From the Snaefellsness Peninsular and Stykkusholmur, we took a ferry across the water to the Westfjords.

Not the brightest of days, and more than a little bit rough around the islands, the hours were livened up by listening to the conversations of an American group next to us. It seemed to be a party of well-to-do young families ravelling escorted by both an American organiser, and a couple of Icelandic guides. There was also a French woman that initially appeared to be part of the group but with hindsight was probably a member of staff.

One of the fathers piqued our interest when talking to one of the kids, his son (apparently) who he called “bear”. He talked of respecting his 6 (?) year old son  whilst talking over him and then disappeared off for a break leaving his even younger daughter to hold the ferry seats. The boy kicked off. The girl kicked back. There were tears all around until the mother a rather beautiful Chinese American lady arrived.

Unfortunately she had decided to share her anger at the length of the journey – she felt misled by the tour guides who whilst they had given her a written itinerary, hadn’t actually verbally read it out to her and stressed the time involved.

There was lots of chat around emotions and validations and respect, all whilst being hugely dis-respectful.

After about 10 minutes of ranting at one of the Icelandic staff, she ground to a halt. & then her husband started up. Putting up his hand to shush her and telling her to listen to him since he’d sat there listening to her complaining.

He talked about the importance of the kids living in the “real” and experiencing the holiday through physical activities, going fishing, visiting real factories etc. rather than just looking at things and places.

And it left us all feeling that no matter how crap our family dynamics might appear at times, they could be a lot worse: I could have named my child “bear” and insisted they visit a fish factory on holiday. We could have lived their childhood in the “real” as opposed to just living. I could have spent my energies filling all of their hours with organised activities, with other people whilst telling them that I respected them (but not enough to actually engage with them myself).

& obviously they had more money than sense, and were easily enough distracted when the Icelandic tour guide suggested stopping off at a hot spot (thermal pool) on the way to their next hotel. No doubt their family will be fine and their parenting techniques aren’t bad just different and considerably more stressing for everyone involved.

Still, listening in managed to pass about an hour with sighs and eye rolls across the table before we rolled off the ferry in our hired car and started to drive towards Patreksfjord. It’s difficult to either explain or capture just how big the landscape was and how high and cold the pass up and over the mountain turned out to be.

Driving twisty roads in the fog, with a drop that could kill you on one size did not add to the enjoyment.

We thought we’d passed the worst and then hit the gravel roads. With a £3000 excess on the car. the idea of gravel kicking up and damaging the car was not restful.

Still, it was extraordinarily beautiful even on a dull and dreary day

& eventually we arrived.