Iceland, consumerism, sleep deprivation

It’s high time I report about my trip to Iceland. I’m still here, but I increasingly find myself creating blog posts in my mind so I might as well write them down.

I arrived at Keflavik airport at dawn, around 1 am. The sunrise was beautifully reddish, pink and orange, with the bay of Reykjavik and mountains and volcanos in the background. Dawn seemed to last forever, but after a few hours unchanged beauty I realized that this is what night is like in Iceland in summer. D’oh.

I can’t believe that I still haven’t checked out the phallological museum Kat pointed me to. However, people who know me (or have travelled with me) will probably very well believe that I haven’t set my foot into a museum yet.

Instead, I visited all the outdoor clothing stores I could find on the main shopping street, which were about five. The last one looked most promising for me to ask (with a red head from embarrassment) for a marine flare, that Daniel asked me to get in case volcano Katla erupts while we’re walking in the area next week and we need to signal our position to the helicopters that come looking for us.

The staff didn’t laugh at me but seemed to take me seriously, even said it was a good idea, and pointed me to the one store in Reykjavik where I could actually buy such a thing. (Apparently, you’re not allowed to bring marine flares on a plane. Maybe I can borrow one and return it to the shop in case we don’t need it.)

Aside from browsing through outdoor clothing stores I’m rather sick of yet another city. After having spent a whole week in Göteborg I didn’t enjoy Reykjavik too much for two reasons. One is that in cities I tend to mindlessly spend money. I often find myself in a shop browsing through clothes that I suddenly think I really need. Even though I don’t. And it often takes me to actually try clothes on until I realize how miserable clothes shopping makes me. Especially in big department stores. In Stockholm I thought that I couldn’t live (and travel) without mid-length sports pants. In Glasgow, I spent hours to find a lint shaver to make my fleece look a bit nicer! In Göteborg I desperately wanted shorts to wear with all my new pretty tights. (I ended up buying a pair for 3€ in a second hand shop which isn’t too bad.) The shopping experience makes me miserable (and feeling guilty if I end up buying stuff from a big international corporation), and I waste money for more stuff that I’ll have to carry - the garment must be REALLY pretty and functional in order to make the purchase worth all that. I already made a longish list of things I’ll leave at home when I stop by there in September before I’ll head to Australia.

Also, walking through a city, whenever I think my feet are tired (every other hour or so), even though they are not really, I look for a coffee shop. There are days when I pay for coffee three times, even though I could make myself a cup for so much cheaper at the hostel. Thinking about it, this is probably part of the reason why I sleep so poorly in Iceland…

And this ties in smoothly with the second reason why I want to flee the city which is what I am actually doing right now, sitting on a bus to the Snæfellsnes peninsula. I don’t sleep well in my hostel. It’s a great hostel for young people I think. Very hip, a live music venue, a former cookie factory, stylish loft-like interior. But it is so loud. All the dorm windows open to the outdoor patio where people get drunk all night. Doors open and close very noisily. One of my dorm mates snores badly. And there’s never an hour during the whole day where it is actually quiet. I have slept fine in other hostel dorms with up to 14 beds. And even at Herräng dance camp with 40 other people in a room no earplugs were necessary.

But the noise all day long in Reykjavik and ALL THOSE PEOPLE (other tourists) have been making me more and more sensitive, so that I eventually booked a private room in the little village Stykkishólmur from where I can explore the Snæfellsnes peninsula and maybe even climb the Snæfellsjökull glacier. And here’s a fun fact since I take the educational mandate of my blog as seriously as all the fun and entertainment: “jökull” means glacier so “Snæfellsjökull glacier” is technically saying the same thing twice.

My host in Stykkishólmur on Snæfellsnes will be Heimur who owns an old farm house with great views and rents out the rooms on the second floor. He offered to pick me up from the bus stop. Also, on his Airbnb (a website where you can rent rooms) profile he states that his guests will be able to join him on the first floor and socialize as much as they like. He’s a musician and might give you a private concert. In his garden live elves/pixies/fairies - forgot which one, also don’t really know the difference, but I’m sure he’ll explain. So I might finally meet a real local today, the first one so far, not counting the bus drivers.

And yes, I’m turning 31 next week and I’m finding myself fleeing the city, the noise and consumerism.