After four weeks in Hólmavík, I was starting to think I might as well have stayed at home. Most of my time was spent alone in the otherwise empty guest house and I was not learning Icelandic anything like as fast as I wished. Worse still, my secondary objective had been stymied: I had wanted to interview a couple of old men in Dalvík (near Akureyri) about their traditional methods of weather forecasting. I made enquiries, but it turned out the old fellows had both died fairly recently.
The last two weeks were spent mainly in pleasure seeking. I took a day tour with Pascal and we went out across the snow on a snowmobile. Until you get used to these machines, they seem as manoeuvrable as a supermarket shopping trolley, veering wildly away from the intended course of travel until you get the hang of it and throw your weight into the turn as you would on a motorbike. Pascal and I soon got used to it, however, and were soon confidently chasing the others across the snowy landscape.