At 6.45 we start from the front door. Prepared with the huge backpacks, hair washed and braided in braids to make a shelf life for five days. Our first track goes to the bus station BSI. There, all white ships are lined up waiting for hikers and adventurers who want to start in Iceland. On the bus, we make professional last travel planning (all tips for fording appear more worrying) and we load a digital map as a precaution and enjoy the upcoming altitude profile.
Arriving in Skogar, it starts. Well, almost. One of us has to take the backpack off and pack it again. Meanwhile, we meet a girl who has already done the hike. She reports sandstorms, lots of rain, missing sticks, and water shoes (check, we have them!) and the side, in which you can only continue with GPS track. And the uneasy feeling creeps back that we are not equipped for every weather.Nevertheless, we start carefree and in good spirits. Short photo spot at the waterfall. First below. Then above. Already on the first stairs, we envy the many tourists for their daypacks. It doesn't matter, we have bigger things in mind, we think and make our way through green landscapes along the waterfall road.In the heights, the blue sky continues to darken, the view worsens, and it drizzles. Unpleasant but not bad. Why do we have functional clothing?The 1000 meters of altitude are challenging, and we are grateful for many breaks and bars that help us carry our bodies upwards. This may also be due to the at least 15 kilograms of luggage that each of us lifts up here.In the late afternoon, we pass the first hut. Some hikers set up their tents in the fog, and we are glad that we will later find peace in a hopefully cozy hut.From the hut, the ground changes from gravel to black sand (that explains the sandstorms). We are fascinated and then amazed because we only now realize that we are walking over a glacier. It briefly changes to concern when we take a very narrow snow bridge over a snow crevice. Whether it can still support people in a few days, no one knows.We venture over the icy glacier. The black sand is a blessing to find enough grip when descending. After that, we have to climb a steep sand dune. Once again, we are grateful for the sticks, without which we would just hit the slope backward like beetles.Arriving at the top, we are short of breath but proud. We are happy about the signpost - only 1 km to the hut. The mood rises significantly, we fool around and are exuberant. A real triumphant feeling with a quick sobering up. The hut we believed to be close is behind a river. It is foggy and cold, and the mood immediately plummets. No one wants to take off their shoes anymore. So we balance across the laid-out stones with palpitations and with the sticks. It's not going well, but it's going. The adrenaline immediately kicks in, and we climb a small hill silently but not elated. When we see the small hut in front of us in the fog, we are just relieved. We are welcomed by Victor in front of the hut. He has already seen us coming. Shoes and sticks stay in the anteroom. And then it's just a room where we spend the evening with 10 other hikers, cooking, exchanging route information, and later sleeping.
