Tag 8

Today was a relatively quiet day. In the morning at nine o'clock, we fed the calves. This time, all three grandchildren came along. None of the three speak English, so we somehow communicated with gestures. The three of them are really cute.

Afterwards, I wanted to clean the cabins right away, but the German couple had planned an eight to ten hour hike today and one of Ingveldur's daughters drove the two of them and me to the starting point of a beautiful waterfall. It was really nice, but we had to climb what felt like an endless number of stairs to reach the top. Only to say goodbye a few minutes later and walk back down. But the view was amazing. On the way back, I chatted with the girl and she is really nice. She's also 19, works at a nearby gas station, and owns Abba.

After that, I cleaned the cabins for about an hour and a half. I could really get annoyed about the bed linen every time, but other than that, it's really nice to listen to music or an audiobook while cleaning.

In between, we had hot dogs for lunch again.

I spent the rest of the day reading. The weather was really nice and you could even sit outside in a t-shirt in the sun. At some point, Stani (Ingveldur's husband) came into my room to make a curtain with me. There's a fairly large window next to my bed, which is really cool, but at night, when it doesn't get completely dark, it's very annoying, and the sun shines in all afternoon. Somehow, we managed to attach a wooden rod to the wall first, then we tacked the curtain to it, and then we added another wooden rod on top to make it look nicer. So far, it's been working pretty well.

For dinner, we had wraps. A friend of the family was also there, and it felt like everyone was talking all at once. On the one hand, it was really nice, but on the other hand, it was also really lonely because I was the only one at the table who didn't speak Icelandic out of maybe eight or nine people. Every now and then, one of the adults would translate something for me, but other than that, I couldn't join in the conversation and just ate my wrap quietly.

After dinner, I retreated to my room because I was missing home again. Back home, I could easily join any conversation. Not here. But when I entered my room, Jonas (a black and white spotted cat) was sitting on my bed. Normally, you only see Jonas when he thinks he can snatch some food from somewhere. I went to the bathroom briefly to wash my hands. He followed me and even waited in front of the door. Then I sat back down on my bed and he cuddled up next to my leg and purred the whole time. I think he even fell asleep at some point. Maybe he noticed that I needed a little company.

After that, it was time to feed the calves again, so I had to wake up Jonas and push him off my leg.

While the little ones and I were feeding the calves, the German couple called and we immediately set off to pick them up. The drive was absolutely wild. At first, I was wondering why we took the Jeep, but as soon as we reached the first river, it became clear. In total, we crossed over eleven "rivers" (four to twelve meters wide) and three smaller streams on the way there. It was really adventurous, and more than once, I thought we wouldn't make it back home with dry feet. But somehow we did. On the way back, we had a really beautiful sunset.

See you later,

Julia