Just when we thought that taking 50 km classic style in Icelandic glacier would be once in a lifetime experience…. We decided to do it again!

For the story of the Fossavatn 2015, please check: Fossavatn 2015 Travel story. In this travel story we will point out things we have missed in that story and tell some more.

Our friend had his 70^th birthday, and the neighbors and friends wanted to give him an unforgettable trip as a present. Of course we couldn’t let him go alone, so here we go, Fossavatn 2016! In our previous blog we reminded that the participants should be booking the accommodation early enough. Well, we cannot highlight this more! We started to search a place to stay in October, and hardly found one (eventually through Airb’n’b)!

At the same time, we wanted to show the magical Iceland to more people. That’s why we had also Marja’s mother Sisko and aunt Tiina with us. The flights are reasonable price, car rental is cheap, and most of the sights are for free, so we highly recommend Iceland for everybody!

We flew IcelandAir, and it was a very pleasant journey. They have invented a buddy service (http://www.icelandair.fi/stopover-buddy/), and that was something we really appreciated, tho didn’t use, as we didn’t know this beforehand, and anyway stayed longer in Iceland (this service is for the people travelling to USA to have a little stop in Iceland). If you come to Finland, we can be your buddies! We love the idea!

Few important tips when landing to Iceland:

Tip! Buy your alcohol in arrival tax free shop! Seriously, when you feel like having a beer, you cannot buy it in a normal shop (!), and the nearest “Vínbúð” is likely to be closed. So, just go there, and buy the beer, it’s also a lot cheaper. Don’t ask more.

Tip 2! If you have booked your rental car from Avis or Budget, the queue at the airport might be one hour long! So, send one of your group to queue for you and the rest can stay in the tax free shop (and collect the luggage).

In the beginning we took the same shocking Reykjanes peninsula (http://www.visitreykjanes.is/) drive through as last year, just to see the bridge between the continents, and smell the rotten eggs in Gunnuhver. It takes only about one hour, and you will see amazing places!

The winter wasn’t so snowy this year (even in Iceland), so there were more roads open to north. We took eastern route to Ísafjörður (where the Fossavatn is always held), and the western route back to south. In Ísafjörður we stayed three nights, as the skating style competition was on Thursday and classic (the real test!) on Saturday. Our accommodation was from Aslaug (http://beiceland.is/gisting-aslaugar-faktorshus), she has few rooms in the center, and what more, a beautiful apartment in the oldest house of Ísafjörður (this is where we slept!). We can highly recommend her accommodation!

In Ísafjörður nothing has changed, the village is small, the people are lovely. Still really nothing to do apart from skiing. And how was it this year…?

Well, the weather was again impossible; the 25 km FT had so hard wind, that the technique was lost, as the side wind was pushing you to go wherever (or do we just have too few powers…?). But anyway, Marja was 5^th when Justyna Kowalczyk was first. And the track was the same as last year, but there was a huge improvement in time (last year 02:00:21, now 01:41:09). Jukka was a bit faster, and also improved his time from last year (01:54:18) and finished with 01:37:23 on position 32 on men series.

After the ski we went to the local swimming pool in Ísafjörður. It was a nice little pool with a hot tube and sauna (every second day to female, and every second to male). The sauna issue was “hot potato” of the village, said the locals. They had some argument whether it’s for men or women, and to wear swim gear or not. Our recommendation: share the sauna and everybody has a towel on.

On Thursday evening there was the Worldloppet banquet in the library/town hall. It was great to meet familiar faces and a glass (or more) wine with the organisers (if no other reason, get the Worldloppet passport only to join these events!).

On Friday we had a spare day, and Marja had her birthday. We went to the neighbor village called Bolungarvík to check their swimming pool. And that one was an experience! It was mainly because the lovely and characteristic man in the ticket sales. Well, first we screwed up with the lockers, you can only lock it once, and you need another key to open it. We needed to go twice to ask for a spare key. There wasn’t a doubt we were the tourists. There were three different hot tubes, and a water slide, it was really lovely. Water slide outdoors, in this chilly windy weather… Suddenly we were young again and going again and again down the slide! Then there was a sauna, which supposedly was unisex. So, just like that, we walked in, only to notice old grandfathers sitting naked and telling that it’s men’s turn. Marja, mother and aunt got ashamed, and went back to the guy who operates the hall, and he told not to worry about them, you can go there! So, just like that, we went back in, and squeezed in with the grandfathers, who weren’t really moving to making space. The Bolungarvík sauna gang.

The sympathetic operator told later on us some stories how it has been when the avalanches have destroyed the nearby villages few decades ago. All in all, it was a great visit. And the only thing to do in a spare day around in Ísafjörður.

Off we go for 50 km! Well, the night before we went on the streets and asked the people for some guidance how to wax the skis. It seemed again to be very hard weather conditions. In the pub somebody told us a new trick, you put clyster under and then wax on top of it! Jukka checked internet, and it was true, it’s the latest hit. So, we tried that one, as the most common reply anyway to our waxing question was: “Nobody knows”. So, with this trick, we hit the race. Well, it was (again) horror. The skis were ok for the first uphill, but after that everything was lost, they didn’t stick, they didn’t glide. The Icelandic weather was its best; sunshine, rain (water), rain (snow), wind from front, from right and left (why never from behind?). Then we started to think of the cake buffet of the evening and the fact we have already once done the 50 km in Fossavatn (we have the stamps in the passports!)… The route was again 2 x 25 km (we think the 50 km loop doesn’t even exist), so, when you see the finish line after 25 km, it’s soooo hard to think of continuing another desperate fight of 3 hours… (yes, this was what it took from us to make the one round!!). So, we skied to the finish line from the half way as losers. We ended up in the result list called “tried 50 km, made 25 km” on position 21 with time 03:10:58. We were not the only ones, there were 79 skiers doing the same thing. But at least we didn’t break up, no bones got broken, and we were fine to join the party of the evening.

Other skiers from our group did a great job, so success stories are there! What is the best, aunt Tiina had perfectly working skis (Peltonen nanogrip) and she finished 25 km with 02:49:57 being the best Finnish female! She beat us! Katri Niittymäki was 7^th on 50 km (03:39:43) while Justyna Kowalczyk won (02:40:41). Mirja Humppi was strong and finished 50 km as 54^th with 05:39:51 and Antti Niittymäki (the birthday boy) was 116^th in men overall with 04:47:15. All of them had some other skis than normal waxed ones. So, next season, we will have also Nanogrip or whatever other than this “nobody knows how to wax”-ones.

The cake buffet was again amazing, and the party after the race is so cool! Marja met the winner of the male series (or at least a nice copy of him).

On Sunday we drove to Reykjavík. We understand why the western road (no. 60) was closed during the winter, look at the pictures! It was really cool and even a bit scary road! And on the way we saw Dynjandi water fall.

There was also one natural hot pool, just on the sea side. As there were no place to change the clothes, and it was windy chilly weather, Jukka was the only brave one to swim in the ocean and then warm up in the hot tube.

On our way Marja got an sms from Aslaug who rented the flat for us. She wrote that one old Nokia mobile phone was found under the pillow. We asked from Antti if the phone has been ringing lately, and yes, indeed, his phone was 4 hours drive behind of us. Luckily Aslaug was so clever and had the right connections that an unknown friendly helpful person called Gingi took the phone with him with his flight to Reykjavik. He left the phone to the domestic flights airport and there we went to pick it up. The phone reached Reykjavik faster than we did! Thank you so much Gingi!

We had one night stay in Reykjavik and we had the hotel directly in the center. One night is actually just enough to see the city. We went to swim in Laugardalslaug, again, it’s the most valuable and nicest swimming pool. Antti had even free entrance by being old enough!

Jukka and the rest of the skiers flew back to work on Monday, while Marja, Sisko and Tiina had three more nights in Iceland. In Reykjavik we can recommend one restaurant for sure, it’s called Snaps, and their lunch of the day is just impossible good.

We left Reykjavik behind, and hit the Golden circle on Monday evening. Our first accommodation was in Hveragerði (http://www.hveragerdi.is/English/). It’s a kind of a garden village, in the middle of the Icelandic desert. It’s close to Reykjavik, and it has the coolest (or warmest) thing we faced on this trip!

Marja had checked from the map, that there is some “hot river” up in the mountain over the town, about 3 km walk from the car park. We were thinking to check this river out. We asked the lady in our accommodation if it’s worth to go, and she recommended, and added that it will take maybe an hour to walk there. We thought that 3 km cannot take an hour, let’s just drop by quickly. Well, the drop by quickly turned out to be such an adventure! We took only swim gear under our clothes, and two 0,5 liters water bottles. Nothing to eat, nothing more to wear… Marja was ready to go with her flip flops, but luckily in the end took proper shoes.

So, we started to walk… And walk… And walk… Then it started to rain. Cold, really cold showers. And it was windy. Hard wind against. Then, it started to snow! It was all uphill. But we always thought the river would be just after the next hill. Marja asked from the people coming back from there that how long is the way still. They said it’s half an hour. Marja didn’t tell the others, as we had walked already one hour… It cannot be half an hour more? But it was! The snow went through all our clothes, and we were freezing. And then suddenly, there is a river, with few people sitting in. Just like that. It felt impossible. We took few hundred meters up, and stopped there to also to drop to the river. It was horrible to take the clothes off in the coldness, but eventually we made it, left the clothes just there in the snow and mud, and jumped to the river, which was HOT! First you think you will boil. But then it starts to feel you are in a heaven! The warm water, after this cold and tiring walk, we sat there an hour. It was the best ever. Maybe one of the best experiences in the life.

On Tuesday we hit the Golden Circle road, and checked all the basic stuff like last time. Those places are great, but after fighting the way to thermal hot river last night, nothing really impresses anymore.

We stayed over in a farm nearby glacier of Eyjafjallajökull. There again we had the hot tube (we were swimming every single day of our 8 days stay!). The last day in Iceland was for the Icelandic horse! We booked a little ride in a farm near Seljalandsfoss. First we went to see the stream, it was absolutely amazing, you could walk behind that!

About the riding. None of us has been in touch with horses before, but these horses are the easiest to start with. It was really easy, they just follow each other and don’t care about tourists on top of them. Well, try this, if you are in Iceland.

TIP! If you ride with the Icelandic horse, keep in mind that ALL you clothes will smell horse after that, your cloves and trousers will be covered with horse hair. It’s a good idea to finish the trip with this, unless you have a chance to wash your clothes later on your trip.

 

We still drove a bit to east, to visit the water fall of Skógafoss. Marja and Tiina climbed all way up, and again this water fall was worth to see!

Eventually we needed to drive towards the airport. We visited the “must” Blue Lagoon. It’s expensive and not too much more special than the authentic swimming pool experience in little village of Bolungarvík. Of course you must visit the Lagoon once there, but, in real, they have got too big status of being “the thing” of Iceland. Still last year there was a little bag of some cream included in the price of the more expensive baggage. Now the gift wasn’t there and the price remained. Also, there is construction work going on, they do apologize that, but it’s not seen in the price of the entrance. They have a Finish sauna there, and it’s terrible. The stove is way too small for the space it’s put, there are too few stones, and the cup you should drove the water is STILL broken. The changing rooms are a bit dirty, and all in all, it’s not really meeting this “luxury” you imagine when you pay 50 euros to enter. Funny thing is that when you get up from the water, you feel like you weight a ton. It’s because of the seawater (or too long holiday?).

The last night we stayed nearby the airport in windy Keflavik (45 km from Reykjavik). Two things to recommend: Extremely perfect (clean, modern, very friendly) guesthouse Bergás Guesthouse (http://bergas.is/) and the best restaurant we visited during the whole trip: Kaffi Duus (http://www.duus.is/en).

It’s sad to head home after the great trip, but you must have the average life in between to be able to enjoy the moments again.

We met so many nice people during the Fossavatn (and everywhere else in Iceland). If you met us, and we didn’t share the contacts, please write to us, would be great to stay in touch for further Worldloppet happenings!

We haven’t enrolled for 2017 Fossavatn, but the date is already set: 29.4.2017! See you there?