Skagi

Today can be summarised in very few words, but I will start at the beginning first. Yesterday morning we left very beautiful and very freezing Reykjanes and crossed forty kilometres over to the Skagi peninsula.

We were greeted by a wall of shingles and warmth. We liked both, and decided to pitch our tent right above the sea on the shingles and bask in the evening sun. We landed quite close to a farm and every animal came to check us out, the horses, the sheep and cows. We decided to go to the farm house as we had no water and didn’t fancy the one flowing across such busy fields.

At the farm we were greeted by even warmer arms of the farm lady and were invited to have coffee, and then given bread, butter and smoked fish. This was wonderful as we are running slightly low on some food.

The night on the shingles was comfortable and we treated ourselves to a slightly lazy start. There’s nowhere to rush, we could see the wind already waiting for us. Today will be hard work, whatever distance we choose to do. It went like this: the wind was a strong F5 headwind, and one had to use the whole body to make any progress forward. However every so often, it went a little still, as if the wind was taking its breath. That was our chance to gain some metres, and then brace ourselves for the gust, here the paddling just managed to maintain our position and not to reverse.

We have been doing this for five hours paddling around the top of Skegi. The low green land here was a stark contrast to the high cliffs from previous days. It was enjoyable to paddle close to land and there and now see the amazing formations of the basalt columns.

The last, sixth hour, was different. We rounded a headland and were crossing a bay, the wind was now from side, so the routine changed, the waves took over. They were rocking us up and down, and only there and now one decided to break over a boat, not threatening, but enough to send the cold sea splashing all over us.