Iceland
Whenever I have the chance, I try to double up on the locations that my trips will take me. A daylong layover can offer a lot in a second country – an overnight stay can feel like a whole other vacation if you plan it right. When my husband and I went to Barcelona for our 7th wedding anniversary, I booked our flights through WOW Air (RIP), which had a mandatory stop in Reykjavík on both ends of the trip to Spain, the latter being a full 24 hours in Iceland.
I booked our hotel in advance as usual – an old army barracks facility turned into room and board for tourists and locals, only a 15-minute drive from the airport. I did very little else to prepare for Iceland, and started to shift my focus to our five days in Barcelona and all the sites I wanted to see while there. I felt confident that we could have a great morning of adventures in Iceland with 10 hours to spare after a night’s rest near the airport. I was wrong about that.
When we arrived to Keflavík International Airport in the early evening, it was already dark outside. Jim and I peered out the plane window, me leaning over him to get a better look at the runway. The lights on the ground blurred in my vision through the sideways rain, and a small howl of the wind hissed in my ears.
“It doesn’t look great out there,” I said, turning back to sit forward in my seat.
We departed the plane and made our way down the tarmac and towards the airport exit, passing the car rental kiosks, and headed straight for the exit doors. The moment we opened the glass double doors, the cold air blasted against our bodies, causing both of us to grasp our jackets closer to our chests and hunker down to try to make ourselves small, more wind-resistant, fearful of being blown away into the dark. I peered up from my sunken state to look for the closest cab, rolling our oversized suitcase behind me as it swayed left and right, only barely manageable to hold onto it in the treacherous storm.
The first driver we came to rolled his window down enough to greet us and ask where we were going, the sound of the trunk popping to the rear of us as he spoke. I screamed the name of the hotel into the night, as Jim opened the back door for me, throwing the suitcase into the open trunk, and scooting in behind me. The driver took off into the complete darkness, Jim and I looking at the windows with sheer terror on our faces. This is not bad weather. This is a horror movie.
The cab driver made his way out of the airport and down a narrow two-lane road, the taxi shaking from side to side as he steadied the wheel, all too used to these conditions. I thought about how grateful I was that we hadn’t rented a car. We could never have driven it safely in these conditions. We arrived only a few minutes later at the hotel, a black, slick-topped parking lot with a one-story concrete cinder block building in front of us. The meter stopped at $50 for a 10-minute ride. I paid the driver and thanked him, exiting quickly and hovering by the car door to wait for Jim as he stepped out of the cab. The second his head left the comfort of the cab, his baseball cap flew up into the empty and vast night sky, like it had been snatched by an invisible tornado. We watched it twirl and spin away, in awe of its speed. We again struggled through the battering rain and wind to enter the hotel and checked in, finding our way to our single room with two small beds and a nightstand. Exhausted from traveling and witnessing firsthand the power of Mother Nature, we went to sleep almost immediately, glad to be safe and warm in our otherwise bare habitation.
When we woke up the next day, we made our way to the lobby for a small breakfast, the other guests sitting around small tables chatting and drinking coffee. I could see in the morning light that the weather had cleared, and I thought about how nice our day visit to the Blue Lagoon and Reykjavík was going ot be with sunny skies to look forward to. Ibypassed the continental breakfast to go directly to the front desk to ask the gentleman working behind the counter if he could call us a taxi to take us to the Blue Lagoon in an hour and how much it would cost.
“You didn’t rent a car?”
“No, thankfully, the weather was terrible last night.”
He paused for a moment, thinking.
“Well, honestly, it would be cheaper for you to go back to the airport from here, rent a car for the day, and then drive yourself around. One way to the Blue Lagoon from here will cost you about $150 in a taxi.”
Oops. I guess I should have already assumed that with the cost of the short ride from the airport last night.
“And, I don’t really think you are going to get a rental car on short notice either,” he said sympathetically.
I sighed, thanked him, turned around, and walked back to the table where Jim had started his breakfast.
“I should have researched this one,” I said, explaining that our options were bleak for leaving the hotel on a budget.
Instead of seeing any of Iceland, we bummed around the hotel for a few more hours, playing pool, reading books on the lobby couches, and then headed to the airport four hours before our flight, when it was time to check out of our room. I asked the kind man at the front desk for one last favor – to call us a cab. When we walked out into the still air of the parking lot, Jim looked around.
“I was hoping my hat had landed back here last night.”
The parking lot was empty.
This is the one picture I took in Iceland.
