Essays
Philosophical and Political
2022 The Northern Route – Norway
The trip from Oslo to Bergen was the first time ever that I’ve felt shuffled around in a prototypical “tour” group. Thirteen hours from point to point with five changes of transport (train to train to boat to bus and back to train)—a recipe for exhaustion and...
2022 The Northern Route – Flatey Iceland
16 September: I left Westfjords last evening, taking the ferry across Breiòafjoròur, a large bay separating the Westfjords from the Snaefellsnes Peninsula and am a hundred miles or so north of Reykjavik in a community called Reykholt; in two days I leave for Oslo....
2022 The Northern Route – Isafjordur Iceland
My introduction to the Westfjords was to rolling country for the most part including even the fjords. But as I’ve driven farther, especially since Holmavik, the valleys and mountainsides have grown deeper and higher. This is how I imagined the whole vast (for Iceland)...
2022 The Northern Route – Akureyri Iceland
Big weather change: wet (although not much so), foggy (much so), and temp in the mid-30s. I’d rather this wasn’t happening just as I prepare to launch into the Westfjords region, said to be the most unpopulated except for the Highlands. The main problem is...
2022 The Northern Route – Husavik, Iceland
I drove the “Diamond Circle” today—it’s a name that confirms that marketing hyperbole has infected travel talk as much as it has real estate and anywhere else it is considered useful. I enjoyed the trip, about 250 km, and it adds to my growing picture of what this...
2022 The Northern Route – Iceland II
The drive north along the east coast (of Iceland) pleased me as these dramatic landscapes usually do. It was high, talus-sloped mountainside port and Atlantic Ocean starboard all the way, with the space between them varying from almost none to a mile, more or less. I...