Sailing Yacht Coco
The excellent adventures of Alex & Jac
Monthly Archives: September 2016
After 3 weeks in Iceland and nearly 7000km of driving, we’ve left Gabby at the airport in Keflavik (hope she’ll be ok!) and we are flying to Sicily for 10 days of downtime with the kids before they go back to New Zealand. It’s been a full-on trip with non stop moving and I think everyone is a bit buggered… Here are my thoughts on Iceland: Iceland is spectacular – put it… Read More
Vatnajökull; the largest ice field in Europe covering an area of 8,400 square km with an average ice thickness of more than 3,000 feet. If it melted, half the world would have pretty wet feet (according to some dude I met). Anyway, it’s big, really big. Pretty awesome to drive 200 kms around the south coast and see non stop glaciers spilling off the ice cap. I figure these United States Navy… Read More
If I was ever going to make a movie about aliens, hobbits or any elfin like creature, the south central highlands of Iceland would be my set. It’s totally stunning. Volcanic, steaming, raw, lava fields. And contrast in the landscape like I’ve never seen before. It’s a cinematographer’s dream come true. Peter Jackson picked the wrong country me thinks. We spent a couple of days in a hut at Landmannalaugar (try and… Read More
Reykjavík, the only real city in Iceland; home to two thirds of the population. It’s an eclectic mix of old and new reflecting the rapid growth in tourism that the country is struggling to manage. The city has an undercurrent of young rebellion with late nights, fuelled by drugs and booze that flows like their waterfalls. Whale meat features on the menu in the slick and eye wateringly expensive restaurants – and… Read More
After leaving the stunning central highlands and a swim in an active volcanic crater(!), heading to some of the more remote areas in the northern fjords bought a new landscape with bumpy roads, deserted fishing villages and another amazing night of the northern lights. As it turns out, seeing the elusive lights is not as straight forward as one might think, it’s always freaking cloudy here! So we are lucky it would… Read More
There are 3 types of roads in Iceland. The red roads: these are the main highways. Sealed. The yellow roads: theses can be sealed or not, but generally drivable. Then there are the white roads. To be clear, I use the term “road” loosely, very loosely. In true Icelandic style, half of these roads are not even marked on the map. They are goat tracks at best. So when my navigator (aka… Read More
Not much more to say. This just sums up the last couple of days perfectly…
Yep, it’s confirmed. They do actually shoot reindeer in Iceland. Approx 6,000 total population and they nail around 1300 of them every year (bring on the Blitzen Burger). I met a guy who had just contributed to this “population control”. And yes, for the record, I have tried it. The sensitive side of me would suggest to you that I am appalled with this abuse of Santa’s little sleigh pullers. But I’m… Read More
Who would have thought. Second night in Iceland and we get treated to the Northern Lights. What an experience. They move and wander across the sky like celestial snakes. We didn’t expect to see them on the Northeast coast so the 1am wandering was worth missing sleep for.
Wow. I thought New Zealand owned raw natural beauty. Move over. Iceland is spectacular. Awesome fiords, incredible waterfalls, alien like highlands, ruggered mountains, colours that change by the minute and a coastline that would make a Viking turn in his grave. Wrap this up with some moody and very unpredictable weather and you end up with an island that takes your breath away. And we are only two days in. Landed at… Read More
This place is beautiful. Raw, dramatic, moody landscape. I can’t imagine how hard life is here. Especially in the winter! It was totally worth the 4:30am start to see such an awesome part of the world. We headed straight to the northern part of the second largest island, Eysturoy. Through the early morning gloom the most wonderful landscape appeared. The village of Gjogv was a our first stop on the northeast tip… Read More
We made the boat! It’s great to be here after all the planning and organisation; plus a fair bit of travel. One day in, half way to the Faroe Islands, just off the coast of the Shetland Islands. We can actually get the Landie off when we arrive at the Faroe’s around 5am tomorrow and we’ll have about 6 hours to have a quick look around before we re-board and continue to… Read More
Finally got around to looking at the details for the ferry sailing to Iceland in a couple of days. It’s actually a 3 day, 3 night crossing (not the 2 days originally specified!). You can just imagine how well that went down when announced to the family! Whoops… My attention to detail is exceptional. Couple of snaps from the drive.
Sailing Yacht Coco 