We have got our first internet acces in Iceland!!!

Hi, this is Freya writing...

Eventually after 9 paddling days we headed into Siglufjordur at the North coast to resupply with groceries, charging batteries and typing our first update...we were just PADDLING and out in the bushes so far!
Sorry for the communication trouble at the beginning of the trip, but OUR e-mails from the Sat-phone to our e-mail adresses were working! That the messages to Steini and others went into their spam-folder, was not expected. And not all of the text messages to the Sat-phone were arriving in time or at all.

So we started the trip as announced on Satuday with crossing those two big bays, one 90 km, one 100 km, and ended after the second day exactly were we planned...but obviously nobody believed us we are really doing it...

We were still in pretty good shape after hard 8 paddling days in Newfoundland, so not too much of a big deal at the beginning of the trip.
Besides jumping out of the plane at 11.30 pm the previous day, getting driven by Gummi and his friend (THANKS!!!) to the closest beach near Keflavik airport, getting to sleep at 3 am, and started to paddle next day at 10.30 am...the planning days were not too peaceful either :-))

But the calm weather was just so tempting...

We ended the first crossing at 1 am, and the second crossing was planned to be done at about 4 am (the light and bright Icelandic summer nights are just tempting to keep on paddling!), but the predicted force 4 headwinds for Monday came in a bit earlier at about 3 am, and felt a bit stronger than force 4 only. But they calmed down after a while again to force 3 or so, and we just kept on pushing to the destination...no turning around at that point any more...have you ever slept whilst paddling? Or just fallen asleep on paddling? Everything is possible...so the "rest" day on Tuesday after the landing at 8.30 am was just necessary.

We just landed, put up camp and cooked "dinner"/ breakfast, as those rescue team guys showed up with their huge trucks and told us their story. So we checked up with the communication problems, and went to the deserved sleep at about 10 am.

One hour later I could kill those f...... TV guys knocking at our tent: "Are you in there and ok for an inteview?" Greg, polite American as usual said "sure" and got up instantly, I cussed a bit more, didn´t talk too much and preferred to leave my sunglasses on my swollen eyes...I am grumpy when I don´t get enough sleep!!!

Done with that chore, the next TV-crew came already down the beach...same procedure, I am grumpy, Greg politely and happily doing the job :-))

Back to sleep again...another hour, and a newspaper guy knocked at the tent together with the farmer...same procedure as above...this was our "REST" day!!!


But anyway, we kept on paddling the next days, 70 km, 60 km, 65 km, two 40 and 30 km halfdays, ending up in the first soak in an Icelandic hot pool. Another 70 km, 65 km, and we are here now...


And yes, we saw some nice shoreline with 1000000000000 of birds and impressive huge cliffs already, paddled into stunning caves and through beautiful arches. Lots of pics to share later!!!

But to be honest, mainly we are going from headland to headland on open water, we were blessed so far with winds usually moderate to low out of all directions, and with water not too challenging besides the huge distances. This is how to get around FAST.

Sure there might be other ways to paddle around Iceland. But as my time line is short due to my home schedule, that´s the way we chose to do it...

We are going shopping now, and the we´ll see! Probably resupply and post again from Hoefn at the South-East before we are starting the sandy beaches...

Freya