Snowcation in Europe

Our most adventurous day kicked off   at about 9am   because we had a long drive ahead of us. Apparently it snowed an unusually large amount the night before so we were greeted to a more wintry wonderland than before! We set off for The Cave which is a lava cave that was formed in 1000 AD… it was a 2 hour treacherous drive… pretty crazy actually and I was so happy to not be driving. Like literally 6 inches of snow on the road - the only way we knew it was a road was because there were little posts on the sides- it was crazy! We were about 20 minutes late but right after we arrived we learned that there was a car and tour bus stuck on the road to the cave- we could actually see them- didn’t look fun, but Icelanders always help each other when they see each other stuck on the side of the road. Thank god for studded tires, but we were still sliding around from time to time… 9am commute The cave is literally in the middle of nowhere- it’s in the highlands, which is pretty much the...

Our first full day was a golden circle adventure! We began before sunrise,   at 10am! Our sunrise drive went by the mountain Asja, which is a beautiful tabletop mountain (the mountains are apparently flat because of the wind) as we headed on our trek. Our first stop was the national park where the worlds oldest parliament was, and this is where sentencing happened for prisoners annually every July (so good luck to those August criminals!) It was very windy and snowy and so many more people than when i was there in April so we didn’t really linger, but it was very cool to see the snow on the rocks as we walked along the tectonic plate. It’s so cool how the topography steps down so drastically between the plates.  The bonus that I hadn’t seen before was the Öxanáfoss, which is a waterfall that was a short walk away. The waterfall is basically surrounded with solid ice and snow, it was beautiful!  We also went to a spa called Fontana, behind which were these pits that they b...

Gođan dagin! That means good day in Icelandic! So after a very covid Christmas, Mama Beebe and I took off for an arctic blast vacation. My goal was lagoon by day, northern lights by night. Reykjavik is only 5 hours from Boston, so I couldn’t resist a “quick, easy, low season” trip, though it was none of those things between Christmas and New Years! Interestingly enough, the weather in Iceland looked like it was similar to the last week in  Our flight left in the evening of 12/27, so we were ready for a red eye experience. We landed a little before 5am and thanks to motherly recommendation on seat selection, were a few of the first through passport control and customs. We were greeted by Jost, our driver, and whisked away to a hotel right by the airport where we were given a few hours to sleep. That was a great little perk I might add. We were able to sleep until 11am, get dressed, and head into central Reykjavik where we were staying. Our drive went past the new lava...