Arctic Photo Expedition

Oslo, Norway; Monday, August 1, 2016

Our Svalbard Arctic photo expedition finally started!

On 7/31, the last day of July, we got on the plane. Our flight was at 9:30pm so we pretty much had all day at home, but the whole day was used for the last minute preparation .... It was raining/drizzling all night all day. We were hoping to walk the dogs as usual, early in the morning, but we could not do it in the rain. Thankfully the rain let off a bit around noon, so we did walk them. I think they knew something was going on because they saw me getting their food and stuff ready .... I felt really really bad and worried about how they would be taken care of at the kennel. They really just wanted to be with us all the time!

We picked up the rental car in the morning. Walked the dogs, then brought the dogs to the kennel (Southboro) at 4 - on Sundays the kennel is open only 4-5pm. I wrote down detailed instructions for taking care of the dogs, and got stuff organized as well as I could, I just hope they adhere to what I told them. My heart really sank when we left them there ....

We left the house right after we got home after dropping off the dogs. And we got to the airport (after returning the rental car and taking the crowded shuttle) before 6pm. The IcelandAir flights were in terminal E which has not been improved for a long time. We had a pretty bad experience there. We first had dinner (our only meal after breakfast of that day) in the Durgin restaurant at terminal E which was sort of OK. Then we waited at get 6A. We waited and waited. Then it turned out that something wrong with their computer system and our flight and another Alitalia flight were at the same gate. It was a chaotic mess. Finally, at around 9:30 when our flight was supposed to take off, we were told to move to gate1C. There, we waited again - the nice gate agent told me that we were waiting for the plane to move to this gate. Finally around 10:30, we boarded. One good thing came out of all this was that we did not have to take a bus to the plane and we boarded the plane right at the gate. Phew! Our camera backpacks were really really heavy - I could hardly breathe when carrying it on my back. Really cannot do this too much longer ....

We were in the economy class, but we got lucky and there was not anyone in the middle seat so Bob and I had the 3 seats to ourselves, just like in the "comfort class". 4.5 hours later, our plane arrived at Reykjavik, at local time 7:20am, 4 hours earlier than at home. I could not really sleep sitting up, but I was able to lie down, curled up, and took a couple of short naps.

At Reykjavik airport, our plane did not land at the gate so we had to take a bus. Then another bus to the connecting flight which was actually delayed. That worked out to our advantage - if it were not delayed, our delay at Logan would have us missing the connection. The flight from Reykjavik to Oslo was 2.5 hours. And there was a time difference of 2 hours. We got to Oslo at local time 1:30-ish. Waited a while for our luggage, then walked to the Radisson Blu at the airport. Very happy to get to the hotel, took our showers and had our rest. Our flight to Longyearbyen is tomorrow morning at 9:50am. We will wear our boots (to avoid checking another luggage in) and leave one suitcase at the hotel. Will definitely try to have a good night's sleep tonight!

Had a scare when I forgot my password for this MacPro laptop! Finally logged in, phew! I really should have tried it when I was at home! Lesson learned!!

Longyearbyen, Svalbard, Norway; Tuesday, August 2, 2016

Yesterday we had dinner at the hotel, buffet that reminded me of the cruises we were on, but a whole lot more expensive! They had a variety of fish dishes, cold and warm, unfortunately I am not a fish eater even though I wish I would eat more of this healthy item. My favorite was the egg salad which reminded me of the one we had on the Hurtegruten cruise a couple of years ago. They sure know how to make the egg salad well!

We had dinner really early, around 5:30pm. After dinner we walked to the airport to scout out where our checkin would be with SAS the next morning. Then we came back to the room. Embarrassingly, I went to bed before 7pm. When I woke up, it was past 11pm. But that was it - I did not sleep at all after that and got up at 5:30. Hope when we get to Longyearbyen I could sleep better!....

I had everything pretty much packed before we went to have breakfast, which was again buffet style. There were quite a lot of people there, including a group of tourists from Asia, either Vietnam, or somewhere south east Asia, speaking the Cantonese style dialect which I did not understand.

We left one piece of the luggage at the hotel to pick up on the 14th, and we both wore our big boots in order to make things fit into the two checkin suitcases. We made it to the airport before 8. We had to first checkin at the kiosk and print out the luggage tags, put on the tags ourselves, then go to the human agent. It took a while. At the security gate, we were required to take the cameras out of the bag - this was something new that I encountered for the first time, It annoyed the hell out of me .....Maybe they tightened their security because of the recent terrorist activities in Europe? .... Don't know.

Our flight took off on schedule around 9:55am. The first stop was Tromso where everyone was required to get off. Those of us who were continuing to Longyearbyen must go through some security ID check. I was told this was because Longyearbyen is a duty free place ..... I still don't understand.

Before 2pm we got to Longyearbyen! The views from the plane as we approached Longyearbyen was pretty amazing! Snow covered mountains without anything green, the clouds floated in the mountains by the ocean, so nice! Unfortunately I did not sit by the window so I only took a couple of photos using my phone, tried to filter out any people between me and the window.

Longyearbyen is way above the Arctic circle, at 78 degrees north. There is not another town to the north. The airport was rather small, but not too bad. We waited a while for our luggage and felt very thankful that both our suitcases made it! Then we took the airport hotel bus and got to Radisson Blu where we're staying for 2 nights. Even though it's also Radisson Blu, this one is a lot more expensive and a lot less sophisticated than the Oslo airport one. But it's right in "down town" Longyearbyen. And it turned out that Wild Photo's gallery, our meeting place on the 4th, is almost right across the street, definitely within walking distance. Liz is staying at a different hotel, a bit far out but a lot cheaper. We communicated with each other via text and agreed to meet at the Wild Photo gallery at 4pm. That's what we did.

We went to the Wild Photo gallery and chatted with Sophie who was a very helpful and very nice lady! Now I had a better idea of what the ship might do - it would sail north for the frozen ice, to look for polar bears. So we will get closer and closer to the north pole! I started getting really excited!

We walked around the center of town and into the shopping building and a few other shops on the street. This is definitely an ideal place to shop for good winter clothing! But I brought what we need so we only did window shopping. I would have loved to get Ole and Roy's photo books, but am concerned about the weight and place to put them.... Sophie gave us quite a bit of tips. I really wanted to rent a car and drive to a few places she mentioned! Right now there is NO sunset - sunset won't come until 8/23! Sophie said she hoped that we had enough sleep as we won't sleep much in the next few days. The good light for shooting is early in the morning and late at night (since the sun does not really set). Unfortunately when we called to rent the car, all cars have been rented. The guy told us to email him. Sigh .....

The three of us had dinner at a well rated, not too expensive restaurant called Kroa. Liz and i had the fish dish Sophie recommended, Bob had the moose burger. Everything was good, except our fish was a bit too salty. Around 8:30, Liz went back to her hotel and we came back to our hotel. We will touch base with each other tomorrow morning. I feel beat, very tired. Hope for a good night sleep tonight!

Longyearbyen, Svalbard, Norway; Wednesday, August 3, 2016

Last night was the first time we slept a decent night since we left home. We took a short stroll in "town" to the information office which was just at the other end of the street from our hotel, after dinner. It was quite strange to walk at 9 o'clock at night but in broad daylight! The sun was still quite high in the sky - supposedly it would not set until after 1am but it would rise again one minute later. We must draw our curtains really tight in order for the room to be dark so we could sleep.F

This morning we got up around 8. After a big breakfast (another buffet), we arranged today's activities. No luck with the car rental - all cars were out. Per recommendations of the hotel receptionist, we decided to take a small group sightseeing 2-hour tour, at 10am. It was quite good! The driver/guide explained things along the way and we learned a little about this place!

Longyearbyen started as a coal mining town in the early 1900s, by American Mr. Longyear. He was a rich man. Others followed him in the mining business. There are still a number of coal mines, but many of them are closed. These mines go by numbers. We passed by a number of them, 2, 3, and 5 (I think) and stopped at 7, which was up the mountain, and the car stopped there to let us out taking some photos. Along the way, we saw a few reindeer, people in dog sled on wheels, the place where the airport used to be, the house where a few years ago a bad snow storm took off its roof (the house is still without a roof), etc. This place would be a different world in the winter! Every household has snowmobiles and these snowmobiles now are all parked in a sort of parking lot place. Our driver's name is Fin. He speaks both English and Norwegian, a nice old man. He has been driving this sightseeing tours almost 1000 times!

I would have really liked to book a ride in the dog sled on wheels, but Bob did not feel riding on the sled on the same bumpy road, so I gave up. Fin told us that these polar dogs always stay outside and the -30 degree weather does not bother them! During the tour, we saw a couple of these sled dogs' home. Quite interesting. They made me miss Djuna and Iubi more! 

After putting the camera back in the room, we went to the museum in the university nearby. A quite nice museum, with display of (dead) polar bear, seals, and lots of good information. After the museum, we went to the grocery store and grabbed some water and snacks.

Huset is the most expensive restaurant here in Longyearbyen. Supposedly it used to be a Micheline starred restaurant. And it is supposed to be very very expensive. But it has a cafe which is good but not too expensive. It is out of the town, probably around half an hour's walk. We made a reservation to eat at the cafe, with Liz. Then we hired a taxi to take us to the place beyond the airport, called Bjorndalen. Yesterday Sophie told us we might be able to see birds and foxes there. The taxi will pick us up at 8:30pm.

We went into the Wild Photo gallery again in the afternoon. Saw Roy, and the other Wild Photo guide (forgot his name), and Sophie. We chatted for a while - Roy showed us on the map where we may sail to. It's very nice to see him again.

At 5:30, Bob and I started walking toward the restaurant. It's supposed to take around half an hour but it took us about 45 minutes. It was quite cold, with the wind blowing. Right by the restaurant, there was a reindeer. Liz was taking photos of it, and I joined her. Roy and the other guide were talking about how ugly the reindeers are at this time, with bulging eyes, round tummy, and patches of falling hair on its body :-) I did not think they're that ugly. But the two we saw today sure had big racks of antlers!

Dinner at the cafe was good. I had their home made pork sausage which was very tasty. Bob and Liz both had fried haddock. Bob said it was a little fishy. Glad I did not order that one!

The taxi picked us up at 8:30 outside the restaurant. The driver was a nice old man who came from Norway mainland and has been here 2.6 years. But he spoke very little English. So I had to ask the staff at the restaurant to translate where we wanted to go. It turned out that Bjorndalen was the area beyond the airport by the ocean where there was no paved roads. We had to drive on the graveled and bumpy road for a long stretch. We had a good view of the sea shore and the remote mountains. But aside from one reindeer and some ducks/birds, we really did not see any wild life. Oh well, it was a nice change of scenery.

We were back at the hotel before 10pm. The sun was still high. Need to pull the curtains and get to bed since it's night time, dark or not.

Longyearbyen, Svalbard, Norway; Thursday, August 4, 2016

Well, I guess it's one good night's sleep followed by a not-good one :-( With the broad daylight at night and our late drive to Bjorndalen, we did not go to bed until probably midnight. And I could not fall asleep for a while despite turning on the TV and watching BBC news repeatedly. Then I woke up around 5:30 and could not fall back to sleep. Sigh :-(....

It's a morning to kill before we had to check out and move our luggage to Wild Photo. We really did not do much today besides getting ready for then getting on the ship. After breakfast we first went to the grocery/general store and got a few luggage tags and tagged each of our bags. We really did not want to wear the boots all day so we put them in the dry bag which meant that we added a third piece of luggage. We did not have to worry about airline checkin limits now so that was OK. Before we checked out of the hotel at 11am (required), we first dragged the 2 large luggage across the street to Wild Photo's gallery. Then we made another trip and brought over the 2 heavy camera bags. Sophie was there so she would watch our bags. We wanted to go to town and try that Thai restaurant Roy mentioned yesterday. We learned that Thai actually was the 2nd largest population here in Longyearbyen! No Chinese restaurant, but there was Thai!

The Thai restaurant was quite different from the ones we’re accustomed to. It served Thai food as well as pizza, etc. Bob and I each ordered a Pad Tai, which tasted good but far from the Pad Tai we’re used to. We met Liz on the street so the three of us had lunch together then headed back to the gallery.

At 1pm, we had our first meeting. Roy talked about our itinerary etc. The 13 of us all met. There was a group of 6 people from India, with their own guide who was called Giant. Then there were the three of us, plus 2 guys from Hungary and 1 lady from Switzerland, Daniella. Not too bad, I remembered one name!

After the meeting, there was another stretch of free time. Bob and I went back to Radisson hotel to use the bathroom and sat on the comfortable chair until around 3 then went back to the gallery. Liz and I decided to walk to where our ship Origon was. Bob did not want to walk so he stayed in the gallery and made sure our luggage all made it on the car which Roy rented to shuttle luggage and people.

I was surprised to see how small the ship was. And it was quite old. We got on the ship before others got there and met the two cleaning ladies, Gabriel and Sally. Sally was new – later we learned that something happened to the original girl who was supposed to come, so they found her in the last hour. Nice girls. They were almost done with things and I was taken to our room, #31. This was the largest cabin on the ship, which had only 2 twin rooms with on-suite. It was on the top floor, and it was very very small! If I thought the Polar Pioneer was old, this ship was much much older and the room was really tiny! It smelled pretty bad, a damp kind of smell. And the bathroom was small, with a very tiny sink that did not drain. I felt depressed ….

On our same floor, there was another twin room, with a bunk bed, even smaller. Danielle has that cabin. Liz and others were on downstairs. Next to our 2 upstairs cabins, there was a staircase that led to downstairs. It was almost vertical! Quite scary! Best to walk down backwards. Liz and I did that. The downstairs rooms of course were all very small, mostly all single rooms, some had on-suites, some not. There was a small common lounge area, with a piano! The piano was old, but not out of tune!

We had another meeting shortly after 4 in the dining room. The captain and all the other ship staff came and talked briefly, the chief officer (a very young kid) went through all the security rules/measures and took us up to the deck to see where the immersion suites and life jackets were. They did not make me feel safe …. God almighty please bless us and not let anything happen! I was getting more nervous by the minute…. This old ship did not make me feel good ….

We had dinner at 7pm. Like the South Georgia trip, Martin would write down on the board each day’s schedule and mark on the map where we went.

Basically, we would sail out of the Isfjorde from Longyearbyen, turn right and sail through the Forlandsundet towards north. Then at the west top of the Spitsbergen islands, turn right and sail north/east towards the pack ice where the polar bears would be. We would sail straight there and not waste any time along the way. On our way back, when we have the time, we would go through the other small places. We might do some zodiac rides up north. Martin and Roy will be searching for the wild life, so more detailed plans would depend on the situation.

Dinner started at 7. Oh we met our chef, Ian, who was from somewhere in Canada. He cooked chicken for us, actually quite tasty. The ship started rocking before we finished our dinner. Because of the wind, we would have an hour of rocking followed by another hour of rolling before we would sail into a stretch of the sheltered area for about 6 hours. People all went back to their own rooms right after dinner. Bob and I did not want to deal with the very heavy and very old, very hard to open/close iron doors to the outside, so we walked down and then up the steep staircase and came back to our room. Now the ship started rocking quite badly. Unfortunately none of us took the anti seasick pills which must be taken a couple of hours before. I started feeling nauseous so I quickly lied down on the bed and tried hard to calm myself down. Bob was not so lucky and started throwing up for the next hour or so. All his lunch went out. The sink was completely blocked and the little room smelled even worse. I lied there and barely kept what’s in my stomach in there! Before 10pm, the ship sailed into the sheltered area and we were on smooth sea! I sat up and started writing my blog. I also need to download the pictures I took the last few days to make room for what’s coming.

The accommodation of this ship really depresses me but there’s nothing we could do. I must be positive and get most out of the situation!

With the 24 hour daylight, it will be hard to keep any normal schedule. We will probably be shooting during the night and sleeping during the day. Roy told us about this.

I am going to try to get some sleep after I download the pictures. No shower today. No sink to use so can’t wash face or brush teeth. Ugh ….

It’s 10:40pm now.

At Sea, Svalbard, Norway; Friday, August 5, 2016

Last nightI went to bed, after only brushing my teeth after 12am – after I wrote my blog/diary, downloaded all the pictures from the last few days, and charged the batteries. Bob was doing OK after we went into the sheltered water after after 10pm. He even took a shower and went to the captain to inquire about the blocked sink. Later the engineer came and got the sink to drain again by taking out the junk that was accumulated there from all the previous people. Yuk!

Could not fall asleep until probably after 1am and woke up after 4, then fell asleep again and got up after 7. Breakfast started at 8 and we went there 20 minutes after. Simple buffet breakfast but there was oatmeal there. On the map, Martin had already marked our sailing route. We will be sailing all day today, first north then north east. Hopefully tomorrow we will reach the ice and start seeing some bears!

At breakfast Martin sat at our table and we chatted a little bit. I feel very lucky to have Martin with us – he somehow injects confidence in us. He talked briefly after lunch about where we've been and where we are going. We definitely sailed past 80 degree north already and possibly 81 degree. He was wearing a short sleeve T-shirt whereas I was bundled up in a wool base layer, a vest, and a fleece. With this, it’s OK to walk briefly outside (as we had to to walk from our cabin to the dining room unless we wanted to walk down the vertical stair case then up the other end). Liz and other had stayed on the bridge the entire morning and saw some walrus and whales in the water. I felt like a pig as I ate and then slept …..

Roy gave a short talk at 2:30pm about photo tips especially in the Arctic area, with ice and snow. Need to over expose for 1 or 2. I will remember that.

After the talk, we came back to the cabin. I wanted to learn more about the new 1DX but hesitated to change the settings at the last minute. Roy is a Nikon user. Not sure if there’s a CANON expert on this trip. We chatted with Giant after lunch about the tiger trips in India. He recommended February and get an all day pass at the park. I am contemplating that …. If we could afford it, a private tour would be my choice ….

Bob took a big nap in the afternoon. Later we went up to the bridge for a while but did not see anything besides water so we came back. I took a nap, then it was about dinner time, 7 o’clock. Nowadays we depend on our watches to tell the time because it was always light outside.

Dinner was pork roast slices, with some cabbage and potato. The gravy was very tasty. Before we went back to the cabin, I chatted with Ian a little while he was making the bread dough for tomorrow’s breakfast. Interesting guy! He’s been to China many many years ago, around the time I went to the US.

Roy talked to us after dinner and told us that we would reach ice in 2 or 3 hours. The weather remained good, no storms so the water was calm. I took a shower and crawled into bed. Then I happened to look out of the window. Ice!! I immediately got up, put on all my clothes and went out with my wide angle lens. It was past 11pm. Liz was already there, and a few others. I took a few pictures with my wide angle, then came back and changed to the 100-400. It was cold! I did not stay too long. Took as many pictures as I felt were enough then came back to the cabin. Took off my layers of clothes and got into bed. We could hear the ship sailing through the ice.

Saw Our First Bear, Svalbard; Saturday, August 6, 2016

We heard Roy's voice outside the door – Polar Bear! We immediately jumped out of bed and I put on my clothes as fast as I could and got out with my 100-400. It was around 3 am.

Yes, our first bear! But he (I think it wa a he) walked rather far from us. Everyone was outside snapping photos. It was really too far away to get any decent photos. Roy said perhaps he would be curious and walked closer. Unfortunately he did not. I should use my 500 with the 1.4 extender….. Somehow a bit hesitant to do it, with the tripod, very cumbersome ….

The bear seemed to have walked off into the fog far away. I came back to the cabin. Bob went to the bridge for a short while then came back as well.

We both tried to sleep but both seemed to have a hard time doing so. It was only 4am and we really would like to get some sleep until the next objects showed up. We finally drifted off after 6am and got up shortly before breakfast at 8.

Roy announced to the team that the first polar bear did not seem to be too interested in us and walked away, so our ship continued to sail towards north east, to find a better ice spot where there might be more bears. He marked down on the board: blue whale: 1, polar bear: 1. Actually just at breakfast time when I got out of our cabin door to walk to the dining place, there was a seal on a piece of ice not too far from our ship. I did not bother to go back to get my camera so I did not capture it on the photo. I saw an Indian girl’s photo and was told that once our ship got closer it went into the water. Hopefully we will see a lot more of them.

Today’s activity was mainly searching, for polar bears and other wild life. We came back to our cabin after breakfast. Bob lay on his bed playing with his phone; I downloaded yesterday and today’s photos and tried to do a little reading of the 1DX manual to understand the AF stuff – still very confused ….

I lay on the bed till after 10am then decided to go up to the bridge for a bit. While there, Roy spotted a seal on a piece of ice. I came back to the room and got my camera. By that time the ice with the seal was rather close to the ship. I was able to get a couple of pictures before it went into the water. It was a beard seal. Two puffins actually landed on the same piece of ice while we were in the bridge, but I did not capture it.

Lunch was at 1pm as usual. Roy announced that we were sailing east then north to the big ice patch where it’s likely to have bears because they like the big stretches of ice where they could walk. It would take 2 or 3 hours. We came back to our cabin after lunch. There was nothing else to do but napping. Perhaps it’s better this way if we will get to see bears at night. With the 24 hour sun light, it matters less when the bears showed up. Our schedule is entirely dependent on the bears.

I napped till 3 or 4. Looking out of the window, we were sailing in the open water again, without seeing any ice. We decided to go to the dining room area to play some cards. While in the dining room, I noticed the sun was out and the colors of the sky was very nice, plus the chunks of floating ice. So I went back and got my camera and stayed outside with Liz and Daniella until it was too cold. By the way, it was around zero degrees Celsius, much colder than when we were in South Georgia. I am quite worried about the prospect of spending hours in the zodiac ….

We were sailing north towards the ice area. Roy said they communicated with their sister ship which was just there. I guess there must be promises of bear!

It is the third day we’re on the ship now. Wonder what luck will bring us …. Or no luck ….

Dinner at 7. As usual, it was very tasty and well prepared. It was fish today and I liked it. We’re been eating and sleeping for the past 2.5 days, and occasionally snapped a few photos. Roy announced at dinner that in a couple of hours we will be at the ice area where the sister ship had some information about bears. Let’s hope for the best. Again, it would be shooting at night.

We came back to the cabin after dinner. Bob immediately went to lie on the bed and started sleeping. Lucky guy! I changed the 100-400 lens onto the new 1DX and put the 16-35 on the old 1DX. I’ll see how that works.

Mother & Cubs; Sunday, August 7, 2016

Our ship reached the ice area we wanted to be around mid-night last night and stopped. We all went out to see what's going on, but nothing. We took some pictures of the ice and the sky then went back to our cabins. They would call us if any polar bears show up.

It took me a while to fall asleep, with all my inner layers on, on top of the quilt. Then all of a sudden we heard a knock on the door saying bears far away. We rolled up and went out as soon as we could. The bears were quite far away, even further than the one the day before. It took me a while before I could see the bears – three of them, one mother bear who had caught a seal and was right by it, eating; and two cubs away from the mother, sleeping. Giant took a picture using my camera to show me so I could see them and I finally did. Roy or Martin had hung a red balloon on the side of the ship hoping to lure the cubs but it did not work. We stayed out for a while. The guys all seemed to have the large long lenses on tripods and they could see the bears a bit more clearly. I did not want to bother with mine so I only used the 100-400 which really was too small. But the bears were really too far away, even with long lenses you could not get any real sharp photos.

We came back to the cabin before 4am and I tried to go to sleep but it took a long time. Finally I stripped down to the base layers and pulled the quit over me. It took me a while before I could fall asleep. The lst time I looked at my watch before I drifted off was after 4am.

We got up around 7:30am. Bob took a shower, I washed my face and brushed my teeth then we went to breakfast. I feel I am living like a slob – sleeping with my clothes on and not taking a shower every day …. Ugh! This is like camping on a ship.

After breakfast we started going back to our cabins. This was when either Roy or Giant yelled out the bears were there! I quickly grabbed my 100-400. We saw a mother followed by her 2 cubs running towards the kill, literally running. They were still quite far out but we took some pictures any way. We then saw the other 3 bears that we saw last night – not mother and 2 cubs, but three males with the biggest one made the kill. The other two smaller males kept their distance.  

All of us were on the deck watching and taking pictures now. I finally set up my tripod and the 500 plus the 1.4 extender and was able to capture some closer shots. Because I had the 100-400 on the new 1DX, I used the 500 on the older 1DX. Somehow I could not change the focus point – hate myself for not learning the camera! I was not able to get a good water reflection shot of the bears. Sigh …..

Roy came to tell us that we would move the ship now, so we were able to move our tripods and took pictures of the 3 bears until they finally walked away. They were absolutely precious! Our waiting and patience finally paid off!! At one point when they were rather close to us, we could hear the cubs crying, very funny. They were just too cute!!

After they walked off we all came back inside. I left my new 1DX and the 100-400 in the bag outside so it would not get fogged up, like most others did. That was about noon time. I looked at the pictures on the camera, rested a little, then we went to lunch.

This afternoon at 5pm, Giant would give a talk about Lightroom. I am excited – definitely want to go and learn!

Our ship had stayed in the ice area (about 81 degrees 30 minutes to the north, and 26 longitude) since last night, but now we were moving. The plan was to move more to the east. Tonight we will get there and hope to see more bears.

We sailed during lunch and we took a nap after lunch. I did not get much sleep last night as many others so I slept for an hour or so, until Roy came to tell us a bear was outside. We rolled off our beds, quickly put on our clothes and went out. It was a big male bear who got as close to our ship as the ice allowed. We got some good shots hopefully. And the shooting lasted until we were called in for dinner.

We had meat loaf for dinner. Again it was well prepared and quite tasty. Ian has been doing a good job! The big male bear was sleeping when we went to dinner, and it was still sleeping when we came out. Unfortunately the fog rolled in. My pictures were all white/gray in a blur. Roy said perhaps Photoshop could help increase the contrast. I will try after we get home.

I came back to the cabin around 9pm – no sense taking the blurry shots in the fog. It will be another sleepless night – we will go out to shoot as soon as the weather clears up. I would really like to take a hot shower! But the shower situation is just not enticing …. I am debating ….

I did take a shower, around mid-night, after spending HOURS copying the images from the fast CF card from the new 1DX to the disks – ingest using Photo Mechanics failed. I think there’s something wrong with the reader – copying the files also failed from time to time, so I ended up copying the 500+ files in batches and it took a long time. I had both cameras downloaded, batteries being charged, and cameras ready for the next shooting.

After the warm shower, I decided to change into my PJs and try to get some nice sleep. Just after I closed my eyes, there was a knock on the door and the words "bear on the move". I quickly dressed myself and went out. The captain was the one that called us and he was standing there. Ah, the big male bear, with the scar on his left butt, was very close to the ship! My 100-400 was even too close to get his full body and had to use the 100. He was really really so cute, especially when he lay down to sleep. We took tons of pictures of him! Everybody was out clicking. He looked at us, walking around, as if wondering what’s going on. Later he walked around the ship to the other side and we all moved accordingly. After a while he wandered off. That’s when I came back into the cabin. It was probably after 2. Bob woke up (he did not go out). I had a hard time falling asleep but I finally did.

Storoya Island, Monday, August 8, 2016

I woke up after 4 and fell back to sleep then woke up shortly after 6 and got up, still very sleepy.

After a big breakfast, we came back to the cabin. It was very foggy outside. The ship started moving after staying in the ice all night. The plan was to sail east to about 27 degrees longitude, then down south along the edge of Nordaustlandet where the world's third largest glacier was. We may get into the zodiac at some point if the weather allowed. That prospect really scared me …. How cold would it be?? I’ve been feeling freezingly cold already standing outside.

The three meals of the day are the only thing that kept us oriented about the day and night and the daily schedule. And I looked forward to them, just like being on the airplane – whatever they fed me, I ate. But the food on this trip was nice. Ian did a great job feeding us delicious meals.

After lunch at 1, Jay (Giant) gave us the talk on LightRoom session 1 – Image management. Very useful! Next session would be on image development which would be very helpful! Our ship now sailed east/south, would reach the island off the Nordaustlandet, right above 80 degrees north, between 27 and 30. Roy said it would be around dinner time, and we would probably go in the zodiacs to search for wild life. I was getting nervous ….

BTW, while chatting with Martin, we learned that the big bear that came to us at night might be a big female carrying babies. We’re not able to tell if it was a male or female. But it was big and fat.

Martin gave us a talk about polar bears at 5pm. Learned a lot about the polar bears. At dinner, Roy announced that we would be sailing by the Storoya island soon and we would first search for bears and probably do a zodiac trip. And we did, starting at 9pm. I was bundled up putting on all the layers I could – wool underlayers, fleece, down, then jacket/water proof pants, plus of course boots.

We were on the zodiac for more than 3 hours. They spotted 4 bears on the barren island, and a bunch of walrus on the rocks in the ocean. I was able to see 2 bears, sleeping in the caved-in part of rocks, away from each other. Then one of them woke up and became active, getting very close to the ocean and our zodiac was able to get in probably 10 meters of him/her! Shooting in the zodiac was tough and the water was quite choppy. Many of my shots were blurred with someone else’s body L But I was able to get some decent shots – not tag sharp, but considering the situation, not too bad. We came back to the ship after 12am. I then downloaded the 100’s of photos I took. By the time I crawled into bed, it was way past 2 or 3am. I was not able to fall asleep and after I finally drifted out, I did not sleep well at all. I woke up around 6

Humpback Whales, Tuesday, August 9, 2016

The day started off well – 4 humpback whales showed up right around our ship while we were having breakfast. I was able to finish my last bite when I stepped out to get my camera, a lot of others did not have breakfast before they went out.

I got many pictures of the whales flipping their flukes. Fantastic! It would beat any whale watching trip! Roy said we would get to the cliff with waterfalls around noon time. No zodiac trip, thank goodness! But be prepared to get wet as our captain usually gets the ship quite close.

I came back to our cabin after lunch, hoping to make up a little sleep. But I was not able to. I kept looking out to see if we got to the cliff and water falls when it got to after 4. 5pm came, nothing was happening so I went to the dining room which was also the gathering area. Then I learned the plan had changed: because of the ice condition and the wind, the captain could not get close to the waterfalls so we were sailing directly down south towards the Barentsoya island and would sail through the Freemansundet strait hoping to search for bears, then we would sail north around that island hoping to go to the waterfalls from the other direction tomorrow.

It turned out that the wind was strong and the water was quite choppy. Roy and Martin were searching at the bridge, but did not see any sure sign of polar bears, only a bunch of reindeer through the binoculars. I went outside for a short while before dinner. Even with the binoculars I did not see anything. At dinner, Roy announced the plan. We probably would not attempt the zodiac excursion tonight and we would dock at the sheltered place right after the strait for the night, hoping to get to the waterfalls tomorrow.

So today the biggest treat was the humpback whales in the morning. That was fantastic! I would not mind a do-nothing night and take a shower :-)

I went up to the bridge for a little bit. Roy showed us on the map exactly where we're sailing. We would explore one more area at the west end of the strait to see if we could find any bears. The wind was extremely strong. The crew locked our outside door because of the wind so we were not allowed on the deck any more. We came back to the cabin and both took the Bonine pills to prepare for a possibly rought night. Forget about the shower.

when Bob did and we got up around 7:30.

Nordaustlandet, Wahlbergoya Island & Birds Cliff, Wednesday, August 10, 2016

Last night was a rough one. Bob got sea sick again right after we came back down from the bridge and after we both took the Bonine pills. He smelt up our room. The ship rocked violently as we crossed from the south side of the strait to the north side. I went down and got Gabbie who came to change his bedding because it got soiled by his throw-up. As we sailed along the north side of the bay, the water was calmer. I went up to the bridge and watched as Roy and Martin counted the bears they could see through the binoculars. I could only see the dots. But I was able to see one bear, one of the ones they were talking about, a sleeping one. The landscape in the sun was beautiful but I did not take any pictures, as I was too scared to go outside.

I came back to our cabin probably around mid-night and went to bed in my base layer. The captain said it would be rocking for a few hours and he was right. The ship rocked quite badly throughout the night. But we were able to get some sleep and woke up right before breakfast at 8. And we went down after 8 because Bob wanted to take a shower.

After breakfast we were approaching the Brasvellbreen waterfalls. I went out to take pictures of the drifting slushy ice chunks and the sky, on both sides of the ship. Danielle was there also and she suddenly spotted a bear! I rushed over but not fast enough to take shots of the bear. I did see him though – he was a lot browner/yellower than the ice. There was a kill there, a seal that got stripped of its blubber and the bear was done with it. Only the birds were picking at the meat an skeleton. A pretty gruesome sight, with the intestines all hanging out …. Later we saw the bear on another piece of ice and then swimming away. Our ship did not follow the bear and headed through the ice straight towards the glacier and the waterfalls. And we spent a lot of time taking photos of the glacier and the waterfalls as the ship sailed along it. It's the world’s third largest glacier which pretty much covered the entire Nordaustlandet. The middle of the glacier had collapsed and pushed the glacier out to the ocean. An eye opener for me. After seeing this glacier, the other glaciers we’ve seen were no longer worth seeing J

I came back to the cabin to warm up and downloaded the morning photos. At lunch time, Roy announced the plan for rest of the day. We will reach the small island Wahlbergoya where there might be a lot of walrus. We will do a zodiac landing and hope to shoot the walrus. After that, at night we will go by the bird cliff where there were thousands of birds and that’s where the baby birds jump to the ocean. We will see how the plan goes.

Shortly before 5 we reached the south shore of the Wahlbergoya island where we would do zodiac landing and walk on shore to shoot walrus. It was a short ride but we all bundled up of course. There were a lot of walrus on the island all huddled together and many swimming in the ocean. These ugly creatures were actually quite cute. They’re kind of like the elephant seals in South Georgia, but not quite as big as the big male elephant seals. They were quite big though, very labored to move on land but very agile in the water. Roy and a few others got really really close to the few in the water. And they were very friendly or curious about these humans. We took as many pictures as we wanted and came back to the ship before 7:30. Dinner was at 8. Next stop would be the bird cliff.

Roy announced at dinner that we would reach the birds cliff around 10pm. Most likely we would shoot from the ship and not do zodiac, but the ship would sail very close to the cliff. There were more than 19 thousand birds there. I could not imagine what it would be like …..

We reached the birds cliff around 10pm. Roy came to our cabin to tell us because we both fell asleep – very tired. The birds cliff was indeed an amazing scene! I honestly did not know what’s the best way to capture it. Giant was teaching others how to pan and capture the flying bird image with blurred background. Very nice! But that could be anywhere since the background was all blurred. I did not know how to pan any way. All the images I captured were cliff scenes where all the birds were standing on the rock edges but the birds were not sharp. The scene reminded me of the bird tour we took in Norway on the Hurtigruten cruise, except at a much larger scale. Impressive.

Very cold. Much colder than earlier when we went on shore. I came back to the cabin around 11pm. While it was not rocking, I think I would take a shower.

Monaco Glacier, Thursday, August 11, 2016

Last night was a "normal" one. After the birds cliff, we all went to bed, before or around mid-night. I took a shower but it took me a long time to fall asleep. I probably dozed off after 2. This morning Bob's alarm went off at 7:15 and woke me up. According to what Roy said yesterday, today we would sail by a glacier and a fjord, and we would be doing another zodiac excursion.

At 10 am we were ready to go on the zodiac – we were quite close to the glacier, the Monaco Glacier, beautiful scenery! There were two other ships in the area, one a cruise ship was from Holland, the other from Germany. The German ship was a smaller one and they sent out 5 or 6 zodiacs. But they were not close to us. Our zodiacs sailed through the ice to get closer to the glacier. The weather was relatively warm – I did not even need gloves to handle my cameras and did not freeze my hands off. Fantastic zodiac excursion. Beautiful scenes! It was fun to be with Roy who was driving the zodiac and gave us a few hints on the scene to take photos of. We came back to the ship shortly before 1pm. Everyone was starved for lunch.

Roy announced the plan for the rest of the day. We’re sailing on the west coast now which was a lot busier than where we had been to. There were quite a few cruise ships and bigger expedition ships. We would be sailing into one of the fjords and we would do another zodiac excursion in one of the bays where there might be bears, foxes, and birds. It would be after dinner. Aside from worrying about the coldness at night and the layers of clothes, I did not fear the zodiac excursion as much now. 

At 2pm after lunch, Giant gave the 2nd session of Light Room. Lots of good information. I really should take a LR course.

I took a off-and-on nap after the LR session until dinner. After dinner we had the zodiac excursion to the Hamilton Bay starting at 9pm. It was not as cold as I expected so the excursion was good! We saw a couple puffins, a lot of guillemots and their chicks, and a couple of baby fox. The baby birds jumping off the cliff to start their life was a sad scene. Their mothers hatched them on the high cliff to avoid predators. But the chicks would need to jump off the cliff to start their lives. Many of them jumped to their death …. And many of them made it to the ocean below but got snatched by the gulls ….. Sad! ….

We came back to the ship shortly after mid-night. I downloaded the photos from the long lens camera and took a shower then went to bed. 

Kongsfjord, Friday, August 12, 2016

The plan for today, as Roy originally announced last night, was to do Kongsfjord zodiac excursion in the morning, 14thjuly bay in the afternoon, and a glacier hike after dinner. Then the plan was changed in the morning because there were too many ships in Kongsfjord, so we turned back to go to Lillethook fjord in the morning instead. It was overcast.

No zodiac excursion in the morning. It was drizzling and cloudy, miserable weather. I dressed up for the zodiac but was very glad we did not go. I stood outside on the deck all morning, shooting the glacier scenes and practicing shooting birds in flight. Got a couple of decent ones. The glacier was magnificent, rugged and beautiful. While our ship just floated there, there were a few calvings of the glacier and we could hear the rumbling sound from far away.

After lunch, the plan was to do zodiac excursion at the 14thofJuly bay. The evening glacier hike was cancelled. We would do zodiac back at the Kongsfjord. That was the plan.

At around 4pm our ship reached the Blomstrandhalvoya area of the Kongsfjord. The drizzling continued. Bob decided not to go on the zodiac excursion to reduce the chance of him catching a cold. I debated if I should go, and I finally decided to go, with only my 100-400 in a rain sleeve. Shooting in the rain was not fun for me. We got some pictures of 3 seals who were quite cute, and shots of a long tailed skua. Everyone got wet, on the outside only since every one had a water proof jacket and pants. We came back to the ship after an hour, right before dinner.

The plan for tonight changed – we would not do another zodiac excursion. We will do one, our last one of this trip, tomorrow.

Roy gave a nice talk and slide show on Svalbard Winter. Looking at the photos, it was really tempting to do it with them in March. But I am not sure if we would be able to deal with the cold ….

After the talk, one of the Indian team guys did one of Liz's photos using her LR to show how he would do it. I watched. I really need to take a class on LR!

Back to the cabin before 10. Need to think about packing now.

Last Day of Expedition, Saturday, August 13, 2016

We had a good long night's sleep – went to bed before 10pm and got up at 7:30. I even fell asleep rather quickly. It was bright and sunny today. Good weather.

On the board, Roy wrote down today’s tentative itinerary: around 10 am we would arrive at and cruise on Origo at Billefjord. In the afternoon we would be at Diabas which was very close to Longyearbyen which we would arrive back at around 10pm. And that concluded our trip.

The day did not really go by the plan. It was a gorgeous day, sunny and warm. We ended up going into the zodiac at Bellefjord, At first we were just shooting birds. Then over the radio Roy heard another ship saw a polar bear not too far away, so we went over. Yes! A nice juvenile bear was sleeping on the bank by the shore. It was rather far away, at least for my 400 lens so the shots were not that great. The bear was sound asleep and not paying attention to the ships and zodiacs watching him(her?). We waited in the zodiac, shooting birds including puffins. Then we decided to go back to lunch and then return. And that’s what we did. We got back on the ship around 1:30, then we returned back to the zodiac around 3. It was so warm and sunny and it was not cold in the zodiac at all! The bear was still sleeping and it only moved around to change its sleeping position a couple of times during the 3+ hours we were there, so we mainly shot birds – fulmars, Arctic terns, a couple of puffins, etc. It was a fun trip.

We came back to the ship shortly after 6 and I started packing. Our ship docked back at Longyearbyen before 10pm. We would sleep on the ship and disembark around 9am tomorrow. Our flight is at 2:45pm tomorrow, so we would probably spend a little time in town before heading to the airport.

It was a wonderful expedition! We had the good luck of seeing a few bears close, including the mother and cubs, plus the humpback whales, the walrus, the fox, etc. True it was an expedition trip rather than a luxury one, but nothing beats this kind of photo focused expedition! I wish we were 10 years younger and had more $ - I would have loved to do this trip again in September when the golden sunrise and sunset lights are available.

We were up to 81 degree and 32 minutes north when we saw those snow bears. Don’t think we would go any more north in our lives!

Oslo, Norway; Sunday, August 14, 2016

I could not sleep last night for some reason. Once our ship docked back in Longyearbyen, I had cellphone signals and I was able to check my emails. I purposely did not read the emails and simply browsed the subject lines and deleted most of them. I read a couple of emails – one from the kennel, one from Ira, etc. But then I got a msg from Verizon telling me they're charging me $25 for international data. I was very puzzled. Did I exceed my $40 provision?? I quickly turned cellular data off to avoid further charge. I would wait till we got internet.

We got out of bed around 6:30 – I did not really fall asleep. I finished the last packing and then we went to breakfast, our last breakfast on the ship for this trip. The Indian group plus Martin and Daniele had left for their early flight, so it was just the two of us, plus the two Hungarian guys, and Roy, and some of the crew. By 9am, we said goodbye to each other. Then Roy drove the ship’s station wagon with the 4 of us plus another two he picked up from the other ship back to town. It was raining and overcast. Since it was Sunday, almost all stores were closed. We left our luggage at the gallery where Sophie came in today for us. Bob then went to the Radisson lounge to sit comfortably and use their internet. I went with Liz first to the museum – I wanted to see if they had that Svalbard Spitsbergen book, but they ran out of the English version. Then we walked to the center of town. There was a good expedition sport store open where I found the ideal dry bag I had been looking for! The perfect bag! Very well made, by Sweden. But it was quite expensive, more than $200. I would have bought it if I knew for sure we would do such expedition again. I decided to not spend the $ and get it if/when we come back here ….

Roy got us a taxi to pick us up at the gallery at 1pm to the airport. We were on the same flight. The flight was on schedule and took off around 2:45pm. Our first top was Tromso where everyone had to go through immigration and custom, had to take out the checkin luggage then re-checkin. It was a very stupid and painful process, especially when we had such heavy camera bags. And the weather was getting warmer and warmer as we left Longyearbyen where we really needed the warm jackets and fleece. We stopped at Tromso for about half an hour or 45 minutes, then back on the same plane again. Now we were wearing only our base layers and it was quite warm.

Shortly after 7pm we arrived at Oslo. Again we’re staying at the airport Radisson which was REALLY convient! And it was so much better than the one in Longyearbyen! We were really not crazy about their dinner buffet, but it did not make sense for us to go anywhere else, so we did the buffet again. Oh I really would love to have some oriental food!

Bob and I were both wearing our heavy boots from the ship to Oslo because they could not fit into the two checkin luggage. Once we got to the hotel, my feet were liberated! Oh it felt good! We had a third suitcase stored at the Radisson since there was no problem with checking in 2 pieces of luggage each person from now on.

Tonight: wash my hair, take a good shower, and watch some TV, hopefully get some Olympic news – we were outside of civilization for too long! But the trip was indeed wonderful! Another rewarding experience!

At the Longyearbyen airport, Roy showed me and Liz his photos. Wow!!! We were at the same spots but his shots were simply stunning, whereas my own were so shabby ….. Very discouraging! I really need to learn!!!

Reykjavík, Iceland; Monday, August 15, 2016

We had a good night's sleep – I felt good being able to take a shower in a normal shower tub and wash my hair! We did not get up this morning until around 8 even though I woke up a few times before that. We did not have to check out of the hotel until noon. Our flight was at 2:45pm, so plenty of time to take things easy.

I was able to upload my diary from the past 10 days up to my TravelPod blog. The prospect of dragging the 3 pieces of luggage to the airport while carrying the heavy camera bags did not excite me, but fortunately the walk was short. We checked out of the hotel at noon. The rather tough/tiring journey started there.

Everything at the Oslo airport went as expected. The security check required all the camera bags be open, and the guard even took out my camera with the 100-400 lens and the 500mm lens out to scan separately which really annoyed me, even though I knew they were just doing their job....

The Icelandair was a cheap airline, so it did not have a gangway - all of us had to be bussed from the terminal to the plane on the tarmac. It was rather painful for us with heavy backpacks. But we got on relatively early so there was no issue getting the 2 gabs into the overhead space. 2.5 hour later we landed in Reykjavik. We have heard that the Reykjavik airport was quite small, so I thought I was mentally prepared. What I did not know was that there were many many tourists visiting Island! I started realizing that when I ran into a tourists group from either Thailand or Malaysia, all older people! Also some Chinese as I could hear Mandarin speaking somewhere. The airport was so crowded and chaotic!  When we finally got to the bag claim place, it was people mountain people sea! The duty free shop was somehow right at the luggage area which made things even more chaotic. We could not find the luggage cart. The only carts we could see were the shopping carts so we got one. There were three luggage carousels each had luggage from 3 or more flights. I felt very lucky that all our three pieces of suitcases made it there! 

After we got our luggage, we had to figure out how we could get to our hotel. I started to realize that we did almost no planning of the time we were to spend at Reykjavik at all, besides booking the photo tour with Paul. How would we get to the hotel?? No idea! Taxi or rent a car? Don't know.... Sigh .... After asking at the information desk, we learned that our hotel was right in down town which was about 45km away, that was 30 or so miles. Then asking the taxi we found out the taxi ride would cost about $140 USD. Ouch! Bob decided to rent a car which would cost the same amount. And he got one small Toyota Carola, with manual shift. Bob had no problem driving stick shift. So off we went, while Bob only knew approximately where to go after looking at the map.

We actually eventually got to our hotel! Phew! That was after a few detours and stopping to ask the locals. Bob did well! 

Our hotel, the Odinsve hotel seemed to be in sort of a down town residential area, but very close to the shops, restaurants of down town. The girls at the front desk were very nice and friendly. We got room 310, which was on the 4th floor ( ground floor, first, second, and third, etc) directly facing the elevator. I was worried about how noisy it might by but it turned out I had no need to worry. Even though there were kids in the hotel, we were not disturbed at all! But, the room was really tiny! It was arranged efficiently, but the space was so small. And the bathroom was like the size of the one on the cruise ship (NOT the one on Origo, thank goodness!). I wondered if it was because I booked through booking.com so we were given the smallest room .....

After we quickly settled in the room, we went out to explore down town. I was very excited seeing the various store selling all sorts of wool products! Things were all very expensive! I found the store 66 degree north, the arctic clothing store that I heard of. I got a few small items for souvenirs and also for practical uses. Then we went to dinner at a Japanese/fusion restaurant called Sushi Samba. Bob and I each had the chef's 7-course dinner. It was the first time we actually had smoked puffin meat and raw mink whale meat! I felt quite bad having them .... And it turned out the meal was more than what we could comfortably consume even though we both stuffed it down. Gladly the last course was rack of lamb and it was very rare, so I gave half to Bob :-) It was an expensive meal, but would be the only expensive one we would have here.

After dinner, we walked to a laundrymat, which was in a cafe. It was at the basement level of the cafe and smelt quite unpleasant. 8 machines, one broken, 3 dryers and 4 washers. Besides us, there was an American family there - they went hiking yesterday and were completely soaked so they were using the dryers to dry their clothing. We did our load and did not come back to the hotel until after 11pm. I sweated that I would never attempt to do laundry in a strange city again!

Oh, I forgot to mention my first impression of Reykjavik or Iceland. The airport did not leave me with a good impression. The drive from the airport to Reykjavik took more than half an hour. Along the way, most of what we passed was undeveloped land, flat, nothing exciting. A few small patches of buildings showed up, probably some small towns. The buildings were rather flat, one or two stories. As we were approaching Reykjavik, A rainbow showed up which was quite pretty. The weather was bad, heavily overcast and drizzling. But by the time we got to our hotel, the sun even came out for a few short minutes! People were wearing down coats. It was rather chilly. The weather forecast said the next few days would all be like this. I guess our photo tour would be ruined ....

While on the Svalbard photo tour, Giant told me that I would need some ND filters to shoot the Iceland landscape and I could get them in Reykjavik. We decided to go to the camera store tomorrow.

We probably went to bed after mid-night with the TV on. By the way, the TV had CCTV America! I never saw it in the US! We got to see a few scenes of the Olympic.

Reykjavík, Iceland; Tuesday, August 16, 2016

I woke up a few times last night even though I was tired and fell asleep rather quickly. We got up around 7 and I started repacking the suitcases so that we only had to bring 1 suitcase when we go with Paul tomorrow.

We went down to breakfast around 8am, even though I could smell the bacon in our room earlier when breakfast started at 7. A regular breakfast, similar to what we had at the Radisson Blu in Oslo, with less selections. Not bad, but nothing there really excited me.

We walked out of the hotel shortly after 9am and wanted to walk to that camera store nearby. We walked by many stores which had attractive displays but were still closed - it seemed that no store was open before 10am. When we got to the small camera store after 10, it was still closed and there was no information on when it would open. We then went to the 66 degree north store which was different from the one we went to yesterday. I got another T-shirt. Then we went back to the camera store. It was now open. Unfortunately they did not have the Lee filter kit and ND filters I was looking for. He told us the other place that would have them was called BECO and showed us on the map where that store was. He told us the price in Iceland was definitively higher than in the US, so I though I would give up the idea of getting these filters. But since it was raining and we had nothing else to do, we decided to drive to the other store. We got back to the hotel then picked up the car which Bob was lucky enough to park almost right outside the hotel (he had to make sure to pay at the kiosk for 4 hours and displayed the ticket in the car window at 9am - no charge from 6pm to 9am, only about $1USD per hour).

We found the BECO photo store, after getting lost and then stopping to ask at a restaurant. BECO had everything I needed. And we decided to bite the bullet and got the stuff! Expensive, and unexpected purchase! I'd better try to take a decent landscape photo! Bob had to spend quite some time on the phone with VISA to finally get the amount approved.

It turned out that the BECO camera store was not that far from the EuRopcar rental place we had to go to return the car. With a few more detours, we found the car return place and returned the car. We were prepared to take a bus and find our way back, but the car rental company said they would drive us back to downtown. Wow!! How nice!

The guy who drove us back turned out to be actually from the US! He married a girl from Iceland and they decided to settle here. He just moved to Reykjavik 4 months ago. He told us that he did not know the Iceland language himself and the language was very complicated. I told him that it was impossible for us to drive around here and the names were very difficult to recognize. I wish I had chosen the phone plan to spend $10 a day so we could use the GPS on my phone! Now we know!

We got back to our hotel after 2pm. We were hungry. We had said that today we would find a Thai restaurant. It turned out there was an express Thai food place just a few steps away from our hotel, called Kura Thai Express. I had a bowl of soup noodles with duck, Bob had chicken curry with rice, and we shared some spring rolls. Simple, inexpensive, and hit the spot! We were quite full. We walked around for some more, then came back to the hotel - Bob took his nap while I caught up on my diaries/blog.

After Bob woke up from his nap, we took the 2 suitcases to be stored at the hotel downstairs. We did not realized that the time was already past 7pm. There was still daylight and we were not hungry. But we decided to go have dinner any way so we would not eat too late. We wanted to go to the Thai restaurant. Tried to yelp it and found a few so we walked towards one of them called Ban Thai. On the way there, we saw another Thai restaurant called The noodle house which was what the original restaurant there called and they did not change the name. It was on the 2nd floor of one of the busy streets nearby. It turned out to be quite good! We had our favorite Pad Thai, a chicken basil dish with rice, and a Tom Yom seafood soup. All were decent. Not quite like the Thai food we were used to at home, but quite tasty, very salty though.

By the time we're done with dinner, it was 9pm. But there was still day light, even though getting a little darker, especially with the heavy clouds. We took a walk by the landmark Church here then came back to the hotel. It was a do-nothing day but spent too much on the filters. I looked online at B&H, we probably could have gotten all the same stuff for $200 or $300 less. Sigh ....

Tomorrow Paul will pick us up at 8am. We want to get to bed early.

Kirkjubæjarklaustur, Southern Iceland; Wednesday, August 17, 2016

Paul picked us up at the hotel at 8am sharp - we already checked out and were waiting in the hotel lobby waiting for him. We were both very punctual. Paul had a big Nissan SUV and we all fit in comfortably. We had trouble with Bob's VISA debit card again even though Bob called the bank last night and was told that everything was OK. Paul said not to worry and we would call the bank later when there was some body there - the bank was not really 7x24 as they said they would be.

It was raining/drizzling and heavily overcast. Paul said we would change our route and do the normal southern road first and do the highlands when we came back. That was fine with us, as we really did not know what was what.

Paul seemed to be a good guide and a nice man! We first stopped at a couple of famous water falls whose names I could not remember or pronounce. There were lots of tourists! And it was raining. Paul taught me how to use the various filters I got and I was able to take shots of the waterfalls with the falls looking silky! Cool! We also stopped at the small museum  which had a 20 minute movie showing the big volcano eruption in 2010. Quite impressive. We stopped at a couple of other places to take photos of some horses and the lava land - back in 1782 the lava flowed for 2 years! The lava rocks filled the land for more than 2 km long. It was a very strange and rather grotesque scene - moss has grown on all the lava rocks and it was a stretch of green mossy weird-shaped rocks! We stopped to take pictures but I was not able to capture the scenery too well. Sigh ....

We stopped to have lunch at a place. By 6pm-ish we reached the hotel we were staying for 2 nights - hotel Laki. I had no idea that I was supposed to book and pay for the hotel room for Paul as well. Apparently that was the custom here and he did not have to tell anyone else. But I had the impression that guides usually take care of their own lodging .... Fortunately the hotel had another room available, a cottage outside of the hotel main building. I paid for it of course. This left me with a very poor impression of Paul about how he conducted the deal ....

We came to our room, #311. Oh boy, it really was a very simple and small room! It was simpler and shabbier than a normal motel room in the US. Oh well ..... A very expensive tour with uncomfortable accommodations! ....

We had dinner at the hotel. Funny thing that there was a Chinese tourists group here also. It seemed that the Chinese from mainland China were really all around the world nowadays!

While we were having dinner, the sun came out and painted the sky quite pretty! But when we went out to take pictures right after dinner, all the colors had disappeared. Sigh ....

This tour would be an expensive wet-our-appetite first trip to Iceland. It is a country with a lot of natural wonders and beauties. We were just seeing a tiny part of it. I would not get my expectations up too high, especially when the weather has been uncooperative.

We would meet Paul at breakfast at 8am tomorrow.

Glaciers, Waterfalls, etc.; Thursday, August 18, 2016

Even though the hotel room was shabby, the beds were decent and we had a good night's sleep. We were supposed to meet Paul at 8am for breakfast, but Bob and I were all done before 7:30 so we went to breakfast and waited for Paul while we ate. And we got on the road around 8:30. Paul's plan for today was to go to the couple of glacier lagoons, to see the icebergs, and more waterfalls. Today's weather was gorgeous! We were lucky! It rained this morning - I woke up around 4 or 5am and heard the rain outside. But when we went out, the rain was gone, the sky was blue with beautiful clouds. I was so amazed at the mountains shrouded in clouds along the way and took some video using the little Sony while Paul was driving. Iceland has the largest glacier in Europe and we drove by it. The various glacier "bleeding spots" showed up here and there. There was one big "ice lake" which had a quite unique scene. Kind of pretty. We stopped there for about an hour. I took some pictures with the icebergs in the "lake", then went off trying to take a few pictures of the sheep nearby. I really LOVE these sheep! They're everywhere and they're always eating. Mostly white sheep, but there were also black ones, brown ones, and mixed colored ones. Also there're horses and cows. There was very little crops and for whatever little there was, it was some vegetable. The vast land was mostly black, sand or dirt from the volcano, and people don't farm them. At most what they grew was hay, for the sheep, horses and cows. We stopped at a roadside visitor spot which had a board that had the story of Paul's grandfather who was an explorer in 1875. There was a mountain named after him and there was a book talking about their 12-day expedition across the glacier. The most interesting place we stopped was near the glacier lake where big icebergs were washed into the ocean and were standing on the beach. Paul taught me a way to shoot icebergs with silky ocean water around it. I took 100's of shots but did not get one ideal one :-( But I really really love that spot! I could have spent hours there trying to practice my shooting skill! If and when we come back next time, we would be on our own and we would definitely come back here! It was quite a bit of driving with stopping here and there. Of course we stopped at another waterfall and I tried to use the filters to get the silky effect. We had dinner in a restaurant about 4km away from the hotel. We all had burgers which were quite good. Then we were back at the hotel before 8pm. Paul said we would meet for breakfast at 7. Bob and I came back to our little room and I started downloading the two days' photos. I had trouble with the new fast CF car again and had to import twice - the second time it succeeded. I wanted to get things ready for tomorrow. Tomorrow Paul will drive to the highlands then back to Reykjavik.

The Highlands, Last Day of the Photo Tour; Friday, August 19, 2016

We met Paul at breakfast at 7am and checked out of the hotel at 8. Today's plan was to drive through a small part of southern Iceland's highlands. The day was beautiful - sunny and warm. We were lucky!

The path through the highlands was not paved. Parts of it was gravel, others were rocks and black volcano ash. Paul had to let some air out of the tires so we would feel the bumpiness less. He was great!

The highlands were absolutely great! A totally different scenery - lots of moss covered green mountains, black volcano ash covered vast land, and the glacier peeked out in the background here and there, and of course rivers and waterfalls. I was too lazy to take out the tripod at every stop and use the ND filters more. I found that taking landscape photos was so different from wild life. It was an education. Paul was very good at it! I wish I could be more like him ....

We picked up some snacks before we entered the highlands in the morning, as there would be no food stores or anything there. The drive was as difficult as the one in Hawaii to the green sand beach at times, and Paul drove through rivers, etc. Only people who know the roads would dare to drive through there! Next time if we come back, Bob would not drive into the highlands, but we will drive through Iceland on the "ring road".

My favorite part of this trip, I would say, was the icebergs on the beach near the glacier lake, with the highlands being a close second. I wish we saw some puffins and I could get some photos. We will have to be back. I love the sheep and horses and would love to get more interesting photos of them!

Paul dropped us back at the hotel before 6:30pm. We then went to the Thai restaurant again. Then back at the hotel and I started packing. Tomorrow we would need to get up at 5 and be waiting for the bus at 6am - we booked the bus to the airport.

Vacation is over. We had a wonderful trip! But we are ready to go home and see our "kids"!