Tuesday 6th February 2024

In the end, there was no alien beside the waterfall, as per the opening scene on the borefest that was Prometheus.

But the waterfall was the same.

Iceland does do waterfalls well. In fact you could pack a week here of nothing else.

I like this one, as it is tall in its thundering glory.

Most get to see it in one of the other three seasons: second winter, brief-summer, and pre-winter, so the valley and gorge is green, and there are few fols around, if there were many, they'd be wearing earth tones.

Not for us. We came in winter. And everyone else came in bright weather-proof clothing, so dot my shots of our brief visit.

I say brief.

It was minus ten.

And blowing a stiff breeze.

I've worked in a blast freezer, and this was colder. Thirty seconds and my fingers were numb. A minute and they began to hurt.

We walked from the car park to the foot of the falls, took shots and walked back.

That was enough.

Took two and a half hours to get here, and the same to get back.

Worth it.

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I've seen things you people wouldn't believe. Attack ships on fire off the shoulder of Orion. I watched C-beams glitter in the dark near the Tannhauser gate. All those moments will be lost in time... like tears in rain.

We too have seen some stuff.

I wanted to see this waterfall, andit was a two nad a half hour drive from the hotel. But we had a hire car and our phones to guide us.

We got up at six, had breakfast and were ready to leave to walk to the car just before eight. It had been some days since we abandoned it the previous Thursday, and it had collected at least two parking tickets.

We then had to dig it out from the jetsam that the plough had left behind. So I started the beast up, reversed it out, and we drove gingerly forward, out along narrow one way streets to the main road, and out southwards into the badlands.

Most of Iceland is badlands. Only a tiny percentage of the island is habitable. There are lava fields, mountains, glaciers and places where people are just not meant to live.

The road south, the southern ringroad, climbs over a plateau, and the wind whipped across, bringing fresh powdery snow to make the drive interesting. On either side, the lava fields extended into the gloom of the early morning, a few hardy fir tree saplings were showing through the deep snow.

The road then dropped to the coast again, in huge sweeping turns, on roads still sheets of ice. The tyres worked and we made it down, then across the flatlands, where the northerly winds blew the powdery show across the road. And the snow caught the light of the dawn, and later, rising sun, making the snow glow, and the dancing patterns hid the road from view, the only indication we were on the right course were the wooden markers on either side, flashing by at 90kmh. Otherwise, we didn't appear to be moving at all.

We passed through a few small towns, until they died out too, and the last 40 km were along the coast, with the mountains and ancient volcanoes on the other side, glow pink in the morning light of the rising sun.

Our road took us straight into the light of the rising sun, making it hard to see clearly, and with temperatures of ten below, the windscreen wash had frozen solid.

We pressed on. Houses and shacks half built onto the side of boulders the size of churches, and herds of stout and shivering Icelandic ponies huddling together for warmth so to see the dried stems of last year's growth, still worth eating.

We reached the waterfall, parking was a free-for-all, but one warden barking at cars that had parked in a spot for buses only.

We parked, and I changed into my walking shoes with crampons, the act of tying laces made my fingers go numb in the low temperatures and biting northerly wind.

We joined the other walking to the waterfall, in sight some 500m away, into the teeth of the wind. I took a few shots, and once there took more with the big camera and mobile. But after 5 minutes by fingers so cold they hurt.

There are 400 steps beside the waterfall to a platform overlooking the cascade. It was too much for me. Even if my knee would have been healthy.

We turned and walked back to the car, too cold the change shoes back, just wanting to get the engine started and to warm up.

On the way back we passed dozens of buses and coaches heading to the waterfall. We were going back to the hotel. Maybe if we could find a place to eat on the way.

In the middle of nowhere there was a bakery, but there were two coaches of people milling around, so we pressed on.

We saw a sign for a hotel, outside one of the small towns, so went there. Parked up and went inside, once we had mastered the semi-automatic door.

We had the restaurant to ourselves, and chose table looking over the snow covered meadows leading down to an in ice-free river with swans and geese swimming in the open water.

We dined on burgers, and sipped on tap water so clear the whisky tumblers in what looked like to be solid glass.

The burgers were great too.

We could have gone to other waterfalls, took more shots, but it was still bitterly cold, so we headed back to the capital and our warm hotel room, retracing our tyretracks back over the lavafields and back into the city, this time leaving the car in a parking garage.

We walked back to the hotel for a warming brew and to finish the last of the peanut butter M&Ms, and to review the shots.

Tis was before the last of our booked tours/events, a seafood grill in a place on "rainbow street".

It was just a five minute hobble, then across the street trying not to slip on the sheets of black ice, then into the restaurant, where we had paid for a fixed menu tasting meal.

First up was a creamy seafood soup, with lots of shrimp. It came with sourdough bread and a scoop of flavoured butter balanced on a rock, so awkward that it was almost impossible to get any butter for fear of the rest falling off.

Looked nice, but impractical.

Followed by seafood grill, spotted monkfish and another fish wrapped in bacon. With sliced and pureed root vegetables.

Also nice.

Followed by creme brulee, which was served apparently deconstructed. But very nice with sorbet and a sliced strawberry.

And like that, our trip was over. We just had to get to the airport in the morning to catch the flight.

Best get home and get some sleep, then.