Day 5 in Iceland

I woke up in Djúpivogur to this view.

Taken from the bathroom. The cars aren't exactly sightly, but what can you expect from sitting on the toilet?

And a video showing a little more:

While we were making breakfast, we met a married couple from France. We swapped travel stories and shared some laughs. The husband then told us how he was in Nice during the recent attack, and explained how he had to help apply tourniquets to some of the victims (this was after he escaped injury by running away from the truck, which was ramming into the crowd). I can't even imagine how traumatic that must have been.

After chatting with them for a while and exchanging contact information, we headed out and climbed one of the tallest hills in town, where I got this shot:

We had our longest drive of the trip (five hours without stops) ahead of us. And, in addition to trying not to get lost, our agenda for the day included seeing the glaciers. Of course, we made some stops along the way for all of the gorgeous scenery.

Once we made it to the glacier park, Jökulsárlón, my mind was absolutely blown. Words nor pictures can truly capture how beautiful and serene the glacier lagoon was. We even saw a few seals popping their heads up from the water. Apparently, they weren't big fans of the paparazzi as every time I tried to snap a shot, they immediately popped back down. 

After seeing the glaciers, we stopped at N-1 (but of course) and later, at Dyrhólaey to view the scenery there.

And then we drove to Skógafoss. I was absolutely amazed by how close we could get. I was also pretty pumped about the double rainbow. Although, I promise I didn't freak out like the guy from YouTube. 

After seeing the glaciers, we picked up our first hitchhiker (a woman from Spain who was working in eastern Iceland and trying to maker her way to Reykjavik to meet up with some friends). She told us that since tourism has exploded there is a shortage of workers in Iceland so restaurants and hotels often recruit from other countries. Of course, my mind immediately started jumping to possibilities of living in Iceland because, holy wow, would I ever love that! 

We made it to our guesthouse (which used to be a boarding school) in Hvolsvollur in the early evening. The bathrooms were a little gross, and the shower drain was so slow that I felt like I was taking a bath all the way up to my calves, but everyone was super friendly. The inn keeper even taught us how to count in Icelandic. Sadly, I don't remember beyond 1,2,3.

We met two British families and chatted with them for a while (one of the couples was into running, so we talked about half marathons). One of the women even let me use her cell phone to call the guesthouse inn keeper since the guesthouse put Keith and me in the wrong room. I especially love traveling for that reason: you meet such nice people. I can honestly say that everyone we've met so far (tourists and locals) has been so incredibly kind.