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robbo here. after a redeye flight from jfk, we arrived to the keflavik airport at around 6:30 am. our car rental contact greeted us at the baggage claim with the keys to our toyota auris. time for slam to hone his manual driving skills--we will be driving stick in the uk as well, but at least iceland drives on the right side of the road.

it's cold--about 12 degrees C with a sharp, bracing wind. as it was still early, we decided to find some breakfast and explore the nearby towns before heading over to the blue lagoon. nothing is open this early except N1, a gas station, which luckily has a decent selection of breads, yogurt, and drinks.

the landscape of southwest iceland is at once familiar and very strange at the same time. born and raised in alaska, i recognized many of the flora surrounding us--sheets of moss and lichen covering the rocks, ribbons of purple lupines, sunny buttercups, horsetail weeds, and cornflowers. however, the scenery was also otherworldly, with endless undulating fields of volcanic rocks, pools of steaming, spurting, sulphur-rich water, flanked by dark craggy mountains. very few trees punctuate the wide wild landscape. the towns are tiny, few, and far between.

we reached the blue lagoon within 20 min. the blue lagoon opens at 8:00 during the summer months. i highly recommend going early to beat the tour groups that pour in around 9:00. except for a couple of other people, we had the place to ourselves. bring your own towel and save 7 krona. we found our small, lightweight towels super useful--more on that later! it's hard to describe the color and feel of the water. it's an intense white-blue . . . it almost seems to glow with it's own light. it feels slightly thick and slippery. it's unique color and feel is attributed to the mix of minerals and algae, and it's supposed to be very good for your skin. the warm water was heavenly after our flight! of course, we had the full experience--we slathered our faces with the mineral mud provided, stood under the pounding waterfall, checked out the sauna and steam room. we found a deliciously hot spot--for those that are interested, it's towards the middle on the far left, near a clump of rocks. next time, i would wear sunglasses to cut the glare and a swimming cap to shield my hair from the water. i dunked my head in a few times to keep warm which was a big mistake--my hair was a crazy matted mess! afterwards, and it actually took a few days for me to wash the minerals out. now i know where bjork gets her hairdo.

we thought that we would explore some other towns before heading to reyjkavik, and drove east. however, the paved roads quickly succumbed to loose gravel, and driving got a little crazy with the winding, hilly roads. not knowing how long the road would be this way, we finally admitted defeat and turned around. we assumed that finding our hostel in reyjkavik would be easy--anything but! major road signs off the highway apparently do not name the streets, but the regions that the streets lead to. not knowing one neighborhood from another, this took a while to figure out. i thought thai words were long, but they have nothing on icelandic words. for example: reykjavikurflugvollur, seltjarnarnes, and skolavordustigur. no, i did not just fall asleep on the keyboard, those are real street names and places!! try sounding those out on a highway sign while driving by at 90 km/hr. it took a while, but we finally found our hostel. we had a basic room in snorri's guesthouse, and it was simple but clean and comfortable. there was a shared bathroom and kitchen area. our location was conveniently near the main shopping/eating street, laugavegar. we found a grocery store on that street and picked up bread, ham, bananas, and cookies for lunch the next day.

outside the blue lagoon.

very friendly icelandic ponies.

crazy landscape, unlike anything we've ever saw in the states.

current location: on the train, enroute from milano centrale to manarola.