'Whole trees in motion. Effort needed to walk against the wind'
I'm not sure 'trees in motion' is quite relevant in Iceland but coming back from the beach at Drangsnes to the campsite against the wind was certainly an effort. In the campground, rounding the corner of the amenities building towards our tent into the full force of the wind made you lurch drunkenly sideways downwind. Every bloody time. We never seemed to remember it was coming and brace accordingly.
The forecast lull we were anticipating looked like Monday night from about midnight through to 6am Tues. But as Monday rolled on we found ourselves looking at the weather on our phones probably a lot more than was necessary. Sure enough our lull was still there but only just, at some point in the afternoon it was pretty clear that the wind was going to drop - but not enough. There was still a sizeable blue patch of 16-20kns smack bang in the middle of our crossing to the Vatnsnes Peninsula. The sea of course was in upheaval as it had been blowing 20-30kns for upwards of three days.
We resigned ourselves to a longer wait.
Just about dinner time whilst sitting in the tent, we both suddenly realised the tent wasn't shaking, we couldn't hear the wind in the 'forest' on the bank behind us and a quick look at the bay showed few white caps. It was peaceful, it was, almost, calm.
This was our lull, earlier and with less wind than forecast.
Suddenly the cobwebs of inaction were blasted away. We could go, we could be on the water by 10pm, what wind there was, 10 maybe 15kns was a sailing wind, we could be across in less than four hours. If it picks up then we can just bear away and go with it.
There was some tidying, there was even some preliminary packing.
Then the doubts, the sea of course would still be in upheaval mode and on the beam, but it wouldn't be that bad. Would it? The forecast, usually so reliable, still showed that blue patch through the 'night', more wind than than we were comfortable with especially when so far offshore. We could bear way if it picked up, sure, but if that happened anywhere near the middle it would mean a 20+kms wild downwind run before we hit land. No fun.
And almost as bad...we could pack up, carry everything down to the beach and pack the kayak, just in time for the wind to pick up too much and have to unpack, carry everything back up to the campground and set up again.
Twice I walked across the campground and the adjoining football pitch to the edge of the cliffs and peered nervously out across Hunafloi. Do we go or do we stay?
Hang on we thought, if we make it across, what then? Given the general strong N/NNE system we seem to be stuck in the middle of, is there any point?
No. Having made it across, the winds on Tuesday and Wednesday were such that absolutely no progress would be made.
Earlier that day we had decided that if we didn't cross that night we'd head further into Steingrímsfjordur to Hólmavik. With five times the population there would be a bit more going on, there would be a supermarket instead of the tiny shop at Drangsnes and as Lonely Planet informed us there was also the Museum of Icelandic Sorcery & Witchcraft with necropants on display.
Hopefully you can read the small print in the photos below.
And tilberis are even weirder.
I'm really not sure what drugs these people are on but it's not alcohol. The Government bottle shops 'Vín Búdin' have very restricted opening hours and fairly ordinary 3l casks of red cask wine between AU$50-60.
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