The best stuff is in the Volvo

True story. I don't watch much TV, in fact I hardly watch any at all. I have been taking the opportunity of being proactively unemployed to watch the Jeremy Kyle Show, but beyond this guilty pleasure I mainly listen to music for my entertainment. Not so this past week however. I noticed on Thursday there was a brand new episode of Curb Your Enthusiasm on More 4. I planned my night around it. I waited patiently for it to begin. Within two minute of it starting I got the first text off Kate which resulted in a back and forth text conversation that lasted the entire episode and finished exactly as the credits rolled. Roll on Friday, I decided to have 'TV night', mainly to ensure myself that I wasn't actually missing anything by not watching TV, also cos I was at a low ebb and was a little bit down and couldn't be bothered to do owt else except stare at the idiot lantern. I watched TWO SOLID HOURS of the X Factor repeats. I felt dirty and shameful by the end, but not once did I hear a peep from my phone. I noticed a Peter Kay show was on later, something that I'd not seen. I like Peter Kay and his spoofs, so I set the reminder on the TV to turn over when it started. It duly did and within two minutes of it beginning Archer called me for the first time in a year to ask if I wanted to go and see Alice Cooper with him. I had to spend ten minutes explaining why I hate Alice Cooper and why I would rather pull my own eyes out and stamp on the stalks than watch him prance about pretending to be Satan when he is a fucking Born Again Christian. He slags of Black Metal bands, by saying they are 'only out to shock', talk about bare faced hypocrisy, as 'shock rock' is what his entire career is based on. Fucking Douche Bag.

Alice Cooper; hypocritical Born Again Christian, Golfer and complete cunt

I politely declined Archer's kind offer and tried to get him off the phone as quick and as pleasantly as possible to watch the rest of one of the few programs I was looking forward to. Peter Kay finished and there was a double episode of Family Guy about an hour later. I duly set the reminder and began watching an hour of laughter filled fun. Not for long as the phone went again, this time it was a half cut Bob. She was wanting to escape Brighton, fleeing from an unfortunate snogging episode that had gone terribly, terribly wrong she was heading north and was coming past Rotherham on Saturday. She half mentioned seeing her Grandparents in Whitby, so I jumped on that and suggested we carry on from Rotherham and head to the coast and stay over. By this stage I was also worst for wear as well having a sunk a few bottles over the course of the evening. In our inebriated states it seemed like a perfectly logical thing to do. Drive for miles, arrive after dark, find an expensive place to stay and drive home the next morning. The Road trip was on!

Whitby: Bracing

So this is how I found myself at Charlotte's house in Northallerton surrounded by several drunks, several empty bottles of wine and cheap Tesco Cava, listening to Fleetwood Mac and Dire Straits whilst being told 'the best stuff was in the Volvo'. We had decided on the journey up that it would be better to stay at Bob's parents place at Northallerton rather than pressing on to Whitby. This was mainly due to Bob's lack of Navigational skills, my lack of noticing motorway exits and the round about way we were slowly heading north. I awoke this morning in Bob's parents spare room feeling like a cat had shat in my mouth and not relishing the drive back home.

Clear your heads with another extract from Singapore...

Sunday, June 03, 2007

We dug all the anomalies that the array had brought up on area 2 and not one turned out to be ordnance. Not a sniff. Nada. Zip. Which is a good thing, as I don't really fancy having my arms blown off. This means that we have now finished the second area that we have to scan and dig. This is also the biggest, so as scanning goes we are nearly half way to finishing. Area three may pose a problem, as we have already found a load of bombs. We dug them up yesterday whilst waiting (again) for Mr's Wong and Sing to finish bashing the jungle. One of the anomalies turned out to be a massive shit pit packed full of what appeared to be aircraft parts. There was Japanese stuff in there as well. Or that's what Ang told us. His word is his bond, I guess. We pulled about 2,500 British Bullets out of the ground along with about one hundred small aeroplane bombs. None of the bombs went off, even when Ang was shaking them out of his machine bucket about ten foot off the concrete floor. Whilst he was doing it, I started running off, he panicked and was shouting 'No running!! No!!' Oh, how I laughed.

I met up with Ariff (From Ironfist) and his mate on Friday evening. We had a few drinks and chatted shit. Ariff works just round the corner from where I live, he's a car-park attendant by day. The lads were telling me that in order to buy a house in Singapore you have to be either married or over 35 years old and even then you will not be at the top of the list. So I guess I am lucky I have this apartment to myself. The lads left, Ariff had a date with the guitarist out of Tormentress, he has done the rounds with the whole band, it seems. I headed back home after some dinner. I went down to St James' Power Station again last night, I didn't stay long. I'd had enough by about 1am. But before I left I went to the toilet and found myself in the Malaysian part of the Night Club. The place is divided into three separate clubs. One bit is mainly Chinese, another Malay and the last big one is a mix of people. The Malaysian one was an eye opener. There was a band on, but not the same band that played the Flamenco shit and was fronted by a Spanish Brian Ferry looky-likey. This was a Malaysian band, fronted by this guy who was a complete throwback to 1987. He had aviator glasses on for Christ's sake. The Malaysians are like the Singaporeans little brothers, desperately trying to fit in and look cool, but failing miserably. Mind you give em their due, they got the crowd going well enough. I wonder if Chumbawamba were aware that their song 'Tubthumping' would become such a hit that it was covered by a crappy Malaysian Night Club band? The mind boggles.

Norse

This is my first posting for a wee while. I have been away on a road trip around the entire Icelandic sub-continent with my parents who came to visit for a week. Also confounding my output is the fact that Atli's computer died on me the other day. He'd lent it to me when my own computer finally went tits up. Atli's has come down with the same problem and shuffled off its mortal coil, run down the curtain and joined the bleedin' choir invisible. Conjoined with this we got a bill for the first six weeks of Internet use in the house. It ran to nearly one hundred pounds. This included a bill for their technician to come out and not do the job he'd been asked to do.

Pretty much how I feel about computers right now...

Enough about this nonsense, lat week was dominated by the arrival of my parents, they had been blackmailing me to stay as long as I could so they could come over for a visit. I would have quit here a lot sooner had they not been coming. Anyhoo, we embarked on a road trip which was initially supposed to take in the South Coast and a bit of the Eastfjords, but turned into a marathon dash around the entire ring road. The going was easy after the obligatory day in Reykjavik, dull little town that it is. The southern part of route one was easy going in good conditions, they oohed and awwwed at all the right places. I'm not going to bore you with the places we visited as it won't mean much to most and I pretty much took them to all the places I visited just before Christ's Mass with Justin and Lucy. We continued on up the East coast and I convinced them to carry on with the driving and head for Myvatn and Akureyri. We had been slightly put off by some English Hippy Naysayers in Cafe Margret, but the owner of the cafe, a massively toothed German woman told us the roads would be fine. Fine maybe for someone in a tank with 4WD tracks. The little Toyota Yaris we had was thrown about the road by the piles of ice and snow like a cork in a washing machine. The going wasn't made easier by driving at 40 KPH with the attached frustration from my father.

what 'good going' on Icelandic roads does to a Yaris...

We finally made it around the full ring road, my first time, but we had to miss out on a planned trip to the Snaefellness peninsular due to snow and ice on the gravel roads. Reykholt and the wonders of nature that like in its proximity had to do instead. Being so close to Reykjavik we decided it would be better and cheaper to head back to my place and spend the night there. The following day we spent tootling around Keflavik and the surrounding area, finishing with a trip to the Blue Lagoon for my mum, as she had just sat for two days in a car. They left the following day and as I haven't heard anything since leaving, I'm assuming they got home fine.

Midgards Eldar

After a good long sleep James and I headed into town to grad something to eat and then ended up in Dillon where we met Duncan and Roz. I also got chatting to a guy called Atli, who had set up the Fuck Christmas festival that I attended before going home. We started chatting due to mutual t-shirt approval. Mine for his Autopsy shirt and him for my Gorgoroth shirt.The next morning we headed out earlyish to get to Akureyri to meet Hrafnkell and Iris. There was little to tell about the journey except that we passed through several beautiful mountain ranges on the way. We me H-bomb outside Akureyri at a local hardware shop and followed him to the house we'd be staying in for the next night at least. The place was a homage to the seventies and was well received by all of us. We all headed out to the local Akureyri fire, which I can say without a shadow of doubt, was the biggest fire I have ever seen in my life. Then we were treated to the firework display which was pretty amazing. Especially the final ones which went off like Tall Boy Bombs...
Hrafnkell's family very generously opened their house to us and we were served cakes and coffee and listened to Hrappi's younger brother tell us about his Lego Town. It's a pity we never go to see it... After this we left the family to watch the Icelandic end of year show and headed back to the house. About 11.30 it started to sound like downtown Baghdad outside. The town folk had started their own fireworks displays and by gum, it beat the local council one into the ground. It was so intense I was having flash backs to 'Nam. Tottenham, mainly. after this amazing display we set off into town for drinkies. Lilja and her other half joined us, as did Stefan and his other half. Finally crashed out about six am.The next day Jo, James and I headed up the fjords to see Ginavik and some turf houses there. Very nice little buildings in a beautiful setting. The rest of the day was spent recovering and heading out to Dalvik to Iris' father's house were we would be staying for the night. Iris showed us around the Museum her father curates, and I tried on the tallest man in the world ever's shoes. In the morning we headed out to Mývatn and Dimmuborgir, the eerie lava formations the band take their name from. The path was a frozen solid and it took a while to get around without slipping on our arses. Which most of us did anyway. With the light against us, as usual we headed to a crater with a lake in the bottom, overlooking some power stations that harnessed geothermal energy. Clever people these Icelanders... Then forging on we headed to Námafjall to see the billowing fumeroles. Again this country never ceases to amaze. After the light had fallen we headed to the spa baths at Mývatn and spent an enjoyable two hours and one pint in the healing waters. We headed back to Hrappi's and played on the Wii all night.

The following morning we were treated to the unmitigated horror of the Christmas shop outside Akureyri. The less said about this horror the better... The light was dropping out of the day as we hit the road back to Reykjavik were Duncan, Roz, James and I painted the town red. Another six AM finish... A lazy Sunday was what I got today. Relaxation in the local pool's hotpots and a kebab in town then home to a nice sit down.

Shores in Flames

Posting a comment wasn't so difficult was it? Now it means you can do it all the time. Come on people, feed my ego... Thanks for all the posting, but I can obviously see some idiots amongst you who are champions of Braveheart... Don't waste your time watching this shit, watch something good, start off with La Haine and work from there. Life is too short for Mel Gibson...

Earlier this week, we machined a large amount of material from Area B, that we would have had to have removed by hand. Now, call me old fashioned but the idea of spending a week trowelling off peat ash deposits fills me with dread for my mental state of mind. So the idea to machine layers off was a blessed relief. After this had happened a few of us cleaned up the entire tent ready for more removal of material. When this was finished I managed to be the only one left in the warm, dry tent to record the deposits. Ha! IN YOUR FUCKING FACES YOU ICELANDIC RACISTS!!! The Brits are back in charge. Everyone else was back in the cold draughty tent whilst I was living the life of Riley in the lap of luxury. I even had butler service. My well needed solitude wasn't to last and a few people were moved back into the tent after I'd finished recording all the layers.

At about eleven on Wednesday night the Northern Lights were the best we've seen whilst being here, I however was slightly distracted, so didn't fully appreciate their incredible natural beauty...

On Thursday night, Jo and I went to the cinema around the corner from the house. Despite having me only having three hours sleep the night before, fucking thinking about fucking things, we went to see 'Burn After Reading'. All I can say is, see it. Then see it again. Clooney and Pitt are so obviously having so much fun making the film it is infectious and I will never see John Malkovich in the same light again...

Friday finally rolled around and despite initial ideas to go into town, Jo and I decided to spend the night in. It was pay day (finally...) and we headed to the wine shop after work. This was a very necessary trip as of this weekend, thanks to the war between Britain and Iceland, prices are starting to go up and booze will increase by 25%!! It's like war-time Britain with rationing and everything. Before you know it we will be drinking powdered wine and shops will be displaying signs saying "Yes, we have no Putrefied Shark!". In Iceland the government controls the sale of booze and decides at what time you can buy it. Which basically translates as any time between about 1pm and 2pm on Wednesday afternoon. Or at least if feels like it. You have to get in there fast and make your purchases quickly before they pull the shutters down. This leads to a situation when you've left the shop realising that you have bought loads of shit you didn't want in a desperate rush to buy SOMETHING. I end with Cooking Sherry, Brazilian Whiskey and six cans of Egil's Malt Appelsin, and that's on a good day. Friday was no different and Jo and I left the Vínbúðin (Booze shop) with a box of 24 Budvar bottles. I tell you, that walk home was a long one... I'm sure Hercules had to do something similar in his twelve tasks, it came straight after the one where he had to clean the Augean stables in a single day. After this heroic task we decided to stay in and drink the bottles until we were stupid. I went swimming with Roz and Duncan first of all. When I mean swimming, I mean I sat in the hot pots whilst Roz and Duncan did some real exercise.

On Saturday, Hrafnkell came and picked us all up for our road trip down south, we went to the recycling centre and dropped off all the bottles we have been accumulating in the house for the past month or so (Owing to Jo's booze habit of about eight bottles of wine a night, we were at the stage of making furniture out the empties as there wasn't enough room left and they were taking over the house...). Then we headed down south to the Waterfall whose name I forget, the frozen path reached around the back of the falls and although Hrappi and Duncan made it round there, the soles of my shoes just weren't up to the task of walking on ice and I had to stay behind. The next call was at the bigger waterfall of Skógarfoss which was frozen but had much easier access. The name translates as Forest Falls, or something similar, but I was fucked if I could even see a single tree, never mind a forest... We climbed to the top of the 60 meter falls and marveled at the wonders of Mother Nature, then laughed as Hrappi fell over in the mud...

After gazing in awe at Skógarfoss we headed on East and turned off the road towards the Glacier at Sólheimajökull, which could be reached by a tiny dirt road across a wide desert like valley from where we could see Mýrdalsjökull, Iceland's fourth largest Glacier. With a couple of hairy moments we reached the Glacier and were all blown away by it's sheer size and majesty. Finally the school party that seemed to have been shadowing us all day left and we had the place to ourselves as the sun was setting. The colours of the place were unbelievable and the skies amazing. We headed onto Vík for some food and with Jo's inane directions and bad navigation searching for a place we finally ended up back at the place we started and I had fish and chips for me dinner.

After a straight two hour drive back the five of us headed out into Reykjavik for drinkies until five, when I headed for bed.

Atli Quotes: On Hrafnkell fancying Jo's Mother 'Isn't that the Octopus Syndrome?'

On the direct translation of New Years Eve from Icelandic to English: 'Old Year's Night.'

On the direct translation of slang for taking a shit in Icelandic 'Playing chess with the Pope.'

Competition Time!!

The past few posting titles have had a linked theme running through them. I'm not going to tell you which ones have the link, but if you can tell me the link you will win a Alex Sotheran pencil and a free subscription to this weblog, just put your answers in the comments...

From Father to Son

In the last post I completely forgot to mention that on Tuesday night, Duncan and I went to Thingtak's rehearsal. Hrafnkell brought his other guitar so we could rehearse some Sudoku tracks as well. I showed the lads a few songs and we played through. Then Thingtak played a few tracks, whilst Duncan and I listened. Fuck me, those lads are good players. Steppi kept saying they were fucking everything up but it sounded fine to me.

After work on Friday I went to the English Pub to meet a few of the heads from site, but I was tired, not having slept so good all week, so only had two pints and headed for home with Jo. After a quick Friday night Kebab we both headed back and watched About Schmidt, the Jack Nicholson movie. I've saw it when it came out in the cinemas and had been wanting to watch it again as it was so good. It's very funny and sad at the same time. I had an early-ish night as I needed sleep.

Saturday saw the heralding of NERDFEST 2008! Ace and I had been talking about playing Axis and Allies (the board game...) all week and the time had finally arrived. Hrafnkell was also persuaded to come along for the ride and although Bjarki was asked he declined. He works as a bouncer and was working til about seven Saturday morning. Hitler never made such a weak excuse when he was about to take the Sudetenland. Atli brought along a mate of his, Jorn, or Jon, I'm not sure how you spell it. I took control of Russia and Britain, Ace had America, Hrafnkell drew Germany and Jorn or Jon had Japan. This is how the game progressed. Basically, Britain and Russia helped one another to crush Germany from both sides, whilst America watched, saying 'It's a European war, we don't want to get involved.' and sat on it's vast reserves and never extended the hand of help. Japan was pretty ineffective in the east except for sinking the American navy and capturing China and small bits of Russia. America still sat by, saying 'It's a Russian/British problem, we don't want to get involved.' British quick thinking combined with Russian determinism pushed the Japanese back to the sea in Asia. After the downfall and suicide of Hrafnkell in Germany Japan was finally attacked by America trying to capture the last moments of glory from the real victors Britain and Russia.Needless to say, it failed. Jon or Jorn surrendered before Britian could mount a final crushing amphibious assault. Both Jon or Jorn and Hrafnkell were executed for War Crimes against Plastic toy soldiers. Britain lost literally dozens of pieces in the fighting, Russia lost over twenty figures defending Europe against fascism. What did America lose? One tank and one bomber.

It was Margret's birthday on Saturday and she was having a party, so we all headed over about ten. It was pretty busy and there was free booze, which is always a good draw... I had intended on only staying a couple of hours, but it was the wee hours when we finally headed for home. Hrappi jumped up and played a few songs on the old Geetar, he played a fucking Queen song and dedicated it to me. The tubby bastard. A good night was had by all.

This morning, Sunday, Duncan and Roz headed into town to pick up a hire car. We had been discussing going over to Hekla this weekend. Apparently it is due to blow, the last time it erupted was in 2000 (I think), and it is well overdue throwing molten lava over the surrounding farms. All reports were that it could go this weekend. So, despite all protestations from the locals, the adverse weather outside Reykjavik, the lack of a map, warm hiking clothes, first aid kits and provision of getting in touch with emergency rescue, we set off. Jo wasn't up for it, maybe she knew something we didn't. Roz, Duncan and I travelled for two hours across icy gravel paths that passed for roads, through zero visibility snow storms, and finally onto the flat valley bottom with the oppressive mass of Hekla staring down at us. We didn't pass another car for what seemed like an eternity. Roz was the first to crack. On a road that we couldn't see for the snow and ice she decided that we were too close to an active and ready to blow volcano and wanted to turn around. Fortunately, Hekla didn't blow by the time we had headed back to Reykjavik. But phew! it was a close shave!

Hail to the Hammer!!

Work this week has progressed as it usually does; cleaning, photographing, mapping and removing the contexts. Nothing too demanding. There was an upheaval on Wednesday when people moved house, but it all soon settled down. On the way home from work on Thursday evening it began snowing. It was a dry and cold day and it began to settle until it was laid thick over Reykjavik. The snow was still on the ground the next day and half of the site was covered. Practically everyone was moved inside the tent and the day was broken up with the occasional violent snowball fight. It was a little like Njal’s saga but with snow instead of swords. Davið provided the best target as he pretty much stood still and took the bombardment.

There was still a lot of snow and ice on the ground on Friday evening and there was a discussion about whether it would be safe to go into to town with the inebriated walk back being a potential death trap. Jo had been housebound for three days after burning her eye with a piece of ash from her fag and was gasping to get out, so that swayed the opinion and we set off into town. This was the first night the Northern Lights had been visible and their shimmering shapes accompanied us on the walk to town. We first went into Kofi Tómasar Frænda, I hadn’t been in this bar yet, but was very glad to do so. It is a really nice little coffee shop that turns into a bar later on. A very cozy little place indeed. After a cheeky sherbet we headed down to the Celtic Cross, after I forbid going in Kaffibarinn, the place owned by Damon Alburn. Jo, Duncan and I had already been in here before and it was full of pretentious wankers then and probably would be now, so I said a firm NO. In the event, it would have been better to be surrounded by pretentious wankers than surrounded by the fart that someone let off in the Celtic Cross, but hindsight is a wonderful thing. After meeting Angelos here, we all de-camped to Grand Rokk, next door. This was full of men and Jo’s idea of an Icelandic fisherman didn’t really live up to reality when she was chatted up by a fisherman who looked like he had a family of Polish Immigrants living in his face. Duncan and Roz went home and Jo, Angelos and I pressed on into further drinking oblivion. We ended up in some bar were Jo was goosed and chatted up by a bloke singing ‘Take a walk on the wild side’.

On Saturday morning Vala loaned us her car for the weekend and we planned a road trip to see some of Iceland’s beauty. The idea was to head up to the Snæfellsnes Peninsula and have a look at Snæfellsjökull, the massive glacier sitting on top of a mountain. On the side of the road we saw a crater and turned off to go and have a closer look, the road didn’t go anywhere near the crater, but brought close to a field full of tiny Icelandic horses. Roz attempted to tempt them with apples, but the first one wasn’t having any of it and turned its massive nose up at the offered treat. After driving for a couple of hours North of Reykjavik we got onto the peninsular proper and turned up the road by the side of the glacier. On top of the plateau was a frozen lake, which we stopped at and Duncan and I attempted to break the ice by throwing massive stones at it. Jo and Roz looked on in disapproval. We headed on and arrived in the tiny town of Olafsvik where we had a meal in a Hobbit inspired restraint/café. This appeared to be the only place open in Olafsvik, besides a discount clothes store with the surliest staff in the world. You’d think that if you lived in a place like Olafsvik and owned a store that the only regular customers were local teenage girls, the arrival of four foreigners may cause quite a stir of excitement. But, no, Olafsvik seemed to have sapped the life out of the staff and they remained nonplussed at our arrival. I bought a shirt for Becky’s wedding and we left. Leaving the desolation of Olafsvik behind we drove on the North coast of the Peninsular to see if we could get a better view of the Glacier. Before we left the town that time forgot we made an attempt at driving up the 4X4 track that led right by the side of the glacier. After several hairy bends and with the girl’s pleas to turn back we accepted defeat and turned the car round to the metalled road proper. The view from the road as we rounded the tip of the peninsular was fucking mind blowing. The lava fields in front of the mountain range made the whole place look like the Plains of Gorgoroth, eerily shaped rock formations jutted from the ground to add a strange and disturbing sense to the beauty of the glacier. We stopped at the crater Saxholl and climbed to the top for an even greater view of Snæfellsjökull. The vastness and intense immenseness of the glacier made everything in life seem so little and insignificant that it was quite a refreshing experience to gaze on it. The sun was setting as we headed back around the glacier and made tracks for home. Hopes to see the Northern lights were dashed as clouds moved in and obscured the sky.

Back at the flat in Reykjavik I readied myself for another evening out on the tiles. This time it was for a purpose. I had been planning all week to see Tyr, the Faroese Viking Metal band on their mini tour of Iceland. They were playing in Nasa in Reykjavik with four other bands. I hadn’t been in Nasa before and had only stood in the queue for a few minutes, so to actually go in the place was another first for me. I met Hrafnkell and Stephan during the first band’s (Perla) rather boring Prog Metal set. The next band, Dark Harvest were OK, they used to be an instrumental only band (Hrafnkell told me) although tonight they had a singer, but they played some of their older instrumental songs which were by far the better songs in their set. After Dark Harvest had cleared the stage Mammút played, Stephan told me he had done a review of their CD for the newspaper 24 Hours and gave it a four out of five. I said why wasn’t it a five out of five? He said, then they have something to work for on their next album… The average age of Mammút was 17 and they were mainly girls. Their performance was a bit lackluster, but maybe this was more to do with the placing of an Indiepop band in an otherwise very METAL line up. They had a few good tunes but weren’t really to my taste. The last of the support acts was Severed Crotch, who’s name led to a discussion between myself and Hrafnkell about stupid band names. Despite their name, they were the best band on the bill that night. Totally brutal death metal, which really got the moshpit whipped up into a fury. It was like the glory days of the Queen’s Hall in Bradford back in the early nineties all over again… Tyr came on and did their thing, and did it very well, but… I still don’t like them. I have been trying to like Tyr for years, ever since their first album came out. They have everything that I should like: They are Pagan, they sing about Vikings, they are from a Norse heritage, they are named after the Viking God of War, they have epic songs infused with Faroese folk songs and are TOTALLY METAL! But try as I might, I just don’t like them. It’s something about the guitar squeals and diddly diddly solos that I find most nauseating. The three of us left together and headed for Hrafnkell’s car where we gave Stephan a lift to the next road over (go figure, it would have been quicker for him to walk to the next bar than have us drive him there, but he took the lift…). Hrafnkell and I went for the now obligatory Klukingerburger and he dropped me off home. I was wanting an early night as Duncan, Roz, Jo and I planned on leaving early in the morning to get the most out of the car, so I was home by three…
After what seemed like two hours sleep my alarm woke me up and we hit the road in Vala’s car. This trip was to go see the Volcano Hekla. This majestic beast has the name ‘the Hooded One’ as it is always shrouded in clouds. It has blown its top several times in recorded history and most of the time it is fucking disastrous for Iceland. She takes no prisoners and one of the eruptions was so bad that the Danish government considered moving the surviving Icelandic population to Zealand rather than try to reclaim the land. Luckily for us, she remained dormant throughout the day and we didn’t have to do anything as extreme as relocating to Denmark. We headed north of Hekla and sought out the farmstead oat Stöng, which was buried by one of Hekla’s eruptions in 1104. It was also Iceland’s first archaeological excavation carried out in the 1930’s. The road to the site is almost non existent and the volcanic ash that covers the area makes it feel like a post-apocalyptic environment. It’s like the Hills Have Eyes and you expect to round the corner to find groups of mutants breaking open human femurs to suck the marrow out. I think we were lucky to get out of there without our heads being stuck on spikes like some grisly trophy for a wandering band of Mad Max style land pirates. The site is covered with a building and preserved with the addition of modern turf walls. The farmstead is surprisingly large inside and would have been rather cozy, with the six foot wide turf walls in place. Roz mistook the pantry for the toilet and this led to a long discussion about the idiot boy Olaf shitting in the butter.

Over the main road and down a better made road was the reconstruction of the farmstead building and the little chapel at Þóðveldisbærinn (try saying that when you’re sober…). Unfortunately it was closed for the winter and we couldn’t get inside, despite banging on the front door for five minutes. Maybe the idiot boy Olaf had lost his keys. After this short excursion we headed down the road towards the hot springs at Reykholt. We had been led to believe it would be a natural rock pool with cascading hot water flowing freely as you sit and marvel at the spectacle of the Northern Lights. The reality was rather disappointing. What awaited us at the end of the road was a grotty swimming pool that was closed for the winter. We broke in and had a look around, then decided it would better to leave and head back to Reykjavik. Stopping at Hveragerði for the worst and most expensive burger in the history of burgers we decided to head down to the Blue Lagoon as Jo and I haven’t been there yet. The place is quite expensive but worth it, in my opinion. It’s a state of the art swimming experience of the highest caliber. It’s quite something to swim in a pool, look down and not be able to see your body because of the thickness of the nutrients in the water. After nearly two hours of being battered by the wind and rain, covering ourselves in some white substance that is supposed to knock years off and sweating it out with Germans in the sauna, we headed back home all dead beat but satisfied. Here endeth the lesson.