I was up early.  After two cups of skyr and a cup of tea I was dressed and putting my boots on in the hallway.  Arthur and I had said our goodbyes a few minutes earlier, but he ran out of the kitchen suddenly with a sandwich wrapped in a paper towel.

"In case you get hungry today," he said.  "It's going to be a long drive."

"Thanks," I said.  "Have a safe flight."

The morning was cloudy and cool.  I headed for the harbor.  On Suðurgata was a big car sales/repair shop.  The Avis logo was nowhere in evidence, but I went in to see if this was the place.

The manager, in a jacket and tie, spoke no English, but he motioned a mechanic over to help.  They both seemed startled when I said I had a reservation.  This was worrying.  It turned out not to be a problem; the manager called the Reykjavík office.

"Reykjavík forgot to tell us," the mechanic said.

"Ok," the manager said at last, presenting me with a form printed in Icelandic, English, and German legalese.  A few minutes later I was in my blue Opel Corsa and headed for Látrabjarg, the westernmost point in Europe.

I started up Tungudalur, the valley above Ísafjörður, heading for the tunnel to Flateyri.  It's a long, three-pronged tunnel that connects Ísafjörður with Flateyri and Suðureyri, two nearby towns.  Reaching the other end of the tunnel, I descended to the sea on the other side and turned right toward Flateyri.  It was out of my way, but only a few kilometers off track, and I was curious to take a look.
 

abandoned farm near Flateyri

The road into the village is lined with farms.  The depopulation of the Westfjords is obvious here.  Many of the farms were abandoned.  I stopped at one, on a rise above the road where the clouds flowed down from the mountains.  Trying to pull back onto the highway, though, I realized that I hadn't figured out how to shift into reverse, so I drove all the way up to the farmhouse and turned around.  While no longer a working farm, this one actually looked like it may still be in use as a summer house.  The glass and lace curtains were still in the windows.  I continued on into Flateyri, by chance discovering the secret of reverse on the way.

While attractive, there was little to see here, so I continued on to Þingeyri, where I began a rumbling ascent up a mountain pass, having reached the end of the pavement.

A green truck, one of the few vehicles I'd see that day, had passed me while I paused to take a picture outside Þingeyri, and as I rounded curves and frequently dropped into second gear to get up the steep sections, I could see the dust it had raised settling back onto the road, though after a while I could see no evidence of the truck at all.  I was alone in the mountains now, navigating my tiny Opel Corsa around potholes that looked like they might swallow it whole (I should comment that on the whole, the roads were in quite good condition, but there were some pretty rough patches).
 

emergency hut in the Westfjords highlands

The road began the steep final ascent to the pass, a long series of switchbacks.  Snow was piled next to the side of the road, and as I gained altitude, the snow got deeper, reaching as high as 10 feet or so.  The top of the pass was marked with a brilliant orange emergency hut.

The descent to Hrafnseyri on the other side was far more harrowing than the ascent.  Driving down switchbacks on gravel at a 12% downhill grade had my hands glued to the steering wheel and my imagination filled with visions of me driving off the side of the mountain.  During the summer, a bus from Ísafjörður to Látrabjarg takes this same road (there's not much choice); I
guess it's a hell of a ride.

I continued straight on past Hrafnseyri, then a few minutes later stopped when I spotted Dynjandi, a spectacular waterfall descending from a mountaintop and then, via a series of falls, making its way to the fjord.  I stopped to take a picture, and thought about getting closer, but the weather had turned foul again--a cold wind blew the car door shut--so I hoped for better on the way back.

At the top of the next mountain I stopped and ate the sandwich Arthur had given me.  I was at a high meadow.  To the left of the road was an ice-covered lake, just starting to melt, though I doubted the present snow was helping its endeavors.  The view below was obscured by the fog that surrounded me.  I could only see rocks stretching into the mist.

I arrived at a crossroads.  To my right was the way to Bildudalur; straight ahead was Patreksfjörður.  This surprised me, since I assumed that the fastest way to Patreksfjörður would be through Bildudalur, but I took the sign's advice and continued straight ahead. My reward, after a good stretch of road, was pavement.

After the bumpiness of the gravel, I couldn't help myself, and drove like I was on the New Jersey turnpike, till wisdom kicked in and I took note of the fact that I was still on a mountain road.  I slowed down.  At last I descended from the mountains.  I was now at the southern coast of the Wesfjords; the next land was the Snæfellsnes Peninsula.  The sign indicated that Reykjavík was to the left.  I turned right.
 

on the road to Látrabjarg

The road is inland a little bit, with farms on both sides.  The farms on the left stop where the fields meet the ocean.  Sheep wandered around in the fields; occasionally I'd see a ewe who had gotten past the fence standing by the side of the road, flanked by her lambs.  After 45 minutes of easy driving, the road curved back up into the mountains again, and I was back on
dirt.  At the top of the mountain stood a stone troll, built in the 40s by road crews with leftover building materials.

The road came back down to the head of Patreksfjörður, where it forked; to the right was the town of the same name, to the left, Látrabjarg.  A sign warned that there was no gas to be had on the peninsula.  Látrabjarg was 45 kilometers away.  I looked at my gas tank.  I was still just over half-full, so it didn't look like I'd have a problem.

At first the road was paved, and I held out hope that because Látrabjarg is something of a tourist attraction, albeit not a big one, I'd have asphalt the whole way.  I was not so lucky.  The pavement ended near a flat stretch of sand, where a large red fishing boat sat embedded in the earth, upright and silent.

For the most part, the road hugs the south coast of Patreksfjörður. Directly across the fjord from the town, the road passes through what seemed to me the most improbable landscape I'd seen in Iceland thus far: rolling yellow sand dunes.  Nestled among the dunes near the shore was an airstrip. Aside from a tiny terminal building, and the town across the water, there
wasn't another building in sight.  This, it turns out, was the Patreksfjörður airport, as inconveniently situated a strip of asphalt as I could imagine given that it is, at best, a good half-hour from the town it serves, and a bumpy ride at that.

I passed farms here and there, and then, after descending into a valley, turned inland and up a mountain, where a backhoe blocked the way.  The driver saw me, and he slowly moved the lumbering vehicle to the side.  I passed carefully, steering around the huge holes the backhoe was digging in the road.  Once I got out of the construction area, the road continued up
and around the mountain, till it was time to go down again, this time into Hvallátur, a tiny hamlet on the beach.  Just a few kilometers from Látrabjarg now, I was in the westernmost settlement in Europe.  Having no easily identifiable industry, it looked windswept and run down.

Just beyond that were the ruins of the town that formerly claimed the title of Europe's westernmost outpost.  There's nothing to see now but the stone foundations of 18th century fishermen's huts.  The tide came in insistently, the waves smashing against remains of the stone sea wall.  From here the road ascended steeply along a cliff over the ocean.  The road flattened out
a bit, but then before I knew it, I had reached the small parking lot in front of Bjargtangar, the lighthouse at the end of Europe.  I was the only person here.
 

the path along the cliffs

I have thus far largely refrained from emphasizing that for most of the day, the wind had been screaming.  There's no use concealing that fact any longer.  An Icelandic vacation is for those who refuse to be deterred by the weather: normal people do not go out on days like this.  I had parked next to the lighthouse's radio tower.  The steel lines holding it up let out shaking, buzzing moans.

Instead of getting out right away, I opted for lunch in the hope that the weather would clear up a bit.  Something a little more conducive to a walk up to the cliffs would be nice.  It was flatbread and cheese and a chocolate bar again.  The wind showed no sign of abating.  I got out of the car.

The wind was blowing out towards the sea.  The waves in the ocean struggled to reach the shore against the force of the same wind that was doing its best to blow me over.  I pulled my knit cap low over my ears and began walking up the slope above the parking lot, leaning in toward the land as if I were auditioning for a V8 commercial.

It was a short walk before I reached a vantage point to get my first look at the cliffs.  The long drive and cold wind were worth it.  Far below, the Atlantic Ocean swirled below the cliffs.  Sheltered from the wind by the black rock walls, birds circled.
 
 

the cliffs at Látrabjarg

I continued walking, staying a good ten feet or so away from the cliffs to keep from being blown off.  The path continued upward, curving back and forth as it followed the line of the cliffs.  The cliffs get as high at 1200 feet, but the point where they get that high is about 4 miles from the parking lot.  I thought I'd try to get all the way there, but the wind proved too powerful for even that relatively modest height.  Nevertheless, the cliffs rose impressively.  Periodically I'd get down on my stomach and crawl to the edge of the cliffs.  When I got up, I thrusted myself backwards into the wind, stumbling a bit then regaining my footing when the wind blew me back forward.

After an hour of hiking in the wind, tired of squinting and wiping my nose, I headed back toward the car.  It was a downhill walk that I occasionally attempted at a run, but it was hard to balance against the wind.  Going down through the fields, covered in brown grass and the odd subarctic flower, "The Hills are Alive with the Sound of Music" ran through my head.  I immediately regretted that the thought had even entered my mind: I don't know a single other line from the song (do you?), and the one line I did know ran on an endless loop to the tune of the howling wind.

When the car came back into view, there was an SUV in the parking lot.  Two people got out, and bundled themselves up.  They proceeded up the path as I came down the final stretch to the gravel lot.  We waved tentatively at each other.  I got back in the car, sat back and closed my eyes for a moment.

After resting a moment, I started on the road back.  On reaching the fork where I could head back to Ísafjörður by the most direct route or via Patreksfjörður, I chose the latter.  Its houses scattered narrowly along the shore, it's a pretty enough town, but I didn't really stop.  I headed on instead for Talknafjörður.

On the drive there, the weather began to clear up a bit, the sun making a brief appearance here and there.  At a couple points I stopped to get out and take pictures; the wind had died down, too.  Talknafjörður is a village of 300 or so, but more picturesque and possibly more prosperous than the other towns I'd seen.  The church, on a hill just outside town, has a contemporary Scandinavian look to it.  I didn't get to go inside, but it looks like the sort of place where the pews would be supplied by IKEA.

I passed through Bildudalur quickly, and soon reached the end of the paved road, climbing back up into the mountains.  It was late in the day now, and at the mountaintops, snow was falling.  Though I had driven to Látrabjarg in silence, just past Patreksfjörður, I had finally figured out how to tune in the radio.  There's no FM out here, but the car was outfitted with a longwave receiver, which allowed me to tune into Icelandic national radio.  I found it about 4 in the afternoon, just as the news was coming on.  The news lasts till 8, so I spent this portion of the drive listening to impenetrable Icelandic talk radio.  I figured out that something was going on in Kashmir and something was up with Alcoa, but beyond that, I got nothing.
 

Dynjandi

Around 7:30, I arrived back at Dynjandi.  I drove down to the parking area.  Again, I was the only one here.  Above me, there was a long series of falls, crowned by a large on at the top, where the water appears at the top of a rock face, then spreads into a broad triangle on its way down.

There's a trail from the parking lot.  It's a short, but very steep, walk up, but definitely worthwhile.  I sat at the falls for a while.  Why leave?  The weather was cool and calm, a few stray raindrops here and there.  Where Arnarfjörður met the ocean, the sun shone off the water.  My car was an ant far below.

Eventually I had to get going.  I stopped briefly at Hrafnseyri, the birthplace of the leader of Iceland's independent movement, for a moment, but there was no one around but some sheep, who ran away as soon as I got out of the car.  Soon after this, the weather turned bad again.  Along the road between Þingeyri and Flateyri, intrepid and civically minded people walked along the side of the road armed with trash bags, apparently picking up litter, though I never saw any.
 

Suðureyri harbor

In the tunnel back to Ísafjörður, I decided to take a left to Suðureyri, just to see what was there.  It's amazing how different the weather can be from one side of a mountain to another.  As bad as the weather was on the other side, it was worse here.  The winds were high, and the clouds were low to the ground.  The road down from the tunnel descended along the wall of the fjord, terminating in the tiny grey town, surrounded by fog.  I took a brief tour in the car, seeing the church, school, and harbor, before turning around and heading for Ísafjörður.

It was now 9:30 at night.  It was a welcome sight after a long day on the road.  It was bright and raining.

I made spaghetti for dinner again, talking to a refrigerator mechanic named Gunnar while he watched the news.  He explained that Icelandic elections were coming up Saturday, so the news was doing a lot of man on the street interviews in Reykjavík.  I washed the dishes and went to bed.
 

 May 22: Ísafjörður & Reykjavík
 Iceland, Round 2 Index
 Travel
 The Internet is boring