We woke to beautiful, warm sunshine and a clear view of the mountains that had been disguised by clouds in the evening. We left our gear and set off on a longer hike for the day. We passed Svartifoss again, but turned left and crossed the footbridge instead of turning right as we did on yesterday's loop. The falls and the black columns were even more impressive in the sunlight.
We planned to drop into the valley and walk toward Kjos, but chose to ascend on a detour to Fremrihnaukur through low brush before retracing our trail and continuing down our planned path.
The morning sun didn't last long, and clouds gathered over the peaks soon after we set out for the day, but we continued our walk to Morsárdalur and sat in the flat, rocky valley for lunch before following the riverbed to loop back to camp rather than press forward into the shifting weather.
After a good day of hiking, we returned to camp, and had a tough decision to make. Where to go next? We hadn't intended to spend our trip at campsites, and wanted to be out on our own. The weather was starting to wear on us, at least on our water-logged feet, and the forecast was actually getting worse - more rain, stronger winds, colder temperatures. After studying our maps, hiding out from the rain, we decided to head back to the race route, retrace the Laugavegur Trail, to see what we missed while running. The trail would take 3-4 days and we'd be headed in the right direction for making our return to Reykjavik afterwards. Now that was settled, so a good night's sleep and we would catch the bus at 08h to begin the next adventure.
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| Skaftafell |
