Lady's Birthday Adventure - Part One

I had originally planned to go to my number one dream location Russia (childhood obsession with the Kremlin), however given the political instability there decided to move to number two on the list which was . . . . . . . .

Iceland

People are always shocked to hear that Iceland was number 2, but it has been for at least a decade (so it isn't just a Game of Thrones obsession or anything). After 10 days there, it is now my dream place to move to. (The Man is rolling his eyes as I have told him and everyone I know since my return that I would give up my life - except my dogs - and move there. I have even looked for a job there!)

I hope I can share with you all the reasons I loved it so much in the coming weeks, but before we get to that, a little about our trip.

A bit about Iceland - about 325 000 people call it home. 200 000 of them live near the capital in Reykjavik. The sheep outnumber the residents.  This year it is estimated they will have 1 million tourists. This is probably good for the economy that was really impacted by the global recession in 2008.  The country is clean,  the water is amazing, but it is a pricy place to visit. 

We had 10 days and slept in 9 different places. We slept in all kinds of other places (I will do a post just on that later).

We (by we I mean the Man) drove the ring road counter clockwise around the island. We drove about 2700 km in those 10 days.  Our GPS  only tried to kill us a few times by taking us on roads suited only for 4 wheel drives (called F roads) or having us drive where no road could be found. 

Food: I can't eat gluten and shouldn't eat too much dairy. As both bread and dairy are huge staples in the Icelandic diet, I was good with gluten but ate dairy. I also ate a LOT of lamb - 8/10 nights it was my dinner. Thank goodness it is one of my favourites as neither the Man nor I eat fish and when you take out gluten in these tiny, tiny communities it doesn't leave much left.  I have never had lamb that tasted soooooo good! Skyr - a yogurt/cream type product is excellent - but I only ate a little of that. 

24 hours of daylight: I could still sleep but I can almost always sleep, so that isn't a surprise and I use a sleep mask all the time which probably helped. I am also a vivid dream and the side effect of the daylight I think was I had extra vivid and crazy dreams. The Man, who isn't as vivid a dreamer had the same thing happen. 

I will share more about the trip next Saturday, where I will feature, places I slept and I think week 3 will be wildlife adventures, and we will go from there! 

For now, here is my favourite picture, I think it looks like a painting.