In flight safety

So that's the end of my whirlwind 3 days in Iceland ... and it has been absolutely amazing. The beauty and power of nature in it's rawest, wildest and most dramatic form will stay with me forever. 

The weather was perfect. A couple of hours of rain/sleet the morning we left for the Golden Circle tour but that soon turned to clear blue skies and that's how it stayed for the whole of our trip. It seems there is a storm hitting Iceland tonight which is going to bring heavy snowfall and strong winds!

The highlight has to be the Northern Lights. Our tour was cancelled on the Saturday and Monday but we managed to get out on the Sunday. Despite no activity on the radar, they said it was perfect conditions so took a chance. There were 11 full coaches travelling in convoy to search out the lights. 

The location was pretty treacherous, complete darkness under foot to get up a hill that was like sheet ice in places as people fell left, right and centre. Two of my friends headed down to the coach after a while as it was freezing cold and the risk of falling was getting a bit scary ... but my other friend and I decided to hunker down and stay. I will always remember the first hint of green appearing, my friend squealing in delight as we waited for them to appear and us hugging excitedly on the top of the hill! A very special moment.

Getting down was another story as my friend is known for being very clumsy but we held each other's hands tightly and I picked a longer, less slippy path down the hill in the light of my phone's torch. 

They say only 30% of all tours that go out are lucky enough to see the Lights so with two out of three tours cancelled, and no expected activity when we went, those weather Gods must have been looking down on us again!

Iceland has helped me to tick off two (and a bit) from my 50 before 50 list ... see the Northern Lights ... visit a UNESCO site (Thingvellir National Park) ... travel to five countries I have never visited before (two down, three to go). 

We were up at 3.30 am this morning as we had to get to the bus station to catch the shuttle to the airport in time for our 8 am flight so no time for another beautiful Icelandic blip unfortunately. I did, however, love the Icelandair safety video which incorporated all the instructions into the natural beauty of the country. The part where they show the location of emergency floor lighting was very cleverly marked by the Northern Lights.

Memories to last a lifetime!