State-of-the-art / tough choices part II.

Those who do not recognize the magic of a good old Icelandic fjord have a reason to travel. Fjords in Westfjord, north west Iceland, are many and vary in shape, size and character. One can find there an excellent collection of fjords which demonstrate the many sides to the tone in this part of the country, the roughness, strength, charm and all the rest of it.

One of the fjords that face Breidarfjordur from north is Vatnsfjordur (Water-fjord), famous for being the landing area of Floki the Raven, (Full name: Floki Vilgerdarsson, a Viking of course), who arrived around 865. He named the island Iceland, because there was ice on the water, not because it was particularly cold. Later gossip say that Erik the Red, father of Leif who found America and lost it again, found this so dim-witted, so silly of Floki, that he named the next door island which was 90% covered with ice, Greenland, just to underline his point how unimaginative Floki was. Floki and his spin doctors, however, managed to get the notion into history books that Floki picked the name Iceland to keep others away from it. But then there were no tourist boards and no specific strategies to attract tourists or market researches suggesting what would work.

This was at the time when real men left their native country for good if they were insulted in front of a woman.

If it was a King that insulted them, they would return within 10 years to kill him, or bed the queen, or both, otherwise it wasn’t worth it. Sometimes we have to understand people’s background before we judge them so we don’t judge them too hard. But what kind of a man would like to be insulted in front of a woman anyway.

At the bottom of Vatnsfjord, or where the fjord meets the highland, is a valley with the exquisite name Water Valley. A lake stretching close to 3 miles is located in the valley, a lake you can fish in, with a permission, and a walk about or even staying over night in a caravan is a good idea. But when you leave the fjord and enter the valley, you also leave human settlement and enter the untouched land. Vatnsfjord is quite a big fjord, including a small country side hotel, number of farms, a bridge which a ferry boat hooks with once a day during summer, an out-door swimming pool and summerhouses where you can stay in the fall to hunt goose and be a man, or a woman for that matter. Parts of the shore are scattered with geographical wonders and to go horse riding can be a day very well spend.

Water Valley is the valley where one goes to play a wild child in his dreams, like made in a computer, to find the golden ring after walking fire and fighting lions, tigers, monkeys and animated monsters. This small but adventurous kingdom on its own, where you hardly meet anyone is loaded with history without a single museum, perhaps a violent history, but one can smell peace there now, or find a place there or a spot with state-of-the-art stillness.