s not actively raining, we’re

going to do it.  So, we stop at Skogafoss and climb the 660 steps to the top of the fall.  Oscar is making fun of me and John because we have to keep taking breaks in order to make it to the top and not die.  Not only is it a lot of steps, but they’re mainly

     steps on a moving steel base that is attached to the side of the cliff.  Excuse me for not running up them in the first place.  It’s a great view from the top, but when we get back to the bottom, we see the way to get behind it.  Supposedly, a treasure is back there that people have looked for, but it’s been raining too much to try to walk behind this waterfall today.  Oscar and I get super close though and absolutely soaked. 

Good thing we did it tonight so that we can start off tomorrow with some dry clothes.  Back at the bed and breakfast and I have a hot shower before we get their lamb dinner to take away and it’s amazingly good.  Every one of these farm stays have had great

 breakfast and then the ability to create a gourmet meal at night too.  It’s crazy to me that they’re able to do this, but I’m appreciative because we don’t have to look for a restaurant in the middle of nowhere. 

PUFFINS!!!

  We enjoyed the museum immensely and did the driving tour of the

island.  We’re following the Rick Steve’s book, but can’t see half of the things that we’re supposed to see because the fog, mist and rain are so thick.  It’s really a bummer.  We see a stop for the Puffin House and get

out of the car, walk down a little track (John finally gets to use the little stairs to climb over a fence that we’ve been seeing throughout Iceland) and head to a tiny little green shed.  Inside there is a man sitting with a huge

camera and all these sliding window perches and openings.  And we realize that we are perched on the cliff with the puffins.  They’re everywhere outside and the man must be from some study of the birds because he doesn’t move,

doesn’t even lift the camera until there is a behavior that he is trying to catch.  We are literally 5 feet from puffins outside and we enjoy this thoroughly.  I knew this island was our best bet to seem them because they nest here to the

point that the kids on the island will go get stray pufflings that have been confused by the lights of the town and take them to get checked out and let them go afterwards. It’s a tradition and we are little late for it, but here are the adults all over the place.

We head to a cliff where we’re supposed to see some great rock formations, but can’t because of the weather.  While we’re there, we see a mother and her two sons get out of their car and walk to the cliff with a box.  And I know that this means that they have pufflings.  We get to watch as the boys each get to get out their puffling and fling them off into the sea where they fly

away and don’t come back to any land that is known for 3 years or something crazy like that.  It’s awesome that we got to see this.  We drive to Elephant Rock, but again, can’t see it because of the weather, keep driving around and run to the

        Bonus for some groceries, look for ash poles to show you how the ash and pumice was on streets when the eruption happened, but never get a picture of one.  We decide that the only thing that we want to do again while we’re here is go back to the puffin house before the ferry leaves.  We head back up to the puffin house and encounter some sheep on the path.  I wasn't

Elephant Rock.....can you tell?

sure if we were going to get head butted, but I just got bleated at and couldn't get good video of the way that they stick their tongues out when they bleat.  In the house the guy that is studying them is still there.  He has the best view of the puffins

 and is packing up, but taking his own sweet time about it to a point that is totally annoying with all these antsy youngsters around who just want to look out his window for a second.  He finally leaves and we get our good peak and leave.  Going down the mountain, we see that he is walking in the rain back to wherever he came from…..if he hadn’t been an asshole, we might have offered him a ride.  In fact, we’ve seen a lot of hitchhikers here and they get picked up and taken on to the next place still.  I haven’t seen that in a long time.