Iceland — A Million Beautiful Places You Can’t Pronounce

Photo: Shutterstock because the author didn’t actually see a puffin

Iceland is a beautiful, peaceful country known for its magnificent landscapes, glaciers, and waterfalls. None of these can be pronounced by anyone not native to the land because Icelandic is incomprehensible. I was there for nine days, and I can’t name a single place I went. The pictures on my phone say I was in Kirkjubaejarklaustur and Blaskogabyggo. Although they are legit places, they look like a bunch of letters a baby would type if they got ahold of your phone and, therefore, hard to take seriously.

Photo by author — Kirkjubaejarklaustur, Iceland

I traveled to Iceland with a group of people I didn’t know. Our guide told us to enjoy everything without being obsessed with taking pictures. She said to take pictures with our eyes. I asked if there were any polar bears, and she said one had swum from Greenland once. How cute! I bet the minute he touched the shore they gave him a catchy Icelandic name like xpklieheipw or something similar.

Not only were there no polar bears in Iceland but there were no bears at all. I was disappointed but relieved because I didn’t want to get mauled to death on a hike since I had two other summer trips planned. When I was in Canada, our guide said that if you see a bear…