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Iceland – Day 3

We got up and out the door before the sun rose…which isn’t a difficult thing to do here it was like 10:30am and still dark. We got in the car and drove east into the frozen tundra, up and down glaciers and mountains and valleys until we reached Seljalandsfoss, a huge series of waterfalls off a glacier. We didn’t walk all the way around it since parts of the pathway were solid ice, but it was still really gorgeous. Then we continued east until we got to Skógafoss waterfall, another big one but this one liked to spray people and it was way too cold for that! There was a couple there doing wedding photos and I have no idea how the bride was managing in her sleeveless dress.

In December there’s only about 4 hours of solid daylight, so we were already getting close to sunset. We skipped a couple destinations we were planning that involved a lot of walking and went straight to Reynisfjara Beach, or the Black Sand Beach. This place was really, really cool. A black beach made up entirely of volcanic rocks and ash with gigantic waves that have literally swept people away because they “sneak” up randomly and with a lot of force. We hung out there for an hour looking at rocks and watching the sunset before we decided to wrap it up and start heading back west.

We were going to stop at the Solheimasandur Plane Wreck but it’s like a mile walk off the parking area so we opted not to do that, too cold! We stopped in Hella for an early dinner, and I tried the local lamb shank which was kind of like roast beef in texture, but saltier. It was pretty good! It was pitch black by the time we got back on the road at 7pm and the skies were clear; however, we apparently picked a week where the chance for aurora is low and we likely won’t be seeing it. The gigantic full moon has been pretty awesome though since when it rises and sets it turns an orangey almost red color and it’s super bright when it’s up in the sky. When we got back to the hotel a little after 8pm and crashed, I’m not a fan of the 20 hours of dark here. It makes me tired!

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Pompeii and Positano

I woke up at the ass-crack of dawn and hiked over to the meeting point for my trip to Pompei and Positano. The trip out to Pompei was pretty cool, since you got to see Mount Vesuvius and pass by some great views of Naples on the way down. It was honestly a perfect day. It was sunny, warm, relatively low humidity, with a light breeze. And yet, when we arrived in Pompei it wasn’t busy at all like we were expecting. We were able to walk right in and hit all of the highlights right on time. We visited a small house that had a lot of the original frescos intact, a nobleperson’s big house with cool floor tiling, a bathhouse, the famous brothel with their more R-rated frescos still in place, the main shopping street, and the main courtyard. We also got to see the casts of some of the people who died there, and we were guided by an active site archaeologist who works on the modern excavations so she was able to tell us about some cool things they’ve found just in the past few years. For example, all the old books say Vesuvius erupted in August, but now they’re sure it must have been at least October from the fruits they’re finding and some new graffiti they found on a wall where the person dated it to what would translate as October of 79 A.D. That’s the cool thing about science, you can always adjust based on new information.

After we left the ruins I pet a cat, and ran back to the bus. We drove over to Sorrento, with gorgeous views down into the bay and of Sorrento itself, and continued under the mountains and to the Amalfi Coast. We drove along the coast, which is pretty dang gorgeous, all the way over to Positano. At which point, we were given a couple hours to just hang out and wander around. I went down to the black beach first and stuck my hand in the lukewarm water, which surprised me, I thought it would be cold. Then I went to a pizza place that had a wood burning oven and ate probably the BEST Margherita pizza I’ve ever had before. Then I wandered back up to the top of the houses along the shop roads and got a lemon slushie, since lemons are a big crop in this area. Afterwards, we all hopped back on the bus and made the long trek back to Rome. I’m going to the Vatican tomorrow so maybe I can get someone to bless this cold I’m developing away…that’s how that works, right?