Bingo rocks! Iceland

I started learning the language of the Vikings this week. With several letters of the alphabet having been replaced by what my textbook refers to as "noises not heard in English", things get a little complicated. Regardless, after two lessons I decided I was ready to get involved with a game of 'Bingo' on Thursday night.

Being drunk wasn't helping me to understand Icelandic numbers

Perhaps not surprisingly, I won a prize - a kiss, a few beers and a massive basket of chocolate. There is still some debate among the locals as to whether or not my victory was obtained legally - and they did start reading the letters and numbers in English as well as Icelandic after I claimed my prize. It seemed to be a big joke among my Icelandic friends who incidentally had no problems devouring the chocolatey goodness. The party eventually wound up at about 4:30am with everyone claiming to be "fully rinsed" :-)

The player haters - but note the half eaten basket of chocolate ...

The Friday institution that is "beer club" was relatively uneventful but we rallied with a lively game of ten pin bowling on Dan's Nintendo Wii. It was very reminiscent of the mini-bowls tournaments on Friday nights at mine and Schnappy's place in Waihi Beach before the Beach Pub - except much more digital in nature...

Saturday was an exciting day here in Holar (and not just because it was Jen's birthday). It was the first time that any of us new students had eaten meat since arriving in Iceland - simply because it is so expensive. As it's the slaughter season here at the moment, last years lamb is now relatively cheap, so I decided to slap up a traditional kiwi roast for the new Icelandic crew. With a heavily discounted (NZ$35) and somewhat runty looking 1.9kg frozen lamb leg in the oven, accompanied of course by potatoes and kumura, we set off to the hot pot to let the meat slow roast in its own delicious juices. This time we were armed with a few icy cold jars, but sadly (sorry Chesterman) no Swedish girls. I don't even want to talk about how good the lamb was, because I might not taste it again for a very long time. I bet Jennifer's time in Venice doesn't compare to a roast leg of lamb ... Pphhhf ... Venice. I hope you had a happy Birthday though Penny :o)

On Sunday, still finding tasty morsel's of last night's roast in my beard, Soizic and I headed off to go fishing for Halibut (perhaps optimistically) and Flounder in the Hofsós Harbour.

View north from Hofsós Harbour to Drangey Island

Hofsós Harbour or "the kill zone"

The oldest wooden building in Iceland - centre stage

Hofsos is a small village on the eastern shores of the Skagafiord Bay, just north of Holar, and one of the oldest trading posts in Iceland. Trading commenced here 400 years ago and remainders from this long period of trading can be seen in "Pakkhusid" (the black building in the centre of the picture above). In the freezing wind whipping off the mountains, I caught my first Icelandic fish.

Soizic reeling in a monster Halibut?

Unfortunately it was not a record breaking 300kg Halibut, but a 30g mini Haddock. It was the only fish we managed to wrangle all day too.

Fizzing over a schlippery little Haddock - my first fish in Iceland

After sufficiently chilling to the bone, loosing several hooks snagged on the bottom and not catching any more fish, we stopped to have a look at some basalt columns at Staðarbjargavík. These hexagonal rocks are formed as lava cools very slowly and cracks as the whole mass contracts (or something along those lines, I know fishes not rocks ...). I saw me first seal too - as he bobbed up and down checking us out.

The hexagonal basalt columns at Staðarbjargavík

View back towards Hofsós Harbour

All in all a good week, but I'm starting to miss 'kiwiland'. You fullas are alright you know :-)