I had a rough night. Fell asleep early and couldn't get back to sleep until 3AM. Going to go grab breakfast and then shower. We're headed to Skaftafell and then Hofn today.
Breakfast was a nice little buffet laid out by our hosts. IT had: cheese, toast, salami, ham, cereal, orange juice, coffee, cucumbers, and tomatoes. I have only seen white pepper so far in Iceland, no black pepper. We got some gas in Vik after some debate between the two of uson how to work the credit card portion of the pump. We eventually caved in and went inside. The attendant was very pleasant and let us pay inside after pumping. I got a candy bar that turned oiut to be two sticks of black licorice cvered in crunchy chocolate (like Krakel). The licorice was not very good and I learned that candy packaging can be deceptive (it had no sign of licorice on the picture). I also leaned the word for licorice is lakkaris. Mystery solved.
After leaving town, we headed for Skaftafell National Park. This is home to Europe's largest glacier, Vatnajokull. The visitor center was nice, along with much needed restrooms. Brian and I hiked up a steep, but relatively short, path to see a waterfall (called a "foss"). After returning, we decided to push on and look for something to eat. We found a little shop/restaurant just a little ways down the road. Sadly the restaurant portion was closed. We grabbed a couple of interesting0looking sandwiches and shared them. The first was smoked lamb with pea salad which was very good. The second was a mackerel sandwich which, in my opinion, lacked anything resembling flavor. Happy for the moment, we pushed on. Oh, I also sampled the most popular soda in Iceland - Egil's orange soda. It reminded me of Fanta orange.
Along the road in this area we constantly were bombarded by the beauty and tranqulity of the mighty Vatnajokull. It was everywhere, and in a big way.
We arrived at the glacial lagoon and were instantly amazed. Jokulsarlon, as it is called, was a large lagoon filled with with icebergs which were recently part of Vatnajokull. The lagoon was surrounded by tourists (which meant nearly 40) and played home to a healthy amount of ducks. The ice chunks were beautiful, some of which had an almost magical glow to them. Those had an incredibly clear blue tine to them. They were absolutely beautiful. Water from the ocean, at this time, was flowing into the lagoon at a tremendous pace. It reminded me of the Chicago River, going the "wrong way."
We walked across Route 1 (our only companion for many a kilometer) to a beautifully-impressive black sand beach. It was covered by small chunks of ice from the lagoon. The black sand was almost fluffy. After the obligatory photo shoot, we headed down the road again.
We arrived at our next farm, Holmur in Myrum, and were greeted by a 10-year-old golden retriever named Lucas. He barked, but his tail was waggin'. The room is on the second level of a separate guesthouse. The view is wonderful!
We headed down the road to Hofn in search of dinner. The restaurant we went to, Humarhofnin, was pricey, but delicious! We tried an Icelandic feta cheese (grilled with pita bread) and a brandade of salt-cod. The cheese was super creamy but a little over-salted. Ironically the salt-cod dish was not salty enough. For the main course we both chose the Icelandic lamb filets, which were heavily on our minds since we spent kilometer after kilometer driving past fields full of delicious-looking sheep. It was by far the best lamb I have ever tasted. It was cooked well, juicy, tender, and served with spiced butter on top and alongside were roasted local potatoes with onions and leeks. A pricey but very satisfying meal! We cruised back to the farm, re-checked my email, and went over tomorrow's day.
