on hitchhiking

Its amazing how interactions with other people can colour my whole outlook.

For example- if cars are going by and not picking us up, I hate Iceland.  Its cold and uninhabited and boring.  But if just one person is nice enough to stop, Iceland is wonderful, the people are so nice, and I love the scenery that changes from otherworldly to bizarre in less than an hour.

And so many amazing people have stopped to give us rides.  In the westfjords, after we had been forced to camp on the side of the road, a young woman moving to Norway stopped to give us a ride.  There was no more work for her husband, so the family had to leave Iceland.  She has two children, the oldest she had at 19.  She told us it was common for people to have kids young, and that it was uncommon for someone not to have a child from a previous relationship when he or she got married.

We also talked about religion.  Iceland is very Catholic, everything is closed on Sundays, and there is even a once a year holiday for confirmation.  But our driver thought that people weren’t educated enough about religion, and that if she could go back, she wouldn’t have gotten confirmed.

Another person who picked us up was a retired engineer turned farmer who offered to let us stay at his 47 sq kilometer sheep farm for the night.  I had read that Icelandic hospitality was good, and it was; the sheep farmer gave us a tour of his farm and made us a delicious dinner.  We also got to help out with the sheep.  They were so friendly, they just walked up to us and started licking our hands!

At the end of our trip I didn’t want to leave, but it is really good to be back.  🙂