John turned the ignition on the car, and ... nothing. He tried the front lights. A whine emanated from the front of the car, and then failed. Turning the warning lights on produced a similar effect. The battery was completely dead.
However, the car had two batteries, and luckily (we thought) the second one wasn't connected, so Dan connected it, and we drove gingerly to the nearest garage. After a little bit of miscommunication from a German (he told us that the garage only did tyres, presumably so that he could be first in the queue whilst we left, the b***ard) we finally got the guy to hook our generator up to an old fashionned analogue ammeter, after which he told us that it wasn't charging. And so, nursing the engine all the way, we returned and apologised to the hotel at Geirland that we wouldn't be staying another night, and travelled to Selfoss.
There, we left our car, and walked to the Ölfusá river, to the edge of Þjórsárhraun, where we had lunch under a rather unattractive bridge, which had clearly been haunted by more jokers believing themselves to be the new Banksy (not!). Anyway, there we found some rather strange formations, which John thought were man-made, until a sign told us that they were in fact volcanic in origin, and probably caused by collapsing bubbles of volcanic gas. It'll take a while for him to live that down!
After a swift espresso, we returned to the truck to find that the mechanic (this time with a fancy digital multimeter) had found nothing wrong, and that we could continue on our way. In fact, all that had happened was that the wire meant to connect the second battery had touched the chassis and shorted the first.By this stage, it was too late and too far to return to Laki, so we continued to Geysir, to watch Strokkur erupt. Apparently it does so every 8-10 minutes, although not in quite as impressive a manner as Geysir, which became dormant in 2000.
The last stop of the day was Gullfoss (in English, lit. trans. Golden Waterfall). Gullfoss is one of the most popular tourist attractions in the country, produced as the wide Hvítá river rushes towards the south and flows down into a wide curved three-step milky glacial blue "staircase" before plunging abruptly in two stages (11 and 21 m) into a crevice 32 m deep.
Our accommodation for the night was at Úthlíð, a tiny village quite nearby Geysir. For only £120, we stayed in a wooden chalet, complete with four beds and a leather sofa (my bed)... and... wait for it... a geothermal hot tub! We arrived after a quick meal of Víking beer and fried cod and chips, and travelled to the nearby bar (John had driven back, and felt a need to catch up with our drinking!). Afterwards, everyone but myself went to bed. I spent a couple of enjoyable hours in the hottub on the darkened veranda, before I followed suit, drifting into a pleasant sleep.
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