Heading to Hofsós

I went on some very nice walks during my "quarantine" between Covid tests

Second Covid-19 test was negative 5 days after the first, so now I can go do all the things.

You’d think I would have had enough rest in the five lazy days I spent in “light quarantine” at my cousin Selma’s apartment this week. But no. I overslept and would have missed my 9am bus to Hofsós if Selma hadn’t woken me at 8:30 to give me a ride to the bus station. I should have been dressed and ready by then, but instead spent the next five minutes frantically getting dressed and throwing things into my suitcase. My teeth remained unbrushed and my eyelashes un-mascarad. Sorry, fellow bus passengers. 

We made it to the station with plenty of time. Probably should have taken that extra minute to brush my teeth after all. I was even able to sit leisurely in my bus seat and watch a group of young adults from an undetermined country in Europe (Germany?) struggling to find room to stow their bicycles on the bus. As this is the only bus that heads north to this part of Iceland on a Saturday, people are motivated to make it work. It’s not like you can just catch the next bus in twenty minutes.

I tossed my bags in the large storage hubs under the bus and hugged Selma goodbye. She and her boyfriend Axel have been amazing hosts to me this past week while I waited for the all clear on my Covid tests. The ancient man in the driver’s seat who was selling tickets took a long, uncertain look at me and asked, “fullordnið eða ungmenni?” Adult or teen? “Fullordnið,” I told him. He held his hand to his ear in the universal signal for ‘speak up.’  Fullordnið.” I said a little louder. His fingers hesitated over the buttons on the credit card machine as he considered whether or not to ask me a third time. His eyes met mine and I said again, “fullordnið.” His eyes dropped away and I could tell he still didn’t understand me, though I assumed he was going to charge me the adult price. The fact that he was even asking was bizarre enough. He took his time to press a few buttons and I handed him my credit card. He handed me the receipt and I moved further into the bus to find a seat, glancing at the thin piece of paper in my hand. Wait, only 2,859 kronur charged to my card? The old man charged me the much cheaper teenager price! Now I’m not only worried about his hearing, but his sight as well. Should he be driving?  Maybe he could foresee the cookie crumbs that would soon be sprinkled on my shirt, and the Taylor Swift music I planned to listen to on the journey. Maybe my inner 16 year old was shining a little too brightly this morning. Normally I feel like each and every one of my 33 years shows up pretty clearly, especially early in the morning, sans makeup. Not today! Or at least not to a half-blind, half-deaf old bus driver in Iceland on this cloudy July morning. I guess I’ll take it.

Resigned to my scruffy, teenage bus identity today I settled in and enjoyed the view out the windows. There are countless sheep and horses grazing in fields along the route. I get a thrill seeing them and thinking of how soon I’ll be seeing my own horse, Frami, who I’m sure is waiting longingly in Hofsós for me. “Ma-hah-hah-hallory!” he will neigh when he sees me.  These are the things I think on the bus (and sometimes off). Please keep reading. It isn’t all going to be so strange.

Everything at this time of year is lush and green. None of the mountains in view here are tall enough to have any snow remaining on their tops at this time of year. Another few months and it will be a different story.  Later in the drive there are taller mountains, and patches of snow still cling in little nooks and crannies in the stone there.  We make many stops in the first hour or so of bus route 57 from Mjödd in Reykjavik to Akureyri. After that the stops are few and far between. Sauðárkrókur is my stop, about an hour and a half before the end of the line in Akureyri. Someone will pick me up there and drive me up to Hofsós. I assume. Wait, I should probably confirm that with someone up there. (Takes short writing break to text Gunna in Hofsós).

Blurry bus window picture, before the rain started.

I’m looking forward to seeing all my people in Hofsós and getting to spend several weeks there before returning to Reykjavik around the middle of August to start school and get settled in a new apartment with my roommate and friend, fellow former Snorri, Erin Johnson. In Hofsós I can chase sheep, ride horses, and spend lovely days at Vesturfarasetrið, the Icelandic Emigration Center, helping people research their Icelandic ancestry. The center overlooks the harbor in Hofsós, and is a cozy place to be regardless of the weather. I’m volunteering with Icelandic Roots again this summer, an amazing genealogy database. People coming in to Vesturfarasetrið often have questions about their ancestors, or about long lost cousins that may be living either in Iceland or abroad. We have tons of resources there to look up information. With Covid-19 ongoing, I doubt there will be many Canadian or American visitors at the center this summer, but Gunna and Valgeir have said that Vesturfarasetrið is staying very busy anyway, with more local visitors I would guess. I can’t wait to get there and see. 

The 11th Time's the Charm: Moving to Iceland

The day has finally arrived! I’m on my way to Iceland, and not just for a visit. This time I’m moving there, and despite the feelings of guilt and sadness over leaving my friends and family in the US behind, it feels like the right thing for me to do. I'm more than a little excited.

    “Why Iceland?” many people have asked me. For those who don’t know the comprehensive history of my Iceland obsession, this is what I tell them: My dad’s dad’s branch of the family is Icelandic. As a child I was somewhat aware of this fact, but the impact was subtle. An occasional Icelandic heritage celebration to attend in North Dakota, a familiarity with certain Icelandic foods and desserts, and a few familiar phrases that had managed to make their way down through 3 generations to my own childhood; “Góða nótt” and “sestu niður”(which my family pronounces with an Americanized twist as "Set the snithur").

    It was sometime in high school that my interest in genealogy arose. One time, when talking with my dad about our Icelandic side of the family tree, we discussed how amazing it would be to visit Iceland someday, and he said something about how he and I would go there when I finished college. I’m the sort of person that locks onto a comment like that, and from then on I was dead set on visiting Iceland after finishing undergrad. Dad and I did indeed go to Iceland in 2009, when I graduated with my Speech-Language-Hearing Science bachelor's degree from the University of Minnesota. We spent 10 days driving around the ring road, and it was, to this day, one of the best trips I’ve ever been on. At that point in time we had pretty limited information on family history details, and a lack of exact locations of old family farms. We also didn’t have the wide spread contingent of knowledgeable Icelandic friends and cousins that I have now who have been able to help fill in the blanks for us. We drove down unmarked roads and explored streams, glacial lagoons, and waterfalls on all ends of the country. We rode horses, stayed up late under the midnight sun, and made dozens of peanut butter and jelly sandwiches to eat along the way. 

First time in Iceland- with my dad in 2009

First time in Iceland- with my dad in 2009

    That trip fueled my passion for Iceland, and in 2011 I was able to participate in The Snorri program. Snorri was a life changing experience for me. I’m not going to go on too much about it, as I’ve already written many a blog post about how wonderful it was. Spectacular adventures, new perspectives, the making of life-long friends, etc. You can read all about it in my 2011 Snorri posts.

Snorri Program adventures- 2011

    Since Snorri, I have been back to Iceland 9 times, all but once during the summer. I've toured around everywhere, met tons of cousins and friends, and now even have my own horse there! I’m extraordinary lucky to have been able to travel to Iceland so often, and to stay for as long as I did each time. It’s thanks to my job in a school with long summers off, and generous host friends and family in Iceland that have allowed me to stay with them over the years when I come visiting.

Now on this, my 11th trip, I’m coming to stay. 

My horse, Frami, who is now 1 year old

    So, what am I going to do in Iceland? In my mind, the picture I've painted is that I'll be frolicking through seaside meadows in the endless summer sun with a herd of wild horses. The reality? Maybe a little bit of frolicking... but mainly I'm enrolled in a master's degree program at the University of Iceland in Reykjavik this fall. So I'll be doing a lot of that. It is a two year program in International Education Studies, but my plan is to see how the first year goes. I'll find a part time job somewhere and just see how it is to live in Reykjavik. If I like being there I'll stick around. If I don't, I'll leave. Pretty simple. After 10 years of spending a good chunk of my summer in Iceland, I want to see if I love the rest of the year there as much as I love summer time. Winter in Iceland is a whole different story, which I've only experienced once. It will be interesting to see how I do long term with the lack of daylight in the deepest, darkest part of winter.

Now, some of you might be thinking, "But, Mallory!! Americans are not currently allowed to leave our cesspool of a country...The rest of the world wants nothing to do with our reckless, Covid-riddled citizens!" That's pretty much correct. However, I have a residence permit for Iceland now, so, I think... I hope... they'll let me on the plane to Iceland this evening. I'll have to take a Covid-19 test upon arrival at the airport in Iceland, and then, assuming I am negative will have to go into a "light quarantine" for 4 or 5 days at my cousin Selma's house. At that point I have to go to a local health center to get re-tested. If I'm negative a second time I can go about my business. They've got a pretty good handle on things over there, Covid wise. I'm plenty happy to follow the rules and make sure I'm not dragging any germs there with me.

Gallery of Flags at BOS, with Iceland on the top left

Right now I'm sitting in the disturbingly quiet Logan Airport in Boston on a 10-hour layover. I had a flight from Minneapolis to Boston this morning at 7am since there aren't any direct flights from MSP to Iceland this summer due to the pandemic. Now I have to wait until 8:50pm for my flight from Boston to Iceland. On my first flight, with my mask securely donned, and carry-on luggage stowed, I wiped down every surface within my reach with a Clorox wipe. My backpack contains every sort of surface wipe, hand wipe, and anti-bacterial goo known to man, along with a large pack of extra masks. Traveling during Covid is not ideal, but I’m grateful that I’m able to get to Iceland at all this summer.

Airplane boyfriend (ABF) pickings on my first flight were extremely slim, as there were only 32 other people on the whole flight. I did find a cute one though, and conveniently enough, I was seated in the same aisle as my chosen ABF. I shared my Clorox wipes, gum, and wint-o-green peppermints with him in a pandemic era meet-cute so epic that our little Airplane Grandchildren will someday repeatedly tell the tale with a gleam in their little eyes. He was a very good ABF too, in that after thanking me for the mints he didn't speak a word to me for the rest of the flight. That's the dream. Fingers crossed I find another good ABF on the next flight.

My mountain of luggage waiting with me at the empty Boston airport

My second flight doesn't leave for another 8 hours, and it'll be at least 4 hours before I can drop off my mountain of luggage at the check-in desk. I'd like to walk around the airport, but as long as I have to manage this clumsy trolley full of baggage that insists on perpetually veering to the right, a rolling suitcase that doesn't fit on the trolley, and a backpack that weighs more than most 4 year old children, it's just too much work. I immediately work up a sweat, and as much as I respect mask wearing during this weird time, sweating, huffing, and puffing in a mask makes them even less fun to wear. I'll stay put for awhile. I found a good place to sit near an outlet and in sight of a bathroom. None of the shops are open in this part of the airport, but I have dried mango and a vanilla dunk-a-roos pack to snack on. What more could a girl ask for?

For those of you who have been asking me to keep you updated on what I'm doing over in Iceland: I plan to write entries here fairly regularly. I'll probably start strong and then taper off. I'm sure I'll post pictures on social media (FB and Instagram) from time to time as well. My email is still the same, but for those of you in the US that want to stay in touch via phone/text, sent me a message and I'll get back to you with my new Google voice number that is still a 612 US area code. 

Thank you for the support and well-wishes for safe travel and new adventures that I've received from so many people! I hope lots of people come to visit me once the world is a safer place to travel. It's more than a little scary to walk away from a good job and wonderful friends and family to do something new like this, but I'm ready to give it a try.