Happily Ever After

Life in The Rural Retreat with a beautiful wife, three cats, garden wildlife, a camera, a computer – and increasing amounts about running

Earlier posts can be found on Adventures of a Lone Bass Player, where this blog began life. Recent entries can be found here.

Cold Showers, Warm Rain, Hot Tubs

by admin - 22:54 on 26 June 2014

Vogur Lodge has still to provide its guests with hot running water. The management spent all day trying to find the problem, but with no success. So after wasting a day, tomorrow it will call in an expert – from distant Reykjavik. We considered leaving tomorrow and begging our next hotel to admit us a day early. However, being British and British-by-adoption we opted not to make a fuss.

Fortunately, breakfast was a lavish selection of fruit, cheese, meats, cereal, bread and pancakes – just right to prepare us for the ramble that took the place of the previously proposed hike, downgraded because of poor weather: eight eighths cloud and drizzle that tried its best to become something wetter.

So our ramble took us down the Vogur's impressively long driveway and along the gravelled road as far as a tempting stile followed by a very brief uphill section which provided an even better view of cloud-and-rain-shrouded hills on the other side of the fjord. Along the way (and back) we were shouted at by various disgruntled birds, who believed we were too close to their nests or their young, and stared at by several sets of sheep. The only houses are scattered and distant. Perhaps three cars passed in the entire two-and-a-half hours we were out. This is a very silent place. Apart from the birds, that is.

At one point we were assailed by a familiar sulphurous aroma but we saw neither hot springs nor rising steam. Shame.

Back at Vogur we made use of the outdoor hot tub, from where we could soak up the view, listen to the birds and enjoy the unaccustomed sensation of warm water on our skin. We resisted the urge to take soap and shampoo as that might have been considered anti-social. We saved them for the cold shower instead. Not nice.

The rest of the day was spent following Matchgirl's grand plan and relaxing, smug in the knowledge that, unlike Paul and Cathy, we weren't driving lots of kilometres, in the rain, to make a ten-hour trek up and down a volcano somewhere in the east, in the rain, then drive back again. Probably in the rain.

Tomorrow's forecast is better. Matchgirl has been busy planning our next excursion all evening. It should be great.

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