I want to go to Iceland for a few reasons, mostly landscape related. There are glaciers, geysers, salt lagoons, looming cliffs, steaming waterfalls, puffins, whales, seals, and of course that whole elf/troll situation mentioned earlier. I've never been in a fjord. The last time I experienced a truly dramatic landscape was in New Zealand, where I ended up kind of by accident. In 2005, I was working for a university in China and had a trip planned to the South Pacific, but a week before I was set to leave, a teacher in my department got drunk at our end-of-semester party, followed me home on his bicycle, forced his way into my apartment and attempted to have a "nonconsensual" extra-marital affair. We call that something here, but in China, according to my Dean, it was a joke because he couldn't possibly have been attracted to me and I misunderstood the whole situation because I know nothing about Chinese men. Hah. Good one. So I jumped on the first flight I could to Hong Kong and spent 9 days in New Zealand. I joined a hiking group to do the Tongariro Crossing, which is essentially the hike to Mount Doom from "Lord of the Rings." I was the least fit member of the group (as usual) and over the course of the hike, I was convinced they were going to kill and eat me for survival, since I was the meatiest. I puffed and sweated my chunky ass to the top of a volcano.
It's a stunning country. It was a great trip and when I got back to my job 7 weeks later, the Dean had me make-up with my co-worker who attempted the "nonconsensual affair" by insisting we play ping pong together. And smile. Just a joke! I'm a modern woman and know that rape is mostly bullshit anyway, so shut up, sluts.
Anyway, so Iceland should be cool. We rented a car from a place called SadCars that specializes in old and dented models. Perfect for me. It's even a Subaru!
We successfully purchased a brand new Subaru a few days ago, at $1,000 below MSRP. I haggled my black, crusty heart out and spoke with about five dealerships across the State. My husband didn't enjoy any of that. He would have preferred to rush in waving his checkbook yelling "I'll pay anything, just give me a car!" to avoid dealing with my haggling over $200 (which I did do). My friend Marisa applauded my efforts and said I had ovaries of steel. In the end, my husband was happy with our deal and now we're ready to celebrate in a fjord in the Arctic Circle. I was going to post a picture, or better yet, a video of him writhing around on the hood of the car like a Whitesnake video, but he has yet to commit to a filming schedule.
I was talking to my mom about our trip and she said "you be careful with all of that adventure travel stuff and don't fall off any glaciers!" and just for her lack of faith in my ability to no longer fall off of stuff since I do yoga and have improved my balance since falling off of Machu Pichu, she's not getting a pet elf. For realz, though, it would be cool if my vacation photos didn't look like this:
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