Coming Home?

I can’t believe that it is my last day in Iceland. As excited as I am to see people at home, I am terribly sad to leave. Right now, I am sitting in the kitchen, surrounded by the smell of French toast, Libby, Dom, Alex, James, Dom’s friend from Australia, Camilia, Liam, and Constantinos. Everyone from all floors has to use the third floor kitchen (my kitchen) as all of the other kitchens have been locked in preparation for the building’s transition into a summer hotel. It is such a sad transition to watch. Yesterday, Libby, Alex, Constantinos, Christian, and I came home from four days driving around the island to the sight of beds and desks littering the hallways and the smell of paint covering up all of the damages we have inflicted on the building throughout the course of the last year. It is too bad that they can’t wait just a little bit longer so that we don’t have to witness the change--- the building feels like it is being killed! My packing is coming along. So far, I have a densely rolled layer of clothes on the bottom of my duffle bag and have begun to work on fitting in my shoes in the most efficient way possible. My room looks messy, much to my despair, but my wall decorations still are cheerfully adorning the wall.
Wow. So much has happened in the last couple of weeks. We have been going NON stop! After 10 days of hanging around Reykjavik, taking care of various city-based things I had been meaning to accomplish, we set off on our glacial geology field course. Amazingly, we had STUNNING weather for the entire course! I was in a short sleeved t-shirt for a couple of minutes one day! It was unreal! The first three days of the trip were dominated by driving, walking around glaciers, talking, stopping for ice cream (our professors seem obsessed with ice cream and candy), and worrying about not having enough food. We were told not to bring our own food, that there would be plenty at the hotel, buttttt there was not. The first night, I resorted to mixing sugar with powdered creamer to fill up after dinner… not a good sign. I guess I don’t really feel like going in to all of the details of the trip, but in essence, I had an amazing time. I learned quite a bit, met a lot of really, really sweet people (who, unfortunately, had been in class with me the entire semester without me knowing just how cool they are), basked in the sun, and went on some fantastic morning runs. I got up at 6:15 each morning to fit in a run, and was pleasantly surprised each time by the calm, cool weather and light skies. As weird as the 24 (essentially) hour light can be, it sure makes it easier to get up. Man, this is making me sad to write about!
After the glacial geology course, we returned to Reykjavik for one night, before taking off again for a 4 day trip allllll the way around the island and a bit into the West Fjords. It was tons and tons of driving, but I think that it was totally worth it. We saw lots of the stuff I had been itching to see, including Myvatn, Akureyri, the East Fjords, the West Fjords, countless waterfalls, and endless amazing views. We were fairly packed into a little car, but people were in high spirits, so it didn’t seem to matter. We had been planning on staying in the car or sleeping right outside the car, but one of the boys didn’t have a sleeping bag, so we wound up staying in little hostels every night. We got an amazing deal at a little hotel in the West Fjords the first night, stayed with a friendly old Icelandic/ Faroese couple the second night, and then stayed in a tiny old church turned hostel for the last night. The final night’s setting was definitely my favorite—I had been intrigued by the cute little churches that litter the countryside, so it was great to get to sleep in one for a night. While it was definitely a functional little hostel, they had left some of the pews, the alter, and other little churchy bits intact, which made it especially quaint.
Oh man, I need to go close my bank account and take care of some stuff downtown, so the rest of this may have to wait. Maybe I will write an extensive and reflective post in an airport on the way home. All of this is just so, so surreal. Didn’t I just get here?! Ahhhhhhh!!!!!!!!!!!