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June 29th, 2021

Day 4: A Morning in Husavik and An Afternoon in the Waterfalls of the Northeastern Highlands

Another morning, another late start. Though this time, it was a last minute, unplanned decision because of how tired Cynthia and I were. But once we were up, we quickly got ready, ate some breakfast, and drove back to Husavik where we spent the morning.

Since my last visit to Husavik, not much had changed in town (as far as I noticed) despite how wildly popular the Netflix original movie Eurovision Song Contest: The Story of Fire Saga was. So as we walked around, we took in the small town scenes and leisurely explored the waterside town of Husavik. We briefly strolled around the harbor under the cloudy skies before stopping to peek inside a souvenir shop on the edge of the harbor.

There, while looking around the shop, we briefly met Abba (sp?) and her sister who own the shop. Because I was interested in their take on Eurovision and was curious as to how the movie affected the town and businesses in Husavik, I struck up a conversation with Abba to ask her those questions. What was a simple starting question ended up being a nice conversation with an Icelandic local.

Abba told me how she thought the movie was accurate in a lot of the ways it portrayed things and stereotypes regarding Icelanders and how it was better than she expected. She also talked about the movie shooting, the actors that she saw around town, and the role some of her family members played in the movie and Oscars music video that was filmed here for the song “Husavik”. For example, her granddaughter was picked to be in the children’s choir that accompanied My Marianne (Molly Sanden) in her Oscars performance. And her daughter was picked to be an extra in the film. Abba was so excited talking about her family’s role that I could tell she was very proud of them. After talking for a bit about the movie’s influence on the town, she took me outside and quickly showed me some of the locations that were used in the film, like the building that served as the Jaja Ding Dong Bar, the bus stop where Lars and Sigrit were dropped off after their Eurovision performances, the house where Lars lived, and the harbor area where the children’s choir performed. What a great conversation I had that allowed me to gain local insights and perspectives into Husavik!

After taking a photo of the shop owners and bidding them a farewell and thank you, we continued our stroll through town and checked out the local Eymundsson bookstore and the picturesque and iconic Husavikurkirkja, Husavik’s wooden church. Cynthia, Minh, and I briefly walked inside and around the church before walking back out to meet my parents.

By this point, people were getting hungry so we decided to eat in Husavik instead of waiting to get back to Akureyri. After briefly scrolling through TripAdvisor and the streets for food options, we decided to stop to eat at Salka, a restaurant located near the harbor and right on the main street running through Husavik. And Salka was a great choice because the food was delicious and the weather outside was fantastic for spacious outdoor dining. We ordered four dishes for the family and the dishes were tiger prawns with risotto and salad, a fried shrimp main course with creole rice and veggies, ling (the fish of the day) served with mash potatoes, rice, and roasted veggies, and a seafood soup starter with shrimp and mussels in a creamy tomato base. The hot food was so flavorful and so delicious! So very good!

We headed out of town and back home once lunch was over to drop Cynthia off for work. We didn’t stop at home for very long before continuing our day sans Cynthia. The next stop was Aldeyjarfoss, located right off of the F26, one of Iceland’s highland mountain roads that require you to have a 4WD car in order to drive on the road. Aldeyjarfoss was located about a 1h20m drive from Akureyri and getting to the waterfall itself required that we drive on a dirt gravel road for a while before starting the F-road section of the drive. Luckily for us, the drive on the dirt gravel road was as smooth as it could be in our Kia Sportage and we zoomed down the road at a safe 100kph with barely anyone else on the road with us. Eventually, we arrived at the section of the road where I wasn’t quite sure if we’d be able to drive any further given that F26 around this area was supposedly closed based on the government maps online. But not seeing any road closure-specific signs or chains blocking the way, we continued on up the now-rougher mountain road until we reached the Aldeyjarfoss parking lot where one other car was parked.

The wind was blowing hard and crazily when we exited our car to hike 10-15 minutes down to see the waterfall. Because of the conditions and her knee, my mom stayed in the car and skipped out on the hike down. So my brother, dad, and I hiked down the dirt path toward Aldeyjarfoss. Once I started hiking down, my right heel started acting up again but I dealt with the pain and continued onwards until I got down to the waterfall. My dad didn’t actually make it all the way down and, instead, saw the waterfall from a windy distance before turning back to the car to shelter himself from the dusty gusts.

It took some time for me to get to the waterfall viewing spot but eventually, I made it to Aldeyjarfoss. The views of the waterfall rushing over the edge of the cliff lined with basalt columns was beautiful and extraordinary. However, given the mid-afternoon sun and lighting, the views were less picturesque than I had hoped for. Regardless, it was a stunning sight and worth the trip out after missed opportunities on previous Iceland trips.

I spent less time than originally expected at Aldeyjarfoss before heading back to the car. With plenty of time and afternoon sunlight left to enjoy, we continued two kilometers further up into the highlands on F26 toward the only other stop we could get to in this specific area (because we finally found the road closure sign chained across the road): the waterfall Hrafnabjargafoss.

Hrafnabjargafoss was a super cool waterfall located off the main F26 and right after a stretch of very rocky side road. It took some slow, careful driving to get the car safely out to a parkable area of dirt next to the waterfall but eventually we made it. The views of the waterfall were spectacular, grand, and so very different from the ones we got at Aldeyjarfoss. What a hidden gem! My dad, Minh, and I wandered around the waterfall taking photos of the waterfall and each other before we finally headed back to the car to make our way back to Akureyri for an early dinner, a first for this trip.

We made a short gas and car washing stop on the way back home before finally arriving at the AirBnB, where we got started on cooking our homemade dinner to try and use up as much of our leftover ingredients as possible to avoid having to lug it with us to our next destination on the east coast tomorrow. With all of our leftovers, I was able to concoct a pretty good mi xao (fried egg noodle) dish, which included sausage/ham, scrambled eggs, egg noodles, spinach, bell peppers, onions, and carrots, for the family to enjoy. It was a pretty good meal despite being the result of a simple goal of finishing up leftovers!

After finishing dinner and watching some soccer, we all left home and walked to get ice cream nearby at Ísbúðin Akureyri. The shop was poppin’ with people at 10pm with tons of people lined up for a late night treat. And I could see why with all the options they had in terms of ice cream, soft serve, shakes, and toppings. So many options! I ended up buying a cone of vanilla soft serve topped with oreos and crunch sphere things. And it was really good! Once everyone received their orders and had enjoyed half of their ice creams at the tables outside the shop, we walked briefly around downtown Akureyri before heading back home, with Cynthia and I taking a different path home in order to show Cynthia more of Akureyri.

By the time Cynthia and I arrived home, the sun was starting to set slowly in the sky but the night was still young. With a potentially beautiful sunset on tap for the evening, Minh and I left the AirBnB to drive north toward the town of Laufas with the goal of finding some random but unique photo opportunities along the way. During our thirty minute drive out of town, we found two photogenic scenes to stop at, the first being a sun-glazed pasture where some horses were wandering around and grazing and the second being a stretch of road lined with lupines with the sun setting in the distance. Despite two stops, it was hard to find the right photo opps on our brief excursion and after an hour or so out and about, we turned back and called it a night, knowing that there would be a long day ahead tomorrow with our trip from Akureyri to Seyðisfjörður.

5 Things I Learned/Observed Today:

1. There are approximately 2500 people who live in Husavik. And even in a small town like Husavik, the people here didn’t get star-struck or bat an eye when celebrities (namely Will Ferrell and Rachel McAdams) hit the streets of town to shoot a movie. They just go on living their normal, Icelandic lives on the north shore.

2. According to the gift shop owner Abba, not much has changed in Husavik (like travel traffic, tourists, restaurants to feed tourists) since the filming and release of Eurovision Song Contest: The Story of Fire Saga in 2020. That is mostly because of the way that the pandemic limited international travel to Iceland and Husavik. But something that the film and resulting Oscars nomination performance did bring to town was the start of a new children’s choir, something Husavik didn’t have prior to the Oscars performance and something the kids in town are really excited about!

3. In Iceland, car washing is important because of the crazy weather conditions that can cake volcanic ash, dust, dirt, etc, onto your car. And you can see the emphasis that is placed on car washing in Iceland when you stop by certain gas stations. Some gas stations provide big free-to-use broom brushes with a hole in the middle of the bristles where water from a water hose flows out of that is used to wash your car! It’s an incredible and ingenious contraption that makes the squeegees of America look primitive and caveman-ish. We should have these broom brushes in Los Angeles for sure! If you saw it and had a dirty car, wouldn’t you want to use it too? Oh, the satisfaction in rinsing off all that crap from your car!

4. So, how do you know if certain F roads are closed at certain times of the year? Check out www.road.is for the most up-to-date information on road closures and driving conditions. Sometimes, even the maps on there are hard to figure out and you’re not quite sure if things are open or closed based on how things are labeled. Fear not, if an F road is closed and not driveable, there should be chained signs at certain points along the road that block access to those not-yet-driveable sections of F roads (at least, that’s what it looked like on F26). I learned this first hand on the way to Aldeyjarfoss and Hrafnabjargafoss.

5. Driving can sometimes be kind of crazy in Iceland with two-lane highways and people speeding along the road when they’re in the middle of nowhere. With so many sheep grazing close to the roads and not necessarily protected behind wired fences, it’s incredible not to see more dead sheep road kill in Iceland! Maybe it’s because we see them from a distance and we expect them and look for them to cross the road all the time. What’s even crazier, though, is that there are way more roadkill birds in Iceland (along our drive, at least) compared to dead sheep or dead any other animal. That’s incredibly weird!

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