Monday, September 28, 2009

Sept. 26, 2009


Wake up very well rested. Lay in bed a while longer just for the hell of it. Breakfast of cheese and crackers topped off with a little hazelnut spread. Have plenty of time before I need to be out, so I take another quick shower, revel in the warmth a while longer, pack up, and head out into the wind. Going to try to make it back to Reykjavik so I can use the internets...hopefully by getting someone to drive me through the tunnel. Stop by a few stores in search of a power adapter with no luck. Stop by a bakery and have some baked goods that provided far more sugar that I needed. Also had a coffee...I don't know why. Bakery girls give me an English magazine while I sip on my cafe au lait und hazelnoot. It almost seems proper. This behavior must end. Bid farewell to the bakery girls and head to the highway to stretch out my hitchin' thumb. This will be a difficult task with a bike. Hail storm greets me. Really freakin stings when a good-sized pellet catches the top of your ear, but I keep my hood down to look more presentable. You'll take my bike? Oh, but you are headed to Bourganes. Going to Reykjavik? No bike. Bourganes. I sense a trend. Two hail storms and a third one on the way, I decide to head back into town to regroup. I could really go for some coffe and some baked goods. Riding into ridiculous wind, I hobble back to the bakery, get my stupid coffee and a delicious roll with butter. One of the bakery girls inquires as to my origin. You spent a year in the states? Cool. In Pennsylvania? No shit, I'm from there. You were an exchange student at Nazareth High School? What the fuck. Small world. Small dreary town in Iceland. The one person I talk to there lived in the small dreary town next to me. Free coffee refill? Sigh, sure. Finish my lunch, and though I´d love to chit-chat, its time to work the highway again. I'm a loner, Icelandic bakery girl. A rebel. Finally, a worker in a flatbed truck pulls over. Not going all the way to Reykjavik, but at least through the tunnel? "Ya.". Take the ride, stop right before the tunnel. Damnit! Miscommunication, you's a bitch. He takes a left up some other road and I am left far from town and just as far from Reykjavik, for all intensive purposes. Thankfully, about 15 minutes later, a Jeep stops. Throw my bike in, and yes, he is going to Reykjavik. In between business calls, I learn that he owns a digital printing company. We talk politics, economy, and U.S. cities. A woman keeps calling the carphone seemingly displeased, and his responses are OK. Yep. OK. OK. Turns out, its his wife. Not too happy he's picked up a hitch hiker. He laughs it off, though. Drops me off at McDonald's in town, and I ride a short ways to the hostel. I offer to work in exchange for a room. Apologetically rejected. Get a room for 2 nights anyway, as I've some business to do here. Girl cuts me a deal, and I pay 2100 kr per night instead of 2600. Ride around searching for a power adapter. The place everyone refers me to is closed. Able to charge my ipod in the back of a computer at the hostel at least. Eat cheese and cracker dinner. Read up on the goings on downtown tonight. Decide to catch a film at the film festival, "Daytime Drinking", and then some bands at a bar. Film was pretty funny. Takes me far too long to find the bar, considering I parked my bike right next to it unknowingly and then searched around for the next half hour. Have a beer by my lonesome, then eventually make friends with a French girl doing the same. One band had one of those electromagnetic field creepy sound instruments. Pretty cool. The last band had Bjork's son as the bassist. They were decent, but did no compare to the band featuring the drummer in a gorilla suit. One of the French girl´s(Laure) friends joined us(Rodrigo from Sao Paolo). We were all travelling alone. Talked about politics, demographics, Brasilian, French, American cities. Exchanged info, and rode my bike in calm weather back to the hostel.

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