It is with great sadness that I report I will no longer be tumbling out of the Hawk-mobile trying to channel my inner cat to help me land on two feet.

We spent a leisurely day making our way back to the city. Well, it was mostly leisurely, except for when Hawk employed his horse call to get the attention of some Icelandic horses grazing near the road. It sounded like a freakish mutant Kaui guinea fowl with tonsillitis. It was even more startling when he did it without any warning. It’s a miracle those Icelandic horses stayed still enough for me to take 1 photo and not bolt across the mountain range in fear for their lives.

As I was saying, it was a leisurely drive back, well, except for the times when he would see a 1-lane bridge coming and another vehicle (usually a very large delivery truck) coming in the other direction and would start to accelerate chanting, “I’m first, I’m first, I’m first” and then dart over the bridge with seconds to spare.

But most of all, I am sad my time with Hawk and Hadda is over. They are amazing guides and ambassadors of their country. They answer every type of question with patience, sometimes the same questions more than once when I have trouble keeping track of the information. They have a unique combination of deep knowledge of Iceland including the recent developments, of well, almost everything from people to construction projects. But they also have unwavering curiosity to continue to seek and understand. They would kindly greet people we would meet in our journey, stop and talk for awhile, and hear their stories. We had experiences we would never have had if we were behind the wheel of a rental car on our own.

If you want to know more about what they offer, (photo and hiking tours) you can check out their website: phototours.is.

We are celebrating Peter’s birthday tomorrow here in Reykjavik, and then meeting up on Tuesday with Cat and Mark for the second part of our adventure.

In the meantime, I’m going to sleep, download photos off my big camera, pay bills, and sort through the 1000 solicitation emails to see if there is anything important in my inbox (odds are the answer to the question is “no”).

It is bound to be a riveting day tomorrow, I’m sure you will be waiting on the edge of your seat for an update.