Iceland Journals: Rebuilding Routine
Day 4 (5/9)
I thought this morning about the significance of routine in our lives and in my own in particular. It may not seem immediately apparent when first meeting me, but I crave routine just as much as the next gal. I tend to wake up and go to bed at the same times each day, journal after I’ve made myself breakfast each morning, and record three things for which I’m grateful each night. I like to meal prep for the week on Sundays, call my mom after work on Fridays, and, as of this year, devote time each day to working towards a personal challenge I’ve set each month. These are just a few routines to which I subscribe, and I find a lot of comfort in the consistency and familiarity of these practices. Given how much I seek out and build routine into my life, a question which naturally arises is: why travel? Travel, done the way I’ve endeavored to explore the world, is inherently disruptive not only of the routines I’ve built, but more importantly, of the ways I’ve come to perceive the world and my place in it. Travel, specifically solo travel and service abroad, has exposed me to my privilege as an individual, both the alienation and inclusion I’ve felt in other cultures, my own strength as well as my dependence in the face of crisis, the varying answers to what is enough and what is a good life around the world, and, perhaps most of all, the beautiful heartache of knowing and loving people from whom I’ve eventually had to depart. Travel sometimes wrecks me and always builds me back up. For me, it both disrupts routine and shapes new routines, new ways of seeing myself and approaching the world. The practices I’ve learned and continue to learn from travel are to trust my intuition, to live in the moment and soak up every morsel of each day, to build community, even when it is fleeting, to dive deep precisely because of how little time we have together, to begin and end each day with gratitude, and ultimately, to value growth over fear. And so I suppose the answer as to why I continue to break from routine in order to travel is so that I can build on the aforementioned practices and continue to shape my routines to reflect the life I want to live. Because you see, I don’t want to just practice courage and daring when I travel, but rather, bring those qualities into the way I approach my work and career, the people I encounter, and the way I seek to serve others in my daily life.
Here in Iceland, I’m just beginning to form my routine on the road. I wake up early (by my standards) at 7am, usually unable to sleep through the morning light, roll up my sleeping bag and mat, the road version of making my bed, prepare a lunch of peanut butter banana sandwiches, re-read the last night’s journal entry, and entitle the entry to fit what I see as the theme of the last day. I never feel I can accurately place the theme when I’m still living in the day, so I make it a point to do so first thing the next morning. This morning, after completing my routine, we set off to the Western Union to pick up the emergency cash that would tide me over before the credit card arrived in a few days. As we drove backwards on Ring Road, in the direction from which we’d come, I marveled at how the same places could look so different with just a change in weather and when driving in the opposite direction. I thought too about how I felt as though I’d been in Iceland much longer than three days and how the two people in the car no longer felt like strangers, but friends I’d one day encounter again. The drive was scenic, the company was delightful, and I was grateful to no longer be floundering quite as much in the aftermath of losing my wallet.
When we arrived at the bank, we were met by tellers none too pleased to see three dirtbag travelers roll into their establishment, dressed in days old activewear and looking a little worse for wear. After explaining the circumstances to the teller and presenting all the necessary paperwork to access the emergency money, I was met with a frustrating amount of skepticism and bureaucracy, both of which I couldn’t help but at least partially attribute to the way we looked. At the time, it was difficult to find humor in the situation, but looking back now, I can laugh at their clear disregard for us and subsequent surprise to find that beneath the scruffy appearance was a steely and very exasperated woman who simply would not leave their establishment without cash in hand. Professionalism is doing your job and serving customers, no matter how they come, and when people cannot find it in themselves to be professional, I’ve learned that you simply have to demand it. An hour and a half later, I left the bank with enough cash to pay for gas to get back to Vik, glad to be on my way and to continue on in my journey.
The night before, we’d planned to drive straight from Vik to Selfoss to pick up the money and make a few stops on the return trip to visit places we hadn’t yet seen in our first pass on this stretch of Ring Road. Our first stop of the day was Skógafoss, a popular waterfall destination only an hour away from Selfoss. The climb to the top of Skógafoss left me breathless, both from the staggering 60 meter ascent on a rickety set of stairs and from the view of the waterfall from the observation platform. From above, the meaning of waterfall came to life as we watched the river water rushing to the edge and falling over 200 feet below. When we returned to the ground, I could appreciate just how tall and majestic the waterfall was as it loomed above me. One of the most remarkable things about Skógafoss is that you can stand directly underneath and while I’ll admit that the chilly weather gave me pause, I reminded myself that I hadn’t come this far to just stand to the side and take pictures. As I ran into the spray of falling water with reckless abandon, I was brought back to a vivid memory from childhood of running around playground sprinklers. I can recall the exact playground, even the beautiful blue dress I’d worn at the time, and how my mother had at first chastised me for getting to dress wet and then resigned to watch as I chased the spurting sprinklers. Under the downpour of water, I made a promise to myself to create more opportunities to run, dance, and play in reckless abandon.
Next on our list of sights to visit was the that of an abandoned plane crash on one of Iceland’s famous black sand beaches. The story of the Sólheimasandur plane crash began in 1973, when a US Navy airplane was forced to land on the desolate shores of southern Iceland. All passengers on the plane survived and, to this day, the aircraft remains on the beach where it crash landed, attracting curious travelers who make the long hike to stand in its haunting beauty. When we began our trek, the weather was stormy to say the least, with fierce winds pelting hail against our bodies. I’d chosen to complete the hike in only a pair of shorts, a t-shirt, and a rain jacket, even though it was only around 35 degrees outside. After a few days in the very rainy south of Iceland, I’d come to firmly believe that braving chilly and rainy weather in the moment in no way compared to the dread of sleeping in cold, damp clothes at night. I’d opted to wear clothes I could afford to get drenched, and drenched did we get.
What we saw at the end of the long, haphazardly marked path was a veritable wreck with gutted interiors, creaking appendages, and engine wires blowing in the wind. The abandoned aircraft, partly buried in the ground and mostly covered in the names and messages of visitors who’d made the trek to pay homage, seemed too raw and perhaps even dangerous to have been left indefinitely on this beach. Tourists climbed on top of the plane to pose for pictures, braving the gusts of wind which threatened to knock them to the ground. On the walk to the crash site and back, I thought about the survivors of the crash and wondered if they’d had to embark on a similarly harrowing trek to the main road, where we’d left the car. I wondered if, upon landing, the terrain surrounding them had appeared to be as otherworldly as it now appeared to me, as if they’d landed on Mars rather than an island on Earth. The 5 mile round trip journey was bone-chillingly cold, but I was in good company, and that made all the difference. Robbie and I somehow managed to shout over the wind and rain to share stories from home. He remarked on my stoic endurance, or perhaps, foolhardiness in donning only a t-shirt and shorts for the hike, to which I could only reply that I had my dad to thank. I could recall all the countless times in my childhood when my dad would teach us lessons of endurance and perseverance, insisting that we finish whatever seemingly impossible task we’d set out to do, so that we could know beyond a shadow of a doubt that it was not impossible. While we did lose some toenails while hiking and spend hours learning our times tables this way, I came out learning too that there were few discomforts I can’t endure if I only just set my mind to it. Yes, the walk was cold, but I reminded myself then, as I’d been reminded when I was younger, you can do anything you choose to do.
When we at last returned to the car, the three of us could not contain our laugher at the absolute soaking wet messes we were. After patting ourselves dry as best we could, we made the somewhat questionable, though much appreciated decision to heat up a pot of tea with a gas burner atop the car’s center console. With warm tea in my pruned and shivering hands, I felt more than ever that everything that had happened in the last few days had been meant to bring me to this moment in the car, spirits high from daring greatly and hearts warmed by a simple pot of tea shared among friends. After drinking our tea and driving the short distance back to Vik, we returned to the rest stop that had become all too familiar to take recharge our bodies and our devices. It’s funny how even moments spent in rest stop bathrooms can be some of the highlights of your travels. I think now of Dima, huddled close to the radiator to dry his pants while fielding the questioning looks of passer-by’s and Robbie, who’d used just about every surface area in the bathroom stall to hang wet items of clothing. I took many pictures of natural wonders and landscapes on this trip, but the pictures I now wish I had are of those moments when I looked on with belly-aching laughter at the hilarious abandon and unapologetic joy we shared. We joked later on that night about the gravitational pull of Vik and how we seemed to always find our way back to that rest stop. I suggested that, in the tradition of trail names and Harry Potter references, they would be Damp Dmitry and Restroom Robbie.
When the sun began to peek out at 5pm, as I’m finding it does only beginning at this time of day, we decided to travel a little further down Ring Road to Vatnajökull National Park for a change of scenery. The drive west was full of ooh’s and ah’s and stops to take pictures, as is typical of most drives through Iceland. When we arrived at our campsite for the night, we were surrounded on all fronts by majestic, snow-capped mountains, a terrain that bore little resemblance to the one from which we’d come. As I fell asleep that night to the pitter-patter of rain on the car roof, I thanked the universe for some of the most delightful moments of the day: discovering that a Canadian, a Russian, and an American had a surprisingly similar repertoire of song choruses memorized, spontaneously breaking out into Country Roads, a road trip favorite of mine, laughing uncontrollably in the car as we prepared to march into the rest stop with soaked clothes to dry under hand dryers, Dima’s gift of a fresh apple in the midst of our canned and packaged food camp diet, and spending the night in one of the most beautiful places I’ve been to in my life.
These self-proclaimed Iceland Journals are a collection of journal entries written during my two-week solo trip to Iceland, one for each day of the adventure. In brief, I booked a spontaneous solo trip to Iceland, decided to rent a car to drive around and live out of for two weeks, packed a single backpack to carry with me, and you’ll have to read on to see how the rest of the the adventure plays out! This Medium series, kept in close form to the original entries written during my trip, portrays the day-by-day lived experience and my personal takeaways from stepping out of my comfort zone, the lessons I learn as a result of what my parents would call somewhat questionable decision-making, and the people I met along the way. I hope you’ll get something from reading these sometimes indulgent, often spur-of-the-moment reflections, and this series inspires you to seek out discomfort in every facet of life, build community wherever you are and whomever you’re with, and fulfill the truest expression of yourself in everything you do.
To follow the rest of the journey:
Day 1: Choosing Courage
Day 2: From Strangers to Friends
Day 3: Highs and Lows
Thanks for reading — claps, comments, and shares are much appreciated!