Iceland, day 2.0

Ten minutes out of Reykjavik, I knew this trip was right for me, the right thing to do, my self-conjugation of verb and declension of noun, guided by personal pronoun. Despite the quiet, cozy small-town feel of this "bay of smokes," and the grayness I had encountered on the day of arrival, I yearned for more, if for no other reason than to be in slight accord with the lights and shadows and escarpments I had pre-visioned. So, now the sun was rising and blazing shortly after Gateway to Iceland's Hot Golden Circle Tour had begun. Well before 1100, our little bus was basking in unequivocal northern daylight. With snow-bedecked mountains and glaciers to the left and right (mostly left), the scenic vistas of postcard-riddled imagination became incarnate. The trip now felt right because it presented on a silver metaphysical platter the natural wonders so dearly hoped for. My tired and tiresome joke from back home, which barely yielded a chuckle if I were lucky, that I'd return with two Nordic goddesses, twins, Helga and Inga, blond and raven, was now officially irrelevant. I had threatened myself with not taking a camera, and the view from the bus endorsed that notion. No camera captures the majesty of the everlasting hills, the eternal expanse. But I snapped away all day, until the battery ran down. Nevertheless, these majestic and rugged views of grandeur lifted me, though I was tired from the day before. Just this, just this: was this one of the "meanings" for which I had traveled and arrived? Remember, I came alone. I doubt anyone else on the bus had done the same. I suppose I entertained slight pangs of envy or self-pity, but not for long and not deeply. Solo was the way to go. (Yesterday, no traveling companion would have put up with my endless traipsing and trudging onward and onward, ploughing forth. Today, by the way, I discovered the FREE shuttle to the Kringlan mall from around the corner of Ice Apartments! I resisted the slap to the forehead. It wasn't meant to be. Plus, I would have missed the intimate step-by-step experiential first-hand knowledge of the village-like [mostly] streets of the world's northernmost capital.) So traveling as one's own companion frees one of conflict, at least outer conflict, and liberates one from negotiation with respect to plans and their execution.