Day 2: Valentine’s Day

I woke up again from my interrupted sleep at 11am and packed my bags to now go to my Air bnb in Reykjavik.

I checked out at noon from my hotel and took off. When I left the hotel there was snow everywhere. It made me a little nervous driving but I’m glad I made the decision to rent a big car to have a less chance of sliding off the road.

It was a true winter wonderland driving. It’s not like anything I had ever seen before. I’ve been to Mt. Charleston in Vegas and seen some snow up there as a kid but this was something straight out of a movie. I mean it was miles and miles of snow everywhere and mountains covered. I drove by and just admired everything around me. Definitely had to stop on the side of the road and do the typical tourist thing and take selfies and photos of everything.

Driving into Reykjavik started to look a lot like the kids Christmas movies I used to watch growing up. The town truly looks so cute when you first get in. They even had a little town called “Elves Town”.

I arrived in Reykjavik at around 1pm and I remember my Air bnb people told me that there was street parking in front of the place but that I had to pay to park. It’s a one way street on most roads downtown so I got the most perfect parking spot that was right next to where I was staying! Someone pulled out and I parked right where they were. I parked and went up to the meter to pay and realized everything was in Icelandic…. OBVIOUSLY. I was like FUCK WHAT DO I DO. I start just pushing buttons until something pops up about language but could not figure it out. Thank God there’s parking people walking around that help you because one of the ladies came up to me since she could tell I was struggling and she helped me push the button on the meter that changes the language for you.

Tip: The red button I circled in the photo is the button you press to change the language on the meter.

Once again, I’m not used to paying for parking ANYWHERE nor did it ever register to me that there was a button that could help change the language because I’ve never used one of these things!

There’s 3 sections you can park in: P1, P2, P3.

I parked in section P1 which gives me access to park anywhere within the 3 paid parking sections because it’s the most expensive. I honestly didn’t care how much I spent as long as I was within walking distance to my car. I was not about to fucking hike to my car for some free parking or cheaper parking considering the fact the weather changes like I change my underwear.

I paid and headed towards where my Air bnb was at and got to the door where there was a key pad you push to unlock it and grab the key that’s inside. I pulled up the email with the instructions and was pushing the buttons and COULD NOT FIGURE IT OUT. I felt like I was in a fucking Resident Evil video game where you’re spending 2 hours trying to solve a puzzle or unlock something until you finally go on youtube to look it up lol. I spent maybe 10 min trying to figure it out and realized there was a button you pull down on that opens the box and in it was the key. THANK FUCK.

I get inside the building and look around for an elevator… There’s no fucking elevator to be found…. I had to lug alllll my shit up 5 flights of stairs.. All I could think of was the movie Cinderella when the mice steal the evil step mothers key and climb up all those stairs to get it to Cinderella to open the door to the room she’s locked in and the mice are sweating their asses off getting up the stairs… I was so irritated… My shit was so heavy and here my skinny ass is lugging all this shit up the stairs.

I punch in another code to get the house key and get in and the Air bnb is GORGEOUS and definitely worth all the hassle of lugging shit upstairs lol. I could not have found anything as nice as this. I had a balcony with a view of downtown and a view of the Ocean where I can see the sunrise. When I booked it I remember how hard it was to book because the apartment is typically always booked up and books fast when it’s available so I got real lucky there too.

I was starving when I got to Reykjavik and it’s hard for me to be on vacation sometimes because I HAVE to have breakfast before I eat anything otherwise it throws my body off. I’m not one of those people that can wake up and eat pizza. My body is very finicky with what I eat and the times I eat it.

I make my way down the street and find a little spot that has an egg on it and think YES THEY MUST HAVE BREAKFAST. I walk in and ask and the lady if they have breakfast and she looked at the clock and was like “uhhhh breakfast was over at 10am.. It’s 2pm….” I was like “miss, I’m sorry, I’m from Vegas where breakfast can be served all day and I saw the egg on the window and thought you guys were my best bet lol.” She laughed and showed me the Chinese food they had for the day. I looked at it and just thought to myself ‘fuck I really don’t want this I really want eggs and toast! 😦 ‘ I was having an internal conflict with myself over FOOD. She said there were other lunch places I could go to but I really wasn’t in the mood to spend more time searching for another place since my morning/afternoon was already so fucked, so I settled.

I got to talking with her and she told me her name was Alex. She was 35 and looked maybe 27. She was a red head with a beautiful long bob haircut parted down the middle and when she would walk her hair would flow so nicely. She had the most beautiful pale skin and I couldn’t stop staring at her.. Clearly lol. I was talking to her the entire time. I wanted to learn more about the city and what she was doing in Iceland. She told me she had moved from Poland and told me how hard people in Poland work and make no money. She said you can make waaaaay more money in Iceland which makes sense because the tourism has exploded over the past 5 years there so they’re always busy. She said she was going to school to study Forestry and would only like to visit the states to see the forests but that’s it. She had no desire to really go to the US.

I finished eating went to check out and noticed she had a map of Iceland which I could really use to help me navigate where I’m at and where I’m going since it’s hard to see the streets on my GPS sometimes. I felt like fate was working with me to let me know I wasn’t lost, just getting around the town and finding my way especially since I managed to go into an establishment that had maps of the city/country.

I walked around for a bit and met a guy by the name of Eyvi his full name is Eyjólfur Eyjólfsson. He was a very sweet guy. I invited him over so we could hang out and chat and he asked about my necklace (where I keep Nicks ashes in). I tried to dance around the conversation a little to try and avoid telling him but he asked if a boyfriend had gave it to me so I broke the news to him and told him why I was really in Iceland… I could tell he felt really bad and he opened up to me about how he’s experienced loss like that in his life as well. We really connected and I didn’t see it before when I was talking to him but he looked almost identical to Nick… I got chills when I saw the photo we took.

Eyvi is easily one of the most unique people I’ve ever met. He was wearing so much wool and just looked like something out of a movie. He was telling me he helps children how to build instruments and play flute and it was the sweetest thing I’d ever heard. We still keep in touch and hopefully I’ll get to party with him in the future when I go back to visit. He was meeting friends out that night and so he left from my place and I got ready to go to my tour to go see the northern lights at 9pm. This was the first tour I was doing and needed to walk to find the bus stop for this thing. I was damn near running to try and get there earlier than the time scheduled to leave because I had no clue what kind of bus stop this was or where I was going I was just following my map. On my way to the bus station I kept looking around at all the buildings and the amount of snow that was in the ground that kept getting all around and in my shoes. I was appreciating being in a different country all by myself and just happy I was doing all of these things alone and just figuring shit out.

I reached the bus station in time to start boarding the bus and off we went. I sat next to this guy that was as well traveling alone like me which I didn’t think would happen since it was Valentine’s Day and everyone was with their friends or couples.

It was raining on the way to wherever the fuck we were going to see these lights and idk where exactly we could see them since there were so many clouds.

On the way there the lady driving the bus kept talking and talking and talking and it was quite frankly driving me nuts. SHE EVEN FORGOT IT WAS VALENTINES DAY. She admitted that they don’t celebrate that in Iceland but that they celebrate the fuck out of Christmas! I thought it was funny that she had completely spaced about it.

We finally found a spot where it wasn’t cloudy or rainy and we just waited. The moon was beautiful and bright but this was the one time I started to get really cold since we had already been out for an hour and couldn’t see shit. It was supposed to be a 3 hour tour and I was over it after an hour. I was cold and just went back into the bus. When the lights finally decided to show they started pounding on the bus for everyone to come out and see the lights but you literally were only able to see them for not even 5 minutes. I managed to capture whatever photos I could on my phone since apparently my camera wasn’t able to pick up on them. The lights are normally more intense but it was beautiful to see them cut through the sky the way they did. Finally everyone was over it and it was midnight by this point so we were all ready to leave. I was beat tired so I was happy we were finally leaving.

Tip: I would NEVER buy a tour like that again. If you’re going to Iceland try and drive somewhere out of the city if you’re renting a car because you can see them just about anywhere in the country. Sometimes you can even see them in the city so paying for a tour is honestly NOT fucking worth it. I wouldn’t pay to GO SEE THEM ever again. JUST SAYINNN.

I got back to my hotel and just passed the fuck out.

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The following day was going to be a very emotional tour for me and made sure I needed to be well rested since it was going to be an 8 hour tour. Stay tuned to find out what it was if you don’t know already. ♥