Our Styled Adventure: Trekking Through Iceland
When you travel as a group of four, you end up with four different ideas for what to do and four different directions of where to go, so we have tried our best to mesh all those things into one great big adventure.
Miss M was super pumped up to check out a few of the highly recommended, super-popular tourist spots, so we started the first morning at the Blue Lagoons. After a long day of travel, it was pretty nice to relax in a really warm geothermal hot spring. However, the hot spring sucked all of the moisture out of our bodies and really tore up our hair, which is a hairstylist’s nightmare. 😒😢 The Blue Lagoons were named as one of the 25 wonders of the world by National Geographic, so it is definitely worth adding to your bucket list.
Our next stop was to check in to our super-cute Airbnb, which is right in the center of the shopping district in downtown Reykjavik. We dropped off our luggage and went out to explore the city. It is really cute, trendy and far more Scandinavian then any of us expected.
As we were taking in the sites and sounds of the city, we thought we heard a parade happening, so we went to investigate. It turned out that what we thought was a parade was a peaceful political protest at the parliament building. I'm not exaggerating when I say all of Reykjavik was there or walking there. It was pretty wild!
We walked for 8 miles, exploring countless streets, shops, monuments and hot dog stands. (Hot dogs are their fast food, and who doesn't love hot dogs?) When our tired legs couldn’t take us another step, we decided to go back to the apartment and make plans for day two.
We looked at all our tour options, from helicopter rides to boat rides, trying to decide what the best way to explore was — or what was best for all four of us fiery, independent women, anyway. We settled on renting a car and exploring on our own. After just a few hours of sleep, we were off on another day of adventure.
With our rental car in tow, we decided to head toward the town of Vik in hopes of finding the U.S. DC-3 plane that crashed in 1973 and was abandoned by the surviving crew. With coordinates in hand — 63°27'32.8"N, 19°21'53.2"W — we set off, not knowing what we would find or what to expect. It was epic in so many ways.
On our way, we saw some PONIES (hear the excitement!) on the side of the road and had to get a closer look. They actually let us PET THEM! It was amazing, and E took endless pictures.
As we continued on our drive, we found a waterfall and had a hot dog from a gas station, and then, we noticed the weather was a changin’ ... low clouds, lots of wind and some sleet?! Being from the CLE, we weren’t going to let a little weather stop us. We had already trekked for too long to stop now (about two hours), so we ventured forth anyway. How bad could it really be, right??
Well ... it wasn't bad, just a different adventure than we had expected. When we arrived at the parking area of our plane destination, we quickly realized it was going to be pretty chilly. It was 39 degrees with 60-mile-per-hour winds! Had we known about the pending weather and sheer distance to the destination, we probably wouldn’t have made the journey, but whatevs, we are in Iceland after all.
So after the windiest, coldest 58-minute 2.4 miles, we rolled up on the deserted wrecked plane. (And, when I say windiest I mean basically bent in half fighting against the wind to walk; it was pretty comical.) Despite the weather and wind, the site was beautiful in the eeriest way and totally worth the trek. The walk back to the car was easily worse than the walk there. We were soaked and a little wind burned but grateful. After finally warming up, we were laughing about the feat we had just conquered. Oh, and did I mention that E did it all without a coat?
We made our way back to Reykjavik and settled in for some dinner. M had a real hankering for "Icelandic fish and chips." After dinner, we wandered some more around the really cute town before calling it a night. After all our adventuring, our miles walked for the day totaled 11.38 miles!
Tomorrow is shaping up to be a very exciting day. It’s STYLED SHOOT DAY, and hopefully, we will see the northern lights. Stay tuned for sneak peaks and our adventures in Ireland!