East!

Tuesday, August 08, 2023
Borgarfjörður eystri, Múlaþing, Iceland
Tuesday, August 8, 2023
I wake up at 04:00 again. Bright light in the tent. I am going to have to make up some sleep one of these days. No wonder I fall asleep at 20:30 in the evening.
There is no téléphone signal here, but the tiny service station (kitchen and bathroom) has wifi.
When I show up there, Sisi has already baked a stack of pancakes. What a life!
A good hot shower. A lot of pancakes. We are ready to go.
We fold the tents - almost no wind now - with alp like meadows and fields around us, topped by brown bare mountain peaks.  The girl who runs the campground told us the have 40 bulls for fattening and about 100 sheep - which makes it a small farm.
We drive off to further adventures. The first is the Rjukandi waterfalls. They are much smaller than the big ones we’ve seen lately, but still beautiful. 
They fall down a long mountain range. Further along the ridge we see more falls.
We want to take a hike onto this ridge, but halfway up the steep slope our almost invisible trail is blocked by a brand new farmer fence. We don’t want to climb over it, so we return to the car in the valley.
Our next target is Borgarfjodur where we hope to see more Puffin birds.
But half an hour on our way the sun comes out in force and we see a picnic table on the steep bank of a river. We stop for lunch and enjoy the hundreds of shades of green al around us, the warm sun, the rushing sound of the river just below us, peaceful nature as far as the eye reaches.
But when we leave, I foolishly leave the plates on top of the car. And when we leave two fall off and break. So stupid of me. Fortunately we have bowls too.
We now follow inland roads and for a couple of hours we wind between the mountains until we pass a very high and steep mountain ridge and suddenly see the ocean. We are facing east, so somewhere there, beyond the horizon, must be Norway. From there, in small wooden handmade boats, they sailed over unknown waters to Iceland, more than 1000 years ago.
We follow the coast until we reach a small hamlet with a campground. We make camp and then go to the coast, to Borgarfjardarhofn, where we park and mount a small observation hill on a tiny peninsula, to look for puffins. Unfortunately most float in the bay, but we do see a few coming in to feed their young. The hillside is full of holes, which are the nests. Presumably there are many young inside.
Sisi gets cold and we leave Didi observing and photographing while we drink a hot coffee and chocolate milk in the cafe in the harbor. That’s where I write these lines.
But they close at 17:00 so we have to go now. See you later!
In the campground service station. We just ate some more delicious lamb with spaghetti. We are warming up just like some other campers from France, Switserland and of course some Dutch.
After our tea we will return to the puffin site. Hopefully there will be more near the nests
During the day, the puffins hunt fish at sea. During mating season in the evening they return to the nest to care for their chick. At 21:00 we are in position and while I slowly cool down until my neck muscles are completely stiff, the puffins are starting to fly in from the sea. 
Just like my chicken going to roost, it’s a very inefficient proces. The arrive, sit fown, fly back to the ocean, come again in a large flock, a number leave again. In short, for an hour we watch and by the time we leave there is over hundred on the small rock right next to us. Like little pinguins they sit in front of their holes.
When I crawl into my tent I am still cold and an unpleasant strong wind makes the tent flap. I hope it will die down soon.
Other Entries

Comments

2025-02-10

Comment code: Ask author if the code is blank