Month Two of the Covid Pandemic

March 30^th to April 5^th

On the weekend of March 30^th Aya and I decided to go to a larger grocery store further away to have a good excuse to get on the bikes and do some shopping. We arrived there in the mid-morning and by the time we left about an hour later I was somewhat regretting having gone as we surely had contact with a few people even though shoppers were making an effort to stay far apart. On entering the store we did notice that there was a stand set up with gloves and alcohol for people to use. We did use it. We also noticed that many of the cashiers were wearing facemasks and/or face shields and all registers had large plastic sheets in front of the cashiers to further protect them from direct contact with customers. Many customers were wearing masks as well.

Up to this point we had not worn our masks. Not because we thought we shouldn’t, but rather because we didn’t want to attract any unwanted attention. Since Poles were now starting to do the same we felt it was time to start wearing them. Just by dumb luck we had shipped about 100 high quality masks with us when we moved from Beijing. We had used them there for the pollution and had assumed that here in Warsaw it was sometimes polluted so we brought them. Even though it had gotten fairly bad a few times over the winter we didn’t actually have occasion to use those as during those bad days we were just inside.

In the stores there were also frequent announcements both in Polish and English to distance yourself. In the aisles people were waiting to enter on purpose to give each other space, but by the time we finished there were too many people in the store and I was feeling uncomfortable. Unlike smaller stores that had lines of people waiting to enter and were limited, larger stores had not yet begun to implement a restriction on those who entered, so it was getting a bit packed.

The following day, Sunday the 29^th I took a long run in the forest. There were now restrictions on gatherings but not on movement yet. There were many fewer people than I had seen the weeks before, but still plenty of runners and bikers. As I began to come out of the forest the sky darkened and the wind picked up. It felt ominous. On coming out of the tree line there was a police car driving in. I couldn’t understand the message, but it started with “Uwaga, uwaga…” Caution, caution, in a deep male voice. As I rounded the corner near a smaller park there were police on foot. They looked really unusual as they were just standing watching the park and wearing a black mask covering half their face. It felt like I was in some movie about end times and a pandemic… oh wait. 

April 5th to April 12

The following week we were all waiting to hear from the government if they would extend the quarantine until after Easter. This was especially important for me because if they did it would mean that the final days of class with my senior students would be virtual.

Most of the week went normally, or as normal as possible. On Sunday I took a run in the woods, which by this point had been restricted. I thought that I might be able to get away with it. I was wrong. It was a beautiful day and I did not see anyone besides a small deer for the first 10km of my run. As I was nearing the end of the trail I could see two men walking side by side. They were police and I considered just turning around and running back where I’d come since they were a few hundred meters away and did not look about ready to give chase. In fact, my Polish friend had told me that while it was discouraged to bike or run the official statement had actually said that police would not run after you. Being a good American I did not think it a wise move to run away from the police, so I proceeded towards them on the path. Through a mix of Polish and English they politely told me the forest was closed and I politely told them thank you and I would go home.

A few hundred meters later I arrived at the gate of the park where people were arriving, reading the signs and turning away. There too I encountered the police as an unmarked car arrived and a couple officers got out. They were too busy talking to some other people to scold me so I just kept going. It was disappointing to have the forest closed and I dare not to risk going through again, but the street and sidewalk were not closed so I changed to running there as early in the morning as I could to avoid other people. I kept wearing a neckwarmer and using it as a pull up mask for when I did get close to other people, as I had been for weeks. Here too I was in a lucky position because I have numerous masks that I use for running and biking in the winter to make it easier to keep moisture in my lungs.

 

On Tuesday Aya and I decided to go to the grocery near our home. We found that there was a long line and the number of people able to go in was restricted by the number of cash registers a store had, two each register at the time. The line was also spaced by a few meters between people. When we arrived at the front of the queue we saw that there were gloves and alcohol that all people had to wear. It was kind of nice being in the store with fewer people, but I did notice that some items were again missing. This trend would continue in the coming weeks as well, fewer items both fresh and packaged.

We also noticed too that there were patrols by policecars around neighborhoods and a loudspeaker message to be careful, similar to what I’d seen before but now we heard it most days.

I had been chatting with my Polish friend and he told me that he’d gotten a letter from our workplace certifying that he biked through the forest to get to work. I thought this was a great idea and so I went to work on Wednesday to get the letter and sign a few other things. I also figured to run around the perimeter of the grounds, a little over 1km x 10 in order to get my run in with peace of mind that the police wouldn’t stop me.

April 13^th to 20^th

This week we thankfully had Monday off from regular school work and I finally had a day where I didn’t do any work beyond answering a few emails. I just ran, read, slept, and watched movies with Aya. I made it a point to get up near 5am so I could run quite early and avoid any people. For the most part it worked, but I did see a couple people near 630am and at one point I was running towards another woman on the road and a police car came up behind her. It just turned, but I thought for sure they saw us and just didn’t want to bother stopping us. Still, overall I saw probably 10 people on bikes and running, only one of them were wearing a mask. I admit I wasn’t really wearing it most of the time, but when I’d get near people I would put my mask up to block my breath.
It was great and nice to finally catch a breath from the frantic pace of adjusting to the virtual schooling environment and having to adjust everything forward by a week now that the school had decided to cut our spring break. It was also a bitter sweet week as it would be the last classes I would have with my senior students. As happens each year, it is hard to see them go but also in some ways a relief in my schedule as it means 80 minutes less teaching time each day and I sure could use it these days!

The week progressed fairly normally compared to previous weeks. I worked from home and I went in to the school building just once in the week, on Wednesday. I ran around the grounds about 10 times, then showered and had one more class before biking home at noon. I made it a point to go through the forest to see how many people were there when they shouldn’t be and there were none (except for me, but I had a note so, … I’m good). On the 16^th Poland enforced a rule to wear masks everywhere but private places and it seems to be effective. Prior to the 16^th the number of people wearing masks or coverings of some kind had been increasing, but was still probably only about 2/3 of people. I was glad to see it. My feeling is to obey the rule, it’s there for a reason. If you break it, ok, but don’t flaunt it and keep to the spirit of it. If there is a runner in the forest alone do they harm someone with their huffing and puffing? No, but please pull your mask up as you pass me by and I’ll do the same.

This whole week a big topic in the US was the roll out of the 1,200 dollar payments to tax filing citizens and others. People had begun to receive the CARES act boost. It seemed that the roll out was slow, starting with lowest incomes first, a good idea. Being so interested in economics I questioned not the payment but what might happen down the road to debt and inflation if this program continued.

Lucky for me there are lots of people that are also at home during the lockdowns and many of them have extra time on their hands. In the prior week I had Mr. Carl Wilkens meet with two of my classes via zoom and then this week I had Mr. Paul Solman meet with two of my classes. I’m sure there will be a few more great opportunities like this. In fact my fellow teachers have set up a conference on the 22^nd to get 9 experts including Mr. Wilkens to talk to our kids about peace and conflict. There are some silver linings to all this. Another silver lining has been the Zoom calls we’ve done with people and the emails and chats. We’ve probably been more social, in some ways, than we ever have and though our connections that are new are wilting a bit our entrenched ones are taking deeper root with calls to my mom, old friends and new, and emails and chats to friends and family.

Unfortunately, not all the news was good this week. In the US the curve seemed to be flattening, but at the same time there were protests around the weekend of the 18^th where people gathered in large numbers to voice their displeasure at having to be constrained.

At a very minimal level, I get it. You are being told to stop and stand still and for a lot of people that is hard for financial reasons. People need to be cared for and one major area for that is caring for their incomes and ability to pay bills. This protest was not really about that though. These were people who were upset that the government was encroaching on their right to freedoms of movement and perhaps of speech. If a government were doing this under normal circumstances I might agree with them, but these restrictions were not isolated to the US and these are not normal circumstances. Governments all around the world were taking similar if not more extreme measures and these people showed their selfishness and ignorance more than anything else. The cherry on top was that the US president encouraged them, tweeting a few times that states should be “liberated”.

Poland was facing similar stark numbers as more rural American states and numbers did seem to be slowing, but that was after weeks of isolation. Like in America, the government began to talk of opening up. Some governments in the region, Germany, Austria, Denmark were considering some loosening. On a personal level I felt more than ever that we should continue to ride the wave of isolation. It was too early to open things and risk a resurgence. The lessons of 1918 taught us as much. There is good evidence from that pandemic that cities that had the more comprehensive and longer lasting closures faired the best. Then as now people flaunted the rules and protested the restrictions which is why some places opened up earlier than others.  

One thing to look forward to was that the forest was opening soon and I’d be able to legally go running again starting on the 20th, but wearing a mask. That’s ok, I’ve been wearing a mask all winter to keep moisture in my lungs and wearing a mask outside was something we did in Beijing often. I was used to it.

By the end of the week in Poland there were about 9,000 cases in Poland and 360 deaths.

April 20^th to 27^th

This week was the first one where I was able to really catch my breath. My senior students were gone and most of my other classes were finishing up a weeks long project, so it was mostly managing rather than having to lead and create. On April 24^th we learned we would officially extend until May 24^th. It was now looking almost certain that we would not return this school year, as most of the teachers already were thinking. There had already been a lot of talk in my teacher friends circles around the world about what the next school year would look like. With a vaccine not in sight and social distancing only playing a role to slow the spread many began to talk about how to bring kids back with distancing or what a renewed year with virtual classes might look like. For the moment much of that is up in the air, but I suspect we’ll see a hybrid where some kids come in and some don’t. Mid-week I had my Zoom conference with many professional speakers coming to talk to your kids and each other on a panel. It was great and actually probably more than we could have done in a traditional setting. Silver linings were appearing. 

I continued to run in the forest and occasionally to go biking as well. There were no requirements to wear masks in the forest and most people took that to their advantage. It freaks me out a little bit, but there aren’t too many people so we can distance. Elsewhere in the city masks were still required and more than 9 out of 10 we did see people with masks on though not always properly worn. Aya was often walking with me or sometimes biking. Even though she was leaving the apartment about as much as before the feeling of everything made it seem like less.

By the end of the week about 12,000 cases were reported in Poland with 550 deaths. Poland’s government began to talk of easing some restrictions, to places like hair styling places and massage places as well as talking of returning young children to schools. Other countries in Europe did seem to be easing as well and taking measures to bring some kids back to school. My former workplace in Beijing saw some teachers and students come back this week, mostly seniors to complete their year with some sort of closure.

 

In the United States things seemed more bleak. The president, musing or seriously, suggested injecting disinfectant or using UV rays to kill the virus and unfortunately a number of people took him seriously and ended up sick. Many states also saw large protests of their lockdown orders, even my own state of Wisconsin. Many people would gather, against state orders, in large groups close to one another to hold signs, flags, and guns to make known their displeasure with the orders. By the end of the week there were about 750,000 cases and 37,000 deaths.

April 26^th to May 1^st

Things have settled into a rhythm now and while I am sure we would appreciate a change of pace the pace we have is pretty nice. I’ve continued going to school once a week by bike and the other days I’m either running or biking in the morning, mostly in the forest. At the end of this week Aya and I biked to a nearby neighborhood where there is an Asian market. Along the way we passed many people walking, biking, and running. For the most part everyone was wearing a mask but many of the runners were not. Gross.Earlier in the week we attempted a bike ride in the forest, but we turned around since there were just too many people around without masks on.

Work has been mostly the same but there are some rumblings from parents about getting part of their school fees refunded since this is not what the signed on to pay for when they sent their kids to our school. While I can understand that I also don’t see how getting a refund will help in any way. The school is still operating and better than most. The teachers and staff are still employed and working hard. The students are still learning. The big question now is what might happen to enrolments next year. Do parents just not pay and try something else or home schooling? I kind of doubt it. Though our service is not 100% of what it normally would be the alternatives are not very appealing. Every school in the world is facing the same challenges, so it’s not as if you can just jump somewhere else and while online learning options are good they aren’t quite up to the par that most international schools can and do offer in their normal or even virtual environments. Many of us are looking at the long term impacts beyond the virus. If parents refuse to pay the school will suffer now and in the future in terms of recruiting new faculty.

This week we were officially told we are out for the year and are now being told by the administrators that the focus is on next year and what the plan might look like for returning after the summer break. That is hard to tell. The rates of infection have not really be slowing down here in Poland though in other parts of the EU it is. Some countries are seeing restrictions eased. Poland is also lifting restrictions to some degree, but I don’t know why. People are still getting sick. Although, I have to say that there is a good amount of distancing and mask wearing and disinfecting going on.

Nothing much has changed in Poland or the US this week from last. There are more deaths and more cases. Borders are still sealed tightly and the economic impact is still growing. By the end of the week there were 1 million cases in the US and 50,000 deaths, exceeding the number of US soldiers killed in all of the Vietnam war. By the end of the week in Poland there were 13,000 cases and 650 deaths.

Month One of the Covid19 Pandemic

It’s been 4 weeks since my school closed down and went to virtual learning in order to address the concerns of the Polish government around Covid-19. In that time, and even before it really, a lot has changed.

Prelude:

In January, like much of the world, we started to see reports of what was happening in Wuhan. In some ways it was terrifying. People dying, disease spreading, the Chinese government clamping down. But all of that was something we’d seen before and so while alarming was not ringing bells in our minds. A few weeks later and our friends and colleagues back in Beijing told us that during their annual Chinese New Year break the school had told them that in person contact with students was off the table. The school would close to physical interaction, like many schools in China at the time, and would rely on distance learning through online schooling. That was near the end of January. Shortly after that we heard that our friends who had been in Beijing during the break were also leaving. For them there was little sense in riding out the pandemic in Beijing since school was online for the foreseeable future and they had homes in America to reside in.

February 22^nd to 29^th

By the end of February Aya and I were getting excited for our trip to Iceland. This had been in the works for some time and was our 10th anniversary trip so we were extra exuberant to be going. Of course, by that point we had heard about some cases outside of China and it was a small concern but during our week in Iceland it became very clear that this was going to be big. It was during that week that we learned that a carrier could be asymptomatic but the patient could still pass on the disease. We learned that there was possibly up to two weeks for the person to show symptoms. We learned about more cases in Europe and elsewhere. Most alarming to me was that we knew there were cases popping up in the US and the president during that week had said, “The Coronavirus is very much under control in the USA…I think that's a problem that’s going to go away… They have studied it. They know very much. In fact, we’re very close to a vaccine. This is a flu. This is like a flu. …you treat this like a flu"; None of which was true. We knew it was not just a flu nor was there a vaccine even close to being produced. Vaccines. Take. Time. The number grew, but by the time we left Iceland cases in the US were at 60 people. Iceland had none, though we saw in the coming weeks in both places the confirmed number of cases explode.

It was frightening, but what to do? We were already in Iceland, enjoying our trip. So, we decided to keep doing that and take what precautions we could. That was basically staying away from people coughing or sneezing and washing our hands with alcohol or soap as much as we thought we should (a lot!). By the last day of our trip I was so paranoid of people in our hotel that I made sure to stay as far away as possible from everyone during breakfast and to not touch anything with my hand unless I had to.

On our way home we noticed a lot more people than normal wearing masks in the airport, many of them westerners, really unusual. We had a layover in Copenhagen and our longtime friend who now lives in Copenhagen graciously met us at the airport. Not only that, but he brought ramen take away and bought me a beer! What a guy. Of course much of our talk revolved around the growing concerns of the pandemic and economic impacts from that, including the availability and pricing of masks in Denmark. On our next leg of the trip from Copenhagen to Warsaw we were even more aware as many of the people on the plane were wearing masks. Even more to the point there was an older fella in the row behind us that coughed for a solid 30 minutes in the beginning of the flight. I can’t tell what was going on with him, but it was making us and a lot of other people on the plane very uncomfortable. Landing in Warsaw that evening I was surprised as there was absolutely no restriction like a temperature check or a declaration of where we had been prior to landing. By this point China, Korea, and parts of Italy were exploding in numbers and in the coming days people coming from there would be under ever increasing scrutiny.  

March 1^st to March 8^th:

That weekend after our arrival Warsaw was just as normal as always, but in my mind I was already beginning to steel our defense. Twice that weekend I visited the grocery store to stock up on essential items (yes, tp!) and started to box away things in the closet (yes, beer!). My assumption was that within a week or two my workplace would be closing and there would be a mad rush to the stores to buy things. Better to get ahead of the curve and go shopping while there were fewer people about. That Monday, March 2^nd my school had an in-service PD day for teachers. Usually this means teachers spend the day in meetings or doing activities designed by the curriculum leaders at the school. We did those things, but in the back of my mind was the nagging feeling to just tip over tables and yell about how silly it was that we weren’t engaging in a plan for when, not if, we were going to shut down. As my Catholic upbringing taught me, even Jesus turn over a few tables when he thought things were out of whack.

 At the end of the day my department of about 10 teachers did have a short discussion about if we felt prepared to go online. Most people said they were fine with a couple seeming to squirm at the idea. I said I’m fine, but we are not. We are not prepared, we are not preparing, and we should be. A couple of the guys agreed with me, but nothing came of it and the next day the kids came to school as usual. By the end of the week I’d reached out to administrators and by that weekend an emergency meeting was called for the IT department to hash out a plan for what online learning would look like. I was lucky to be invited to that meeting and so got to give my input and perspective on what the school might plan going forward. The school began to take small actions like putting alcohol hand gel in every room and asking students who’d been in potential hot spots to stay home. They had already been doing that for students from China, but now that meant Iran, Italy, and a few other places. They started to beef up the school’s planning documents for what a virtual learning environment might look like, but to my chagrin nothing big came down the pipe in terms of learning about tech tools or strategies. All the week I was shopping. Filling my bag with tuna, pasta, beer, soup packets, beer (yes, it’s there twice, can never have enough), and other things we might need that would last for some time. I was also trying to make sure that if we did get sick and end up at home battling the virus we could live so easy to make soups, hydrating salts, lots of aspirin also got checked. I was trying to plan for the worst but to pretend to be living normally in the present. It was a bit stressful to keep up a façade at work some days, but we had to keep moving and we had to do the best thing for the kids which was indeed to conduct our day to day live as close to normal as possible.

On Monday March 9^th it was announced that the following Monday would be a “practice” online day and all students would stay home while teachers came in to see what it would be like and work out the kinks. This was all a step in the right direction, but two steps behind where we needed to be. By Wednesday of that week it was announced we would be closing down for at least 2 weeks. Thursday and Friday I practiced as much as I could with my students and offered guidance to what teachers I could connect with. On Friday morning I held an hour long session to play around with tools for teachers who were interested. About 5 came. Teachers were asked to come in on Monday the 16th, a bit baffling to us all but in the end valuable since we got to work out some of the kinks as intended and then we were on our own.

All the while I was shopping. Getting cans of veggies, making sure we were topped up on aspirin and other medications, making sure things around the house were in order and wouldn’t need to be topped up. I was also beginning to move things from my classroom to home that I thought I might need for a longer haul. Microphones, e-drawing pads, notebooks and my most personal effects all went home with me.

We had decided around this time that Aya would not go out alone. We were already hearing some reports around the world of Asians being targeted for harassment and we knew from our previous nine months or so living in Warsaw that people were kind but there were a couple bad apples and in generally Aya was quite noticeable and noticed when we were out and about. On that Thursday I popped the tire on my bike and I assumed I better get it fixed right away both as I used it a lot and because I thought shops might close soon. Aya and I walked together to the first bike shop, but they were unable to do it. As we walked on to a second shop she said she would go to the grocery and meet me at home. I agreed and went to get my tire repaired. When I arrived home she told me that in the bakery someone had sprayed something around where she was, like a disinfectant. It was laughable, and we did laugh, but it was also upsetting. We agreed that Aya should not go out unless we were together. Stores were beginning to see signs of empty shelves by the end of the week. 

Later that week president Trump announced that the US would close its border to incoming European travelers. That was shocking. I could still go to the US and so could Aya, but the walls were closing in. It was clear to us, just like it had been a couple weeks prior, that the wave was continuing to roll across the world and the US was next. I wrote to a friend in the US describing what was happening and told him to get ready because he was just a week or two behind us. Late on he wrote me back, “It happened!”.

March 15^th to 22^nd

The 16^th was our official “practice” day for online learning which now was a reality, but teachers still came to the school to be in their familiar environment to make sure all things were working properly. Some teachers, because they were also parents of young students now stuck at home, were not on the campus. The feeling was beginning to turn now that the school was closing and kids were not on campus. We were wearing our fears on our sleeve and people were being extra cautious. Still though, we mostly ran the day as normal. Knowing that it was quite possible I would not be able to return to campus soon I made sure to pack up the last of what I needed of student work and materials and headed home that day feeling like the world was off its axis. The rest of the week we were on a full time schedule, trying to maintain normal, while teaching online and from home. Teachers were not officially told to stay off campus and some opted to keep going in for various reasons. The school did check temperatures at the gate and again at the front door and they did ask for distancing on grounds, but the gym (which is quite compact) was still open to any and all and the pool and track were open for use. All tempting to me, but I had the Kabaty forest out my door and plenty of other things to keep me fit from home.

By the end of the week we were all knackered and it was clear the pace at school could not be kept up online. We also received word from the government that all schools would stay out until just after Easter, April 12^th, so our plan extended and our hours got shortened from 80 to 60 minute blocks. On Friday I returned to the school building both for a meeting and to grab my desk chair to haul home as sitting on a balance ball was something I could only do for short periods of time and we didn’t have a suitable chair.

Polish society kept up mostly as normal but there was a marked decrease in people in public places. Public transit was desolate. I took the bus to and from work that Friday to get my desk chair. On the way in I was with 4 other people in a double length bus. On the way home I was alone until just a few stops before home when one woman came on. The bus had taped up notices, taped off call buttons, and plastic in front to protect the driver. 

Large group gatherings were beginning to be restricted. We did see people beginning to wear masks and gloves as well as some stores posting signs that only a few customers at a time were to be allowed. Around public spaces like parks, signs were posted telling people to stay far apart. Towards the end of the week on Friday or Saturday we took a bike ride around the forest to get outside and get exercise. People were everywhere. People were having picnics, gatherings to play sports, taking walks together. All of the normal things people do, but all the things the authorities had begun to warn against. It was also this week that we saw the madness in shopping take over. 

Earlier in the week we went shopping to stock up on a few things, but the veggie section was completely wiped out as well as shelves of disinfectants, toilet paper, and in some places canned goods. When Poland closed its borders on the 15^th I admit we ran to the store as we assumed we might be stuck for some time and that goods again would be in short supply and as the transportation networks ground to a halt.

March 22^nd to 29^th

By this week things started to click for me in terms of a daily routine. I did go into work, as I would continue to do at least once a week. My online learning with Global Online Academy had also started to shift. Most of the US was now seeing the same things that we were in terms of cases growing and businesses shutting down. Many of my online students were talking about their own schools closing in Washington, California, Texas, Minnesota, New York, and Ohio. There was a lot of talk of what the government would do and how the central bank would step in since people were not unemployed and businesses were not generating revenue. On March 23^rd it was reported that in the week prior 3.3 million unemployment claims were filed in the US, the largest ever single week in recorded history, but by the end of that week 6.8 million more would follow. The Dow Jones in the US fell to 18,600 points, at that time a more than 30% retrace from the high less than two months earlier. The longest expansion in US history came to a sudden halt. The Federal Reserve took action like it never had before injecting nearly 4 trillion into the US economy, or a little less than 25% of GDP.  

Meanwhile I was watching the count grow day by day and waiting to see a case show up in my home county in Wisconsin, Door. Finally it came on March 30^th. I had of course been thinking of my family in Wisconsin (and Japan, and Germany) quite a lot and what might happen to them as this grew and grew. At first it was seen as a virus that was mostly dangerous to older people and those with underlying conditions which made little difference to me because you never know if you yourself could be a carrier to them with or without knowing it. More troubling was that some of the family and family friends I was thinking of WERE elderly and DID have underlying conditions.

This week also marked our first delivery of groceries and food delivery with “no contact” orders where the delivery person would make the delivery, knock, then walk away.

As an introvert I have to admit that this whole isolation thing has had a silver lining and this was one of them. Of course, we tipped well which is generally not expected in Poland but these were different times. I bet the delivery people were making a killing on tips, at least I hope so. Like in many places around the world societies were leaning not only on medical staff but delivery drivers, grocery store workers, and other workers of essential services like electricity, internet, water, etc. to keep things going.

This week also saw further restrictions to outdoor activities with gatherings involving more than family members banned. While parks were still open a lot of their gathering spaces were closed off. In the woods where I run the picnic areas were shrouded in plastic to prevent people from sitting on them and there were signs everywhere warning people to stay 2 meters apart and not gather. Much of that week there were police officers in the public areas making sure that people did not gather. There were also police cars driving around with a message to the public to follow safety measures. For most of this week and the one prior a military helicopter had been making a loop south and around Kabaty forest. I don’t know why, but I suspect that they were checking to see just how many people were gathering.

Iceland

Traveling to Iceland everyone says a few things to you in advance. It’s expensive, it is beautiful, there are a lot of tourists and in the winter or course, it is cold. We found most of that to be true, barring the part about a lot of tourists. Maybe because we travelled in February, maybe because Cov-19 is giving people a reason not to travel, who knows. On a couple of occasions we even found ourselves totally alone, if briefly, at some of the most popular spots. 

Anyways, on to what we saw. We had decided early on to rent a car and drive around the south and some of the west of the island. This is not too uncommon and most people view the things we did in what is called the Golden Circle. Certainly this is where we saw the most tourists, but even there, not a huge amount. We ended up getting a Subaru Forester, which was a good choice as it was big enough to get us around in winter, but not so big that it was a gas hog or hard to park. Gas is expensive! It was close to 120usd to fill the tank which we did a few times during the week. The first day we had just enough time to land, get the car, shop for a few things, and then get to our first airbnb. It was a nice little place and literally right across the street from the Secret Lagoon. The Lagoon was a fairly nice pool and it was cool to take the soak in the cold air, but its nothing like Japanese onsen with its many pools and so forth. Still, it was relaxing and how can you go to Iceland and not go to at least one hot spring? 

 

The circle includes the Gulifoss, the Strokkur geyser, and the Kerid crater which we did not go to. At the waterfall there was a hard snow storm blowing. We arrived just about at 10am, sunrise was around 9am, and the tour buses seemed to roll in just as we were leaving around 1045. We found this most days, if we could start driving in the dark around 830 and get to places by 9ish then we would be mostly alone before tour buses were hitting the road. The falls themselves were massive and beautiful, but it was just too cold to stand around for a long time and even removing my glove to snap some pictures left me with a sting in the fingers. So, we headed to the gift shop for some warm drinks and to write postcards. Not nearly as beautiful, but a lot warmer than standing by the falls. 

After the waterfall we headed to the geyser. I hear that the big geyser has stopped spouting, but the smaller of the two is still going and seems to blow every 5 to 10 minutes. It was here that I learned that Aya cannot take a selfie. We are not picture people, so it makes sense, but I thought everyone could do this much like eating with chopsticks (also not true, some people can’t). I’ve also since learned that geyser is an Icelandic word that we have adopted into English. Pretty cool. I wonder if there are other words that made it in? I kind of doubt it since Icelandic is a pretty hard language for native English speakers to grasp and while there are a lot of unique things in the country they probably don't cross over much to other places. Can you say, "Snæfellsnes"? How about Eyjafjallajökull?Well, that is probably why not many words crossed over. We did get a kind of selfie during the blow up, and then hit the road again.

Heading south now in the golden circle we stopped for a quick lunch at a Tomato Restaurant. Aya had read about it and when we arrived there we saw a group of Japanese tourists inside waiting for lunch. It was just the type of spot where Japanese tourists would flock to, cute little place with fresh veggies and high prices. We knew right away they were Japanese and not Korean or Chinese since there were about 20 of them at a long table and you could see the lips of some of them moving, but you could not hear them at all from even just a couple meters away. At first I thought, wow, the acoustics in this place really dampen your voice, but that was not so. There were other people stopping there too and there was a large greenhouse attached to the restaurant area we were in where you could see the production of the tomatoes everyone was eating. As we went among the rows looking at things an American just ahead of us commented on our yaktrax that we were wearing. How do I know they were American? Just like the Japanese there is communication etiquette that sets Americans apart. They are very likely to engage in small talk with strangers and are friendly, but they are not nearly as good at volume control as the Japanese are. Though a mere meters away I could have been on the other side of the greenhouse and still heard them. After poking around for a bit we had some tomato soup and bread (really delicious!). I was tempted to get a bloody mary, but I'm a responsible driver so I just moaned about not having one for a bit and then we hit the road again. 

ON the way south we stopped at a foss just outside of Hella. I'm not sure of the name, but is was "foss"tastic. We had the place all to ourselves, though we did see some tracks in the snow so we knew others had been there in the morning. 

Continuing south and east we stopped at the black sand beach (totally empty!) then went on just a bit past Vik where we stopped for the night. We stayed at Landabrot cabins, just past the Magma Hotel. The cabins were kind of in the middle of nowhere, but there were a few of them strewn about so it was kind of funny to see the other tourists like us come and go each morning and evening and get a sense of when people were traveling. We stayed there two nights, the first on arrival and then the second after hiking the glacier. 

Our glacier hike went from 2pm to 5pm, but really it seemed a lot longer. We took a late start in the morning and due to snow ended up driving for about 1.5 hours before getting to the national park and the glacier. The hiking company set us up with helmets, harnesses and crampons. Otherwise we were well prepared with many layers and little heat packs we each put in our boots by our toes. As we later learned walking around Reykjavík the little heat packs in the boots are a good idea as with the packets, the layers, and the hiking around we weren’t really too cold during our hike but we were later in the city without the heat packs. In a group of about 20 we were lead up to the foot of the glacier and then we went to three different ice caves. The first and last were quite large and blue ice. You could easily stand in them and see the air bubbles and debris that was in the ice. The second cave was dark grey ice that our guide said was volcanic ash. I suppose this was true as most of the island is made up of volcanic ash so one way or the other it is everywhere. In this second cave we crawled through a claustrophobic passageway to really see the belly of the ice cave. After spending a couple hours in the caves we made our way down arriving to the parking lot around 530pm. How do I know the exact time? Because, in Iceland there are only state owned liquor stores to sell beer and they are only open from 2pm to 6pm. I knew it was too late to grab beers for the night. Life is hard, what can I say. From there we had another hour or so back to our cabin and an early night to sleep and get ready for the long drive the next day. 

The next day we ended up covering about 300km. As with other days we started out early and made it to Dyrholaey peninsula where there is a beautiful lighthouse and rock formation. On the drive there we did not see many people and as we approached the bottom of the hill leading to the lighthouse we saw some knocked over sign on the road, but I figured it was nothing and drove on. The blue hue of the early morning light was so intense and we were the only people on the grounds for the whole time! Unbelievable... I thought, until we drove back down the hill and there was the same sign but now upright and it said DO NOT ENTER, LANDSLIDE. Oh well, we lived. 

 We had to do laundry this day and so made it a point to just drive as far as we could and get to the next place with enough time to spare in the evening for laundry. We thought it might be possible to do this and to get a few hours up to the Snaefellsness peninsula, but by the time we got to Bogarnes it was already later in the afternoon and I was getting tired of driving. We spent this evening just hanging around, watching Dr. Phil, and doing our laundry. Wow, I forgot how crazy the Dr. Phil show is. Dang America, you are giving Icelanders one hell of an impression of what American society is like!  

The next day we were out early and on the road to get up to the peninsula. I’m a big fan of The Secret Life of Walter Mitty and so I wanted to go see one of the places where it was filmed in Iceland. IN the movie it is supposed to be Greenland and really what is the difference in filming? As we were driving north we could tell that the wind and snow drifts were pretty bad, but having grown up driving in Wisconsin I was pretty sure of myself on the road. However, as we went through a mountain pass I nearly gave up and turned around as I couldn’t see more than 100 ft in front of me and the wind was really blowing hard. We kept going and eventually got to clearer weather. We did eventually get to Snaefellsness, found the scene from the movie and walked around the town for just a bit getting some good views of the sea before heading back again. 

As we were leaving town a rescue vehicle nearly cut us off and I thought, oh shit someone got stuck in the pass we just came through. Sure enough when we took the pass again there was a line of cars waiting and as it turned out someone had gotten stuck in a drift that was covering the entire lane on a bridge, the drift being about a meter Deep. The rescue vehicle was really just a souped-up suv and as we passed it hadn’t made any progress yet on pulling the car out, but we did get past. As we made our way down the mountain visibility was nearly as bad and there was a caravan of about 5 cars, myself in the end position, making our way down slowly. As you can imagine, it didn’t take long for someone to get behind me and attempt to pass all 5 cars in the blinding snow only to have oncoming traffic block their way and to swerve into the line of slower vehicle causing me to have to jam on the brakes. I could not believe it, but this guy attempted a few times to pass all the cars and each time was rebuffed as there was oncoming traffic which any of us could see. I don't mind so much if people are suicidal, but when they are going to take me with them I get a bit irritated with them. 

Eventually we came off of the mountain and lost of most of the bad weather continuing on our way to Reykjavík. About half way there, in the distant bay, I could make out some wakes in the waves that were just too big to be anything else than whales. Eventually we found a rest point and watched them for a bit. They never did breech, but watching the motions and size of the wakes we could also see their black backs sticking up a bit too. They did not seem to be in a big hurry so we made our way to the Hilton on the outside of town and got hunkered down for the night. 

The following day we went on a walking tour of the town which didn’t cover all that much area. Reykjavík is not a big city, just about 200,000 people, but even at that size the downtown was not very big and most of it could be covered on foot within an hour. Our guide showed our group around to a few different spots, the parliamentary building, the courthouse, and some historical sites. What we did not anticipate was the cold. Like our glacier hike we made sure to bundle up, but we assumed that our toes would be fine and did not use the hot packets. That was a mistake! By the end of the 1.5 hour tour my toes were frozen! Feeling like we had pretty much seen everything we wanted to we headed back to the hotel to use their spa and get my little piggies warmed up. 

That was pretty much that for Iceland though we did drive to the airport the next day and so forth. It is a beautiful place and now, sitting in Poland with the borders close, we are so glad we got to take such a great trip just as the door was closing.