A trip to Iceland | I

I had bigged up going to Iceland in my head for years, until it had reached this really unsustainable fever pitch of obsession. So I decided to just go for it. Winter, probably not the best for a first experience of Iceland, as the snow and Atlantic winds made it rather inhospitable, but hey, never underestimate the power of fleece-lined leggings.

We flew with Wow Air, one of those cheap and tacky airlines that actually did a really good job and didn't send my cortisol levels through the roof like, say, Easy Jet or Ryanair. The pilot even gave us a little sight-seeing preamble, indicating the volcanic eruption we were flying over, and the Aurora visible in the sky above us as we flew. Pretty magical stuff.

We arrived very late and got a bus to Reykjavik. Then it was straight to bed, as I had a nasty cold that was weighing me down. In the morning we woke up late enough and headed to a really American-style place to eat tacky American-style food and drink a lot of coffee. It was perfection. Then we wandered, watched the sun set, hung out with geese, wandered in the snow to a church and sat inside for a long time. We had even more coffee, and then Leo's friend Rikki came and picked us up, the guys went swimming, we had a hotdog, saw the Aurora again, and then drove around the borderline of the city, stopping on occasion to get out and see nice things Rikki likes, then to a friend of his' house to pick something up. We met some cool people, some nice animals, drank more coffee, and hours and hours later went back to our hostel. It was a pretty chill and perfect first day.