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Iceland 2025

I met Daniel back in 2013, and we’ve been talking about driving the Ring Road in Iceland pretty much since then. It took me staring down the barrel of 40 (and a great deal on airfare) to make it finally happen, but finally happen it did.

On the way there, I had an overnight layover in London but decided to spend the night closer to Heathrow in Windsor, England (not recommended unless you’re hot for the royal family or private school lads). The next day, I arrived in Reykjavik around 10:30 a.m. Daniel had arrived in the wee hours and picked me up on a gray, drizzly morning in our rental car. Google “black Suzuki Jimny” and eat your heart out. Daniel said he’d always wanted to drive one, and we agreed it looked like a G-wagon that got shrunk in the dryer. It would be the first time I’d driven outside the U.S. and the first time I’d driven a standard in many years, but—spoiler alert—there were no problems.

The first of many waterfalls. Tiny people for scale.

For anyone who doesn’t know, the Ring Road in Iceland encircles the entire island (imagine that), though you’re not on the coast the whole time. Guidebooks recommend allowing for at least seven days to do it. Daniel and I would be doing it in about 4.5 days, which we both agreed after the fact was plenty. We probably missed some things, but thankfully neither of us approaches travel as a checklist, nor are we interested in visiting places just because “everyone goes there.” They tend to look just like everyone else’s photos anyway.

One of the more touristy waterfalls (we didn’t stay long)

It was only about 2.5 hours from the airport to our first stop, Vik, which was the easiest-to-pronounce town of the whole trip. On the way, we stopped at a couple waterfalls (soon realizing we couldn’t stop for all of them – they’re everywhere), a glacier, and just generally admired the otherworldly landscape. We stopped for lunch at a gas station called “Bjork” because it was called “Bjork” for the first of what would be many gas station hot dogs. I looked it up later, and that word just means “birch” in Icelandic, so I guess it’s like naming a girl Willow or something. Anyway, gas station hot dogs are actually pretty good there, especially when wrapped in bacon, and at around $5 they’re about the cheapest meal you can hope to get in Iceland.

We saw this sign on a playground and adopted it as our motto for the trip…and life

One of the coolest things about driving the Ring Road was how frequently the landscape would suddenly changed. You’d be driving through a vast field of lumpy lava rocks covered in green moss, then round a bend and suddenly its either a brown grass field or a massive mountain range, endless valley, or dramatic coastline. The word “epic” got abused pretty badly a few years ago, but it’s really the only word for Iceland.

I’d heard Iceland was expensive. Then I found out for sure. While the rental car and hotels weren’t particularly expensive, everything else generally cost 2-4 times what they do at home. Examples: beer was around $11-14 a pint, a large pizza was $35, gas was between $9-10 a gallon, a small plush puffin keychain was about $15, and so on. I’m pretty cheap by nature (and I had just left my job three days before the trip) so it always stung, but I just had to get over it and stop doing the math. However, travel tip: the Apple calculator now has a built-in currency converter – wish I’d known about that before I accidentally spent $75 on hamburgers in Norway that one time…

Daniel’s phone said it was only 270 meters to the waterfall, but we’re pretty sure it was missing a zero. Uphill.

I really liked all the modern, minimal architecture there

Friends have asked what my favorite part of the trip was, and the boring-but-true answer is simply looking out the window. Iceland is easily the most beautiful place I’ve ever been. Some parts reminded me of Oregon and Colorado, but the rest looked like nowhere else I’ve visited. I chose not to take many photos on the drive because I knew they wouldn’t do it justice. And while I don’t think I’d recommend doing the Ring Road with younger kids, I’d highly recommend anyone do it who can. We were not disappointed. I think it helped that I intentionally didn’t look up any photos or videos beforehand; I wanted to see it all for the first time in person.

We’re not NOT stopping to photograph a lighthouse…

I laughed at myself after taking this. So clever. Such an artiste.

While I remember the places we stayed in clearly, the days of driving mostly bleed together at this point. The small towns (and they’re pretty much all tiny by U.S. standards – a couple hundred to a thousand people, max) were clean, quaint, and picturesque. I had strong, wistful feelings looking at playgrounds and elementary schools; I couldn’t help imagining healthy, Viking-descended kids enjoying ideal childhoods, if that’s really a thing. In fact, everywhere we went seemed very clean and well cared for. We noticed that even some municipal and industrial buildings were sleek, modern, and stylish. Maybe there’s a price to pay for all that order, but I liked it.

The spot everyone takes pictures from in Seydisfjordur. Also where Walter Mitty barely escapes the volcano in the film.

A couple people have since asked me if I thought I could live in Iceland. If I knew people there, could find a job, and magically learn Icelandic without having to work at it, then sure. It’s very pretty, and I don’t mind the cold. (I might if I was there in winter.) But since those things aren’t going to happen by accident, probably not.

This place smelled like hell (I’m guessing) – rotten eggs with sulfur sprinkled on top

This was my first non-nonprofit trip traveling with anyone else, and of course it was a lot more fun. But people with friends and couples who actually like each other already knew that. Daniel’s been to about twice as many countries as I have thus far, so we’re both fairly seasoned and easygoing travelers (not tourists!). The simple back-and-forth of, “Want to stop?” “Sure, why not.” led to seeing some great stuff I’m sure I’d have skipped over if I was flying solo. Good travel buddies are hard to find, and I’m glad to know a good one.

Daniel in an abandoned house near Husavik

I was thinking of “Wind From the Sea” by Andrew Wyeth when I took this

It was also great traveling with a fellow photographer because we always wanted to stop for the same stuff. We spent a fair amount of time in an abandoned house outside Husavik, which was the farthest north either of us have ever been. We were only about an hour drive from the arctic circle, but it was too out of the way to go. With frozen hands, we drove into Husavik craving chowder and ended up a little cafe that served mushroom soup with free refills. At $20, I felt entitled to three helpings, but it was amazing. I don’t have a “favorite food” because I love the experience of craving something specific, seeking out that thing, and having it actually hit the spot (it doesn’t always). This one did. Lovely.

Let’s see, what were some other highlights… Akureyri up north is the second largest city in Iceland (at only around 20k people), but it was fun walking around there – had a good feel to it. We shared a good, spicy pizza in…Egilsstadir, I think? After that, a nice little happy hour in a hostel there. The road down into Seydisfjordur—the one Walter Mitty longboards down in the movie—was beautiful but super windy; Daniel did a great job keeping us on the road (it seemed like he got all the hard driving days). At our last stop in Borgarnes, we ended up in a little restaurant that had horse meat on the menu. I almost didn’t do it because it was the most expensive thing, but I pride myself on trying “weird” foods. I’m glad I did; it tasted just like beef and was the best steak I’ve had in a long time. Also the best meal I had in Iceland.

Daniel gassing up the Jimny in Grundarfjörður (try saying that once at regular speed)

I think the thing I’ll remember most was all the good, deep, personal conversations I had with Daniel. He had to listen to a lot of pre-forty processing, but he’s also one of my more intelligent and thoughtful friends, so it was a pleasure. His flight was a couple days before mine, so we walked around Reykjavik a bit before he dropped me off at the guesthouse and headed to the airport. My favorite parts of the Icelandic capital were walking around some quiet neighborhoods away from all the tourists (yuck), overhearing a children’s concert in the library (familiar tunes but in Icelandic), finding/trying the rotten shark (not tasty but it was on the bucket list), and enjoying a pizza in the upstairs of a quiet neighborhood spot.

Touristy viking ship sculpture and helicopter, Reykjavik

So there you go. Iceland was great. Favorite trip so far. I was worried it might not live up to my expectations, but it exceeded them. I hope anyone who wants to gets a chance to go someday. One more flag collected. On to the next one.

Hákarl (rotten shark) and Brennivin, Seabaron restaurant in Reykjavik. Skal.

Scandinavia 2024

The last time I left the country was the fall of 2019 when I went to Romania to make a video for a missionary organization. One of the many things covid interfered with was my travel momentum; first not being able to travel, and then not feeling confident about it. I spent 2023 wandering around the U.S., but at this point, “travel” equals international travel. After finding a good deal on airfare last summer, I planned a 10-day trip for March of 2024.

Beer (and everything else) was tres expensive over there, but, being overly sensitive to caffeine, pubs were some of the only spots where I could sit indoors and rest, hence most of my Instagram stories had a pint glass in them.

My friend Daniel is a fantastic photographer who’s traveled much more extensively than I have. His favorite European city is Copenhagen, so that’s where I decided to go first. Sweden is right across the water from Denmark, so I decided to go ahead and book a train up to Stockholm as well. When my return flight was changed to include an overnight layover in Helsinki (Finnair), I thought what the heck and booked a train to Oslo to make it an even four-country trip. Make up for four years without leaving the country.

I pretty much just walked around exploring different neighborhoods; steeples and church domes gave me something to aim at.

After the guy in front of my on the plane kept his seat reclined all the way back for the entire 10-hour flight, I made it to Copenhagen tired and very grumpy. It was easy getting a metro into town, but my hotel room wasn’t quite ready yet so I dumped my bags and walked around a bit. I only made it to about 6:30 p.m. local time before I couldn’t keep my eyes open anymore. I slept off and on for about twelve hours, which didn’t really alleviate the jet lag, but it was enough to get up and start exploring the next day.

I picked Hotel Alexandra in Copenhagen because Richard Ayoade and Noel Fielding stayed there on the Copenhagen episode of Travel Man. I was initially surprised at how small the room was, but it was actually plenty comfortable. If it had a theme, it was “famous Danish furniture makers,” and the lobby was pretty stylish. You could get a free glass of wine in the evenings, and it was a cozy spot to sit and read for a bit. All of my hotels on this trip were covered by credit card miles, which was nice.

I walked a ton on this trip, probably 10-12 miles per day, which my sedentary self wasn’t ready for. I do regret not going to any art museums in Copenhagen, but in the moment, I didn’t feel like going inside just to walk more. By the end of the trip, I had done something to my achilles, and I was limping badly. Exercise and better shoes are in order for the next one.

Copenhagen looked like this pretty much the whole time.

Anyway, Daniel gave me a bunch of recommendations that were much appreciated. I had my first (and second, and third) cardamom buns there, my new favorite pastry. I noticed them in Trader Joe’s the other day, but theirs are too sweet. The only restaurant I knew I wanted to try in Copenhagen was Baest, a pizza place I’d seen on Instagram because the owner had been on an episode of Mind of a Chef. It was quite good, but Neapolitan-style pizza will never be my favorite. Plus, it was a little lonely eating alone at the bar in restaurant crowded with couples and families, but that the reality of solo travel (for introverts anyway…or maybe just me).

Almost every church in Copenhagen was open (and empty), so I saw a lot of great architecture. Almost every church in the other countries was closed, except for one in Sweden where a funeral was underway. Oops. My travel mantra is “always try the door.”

I think I was pretty much eating only one meal a day, partly because everything was expensive there, and partly because I was chickening out about eating by myself and dealing with Danish menus and waiters. The exchange rate was around seven Danish krone to the dollar, but a beer (for reference) could easily be 70 krone or more, about twice as much as here. I’m cheap by nature (for some things anyway), so it was hard not to focus on prices, but next time I just need to let it go.

The metro was really easy to use there; I just got a pass for the week and hopped on and off at will. I couldn’t pronounce the names of the stops, but that’s where my phone came in handy. It was a bit like trying to remember the names of Ikea items...

It’s true that almost everyone speaks English there. No one had an attitude about it with me, but not everyone spoke it very well (not complaining; I’m the dumb, monolingual American). This was my first time being solo in countries that primarily speak a different language, and I did feel that limited me in some ways, especially being alone.

Smorrebrod, or elaborate open-faced sandwiches. The ones I had looked better than they tasted, but they were fine.

After a few days of walking around, it was time to catch a train to Stockholm. Before the trip, I was nervous about catching my trains on time, finding the right platform, car, seat, etc. but it was all pretty easy. Leaving Copenhagen, the train crossed a bridge into Malmo, Sweden, and then up to Stockholm. From what I saw out the window, it seems like Sweden is mostly farmland, and the landscape reminded me a bit of rural Oregon.

Most of the hotel options in Stockholm that I was seeing online looked like your standard Motel 6 rooms, so I decided to try my luck with a room on a boat. As you can see, the room was tiny, but it was plenty comfortable and had a nice view of the water. They had a Thai restaurant on board that I ate at a couple times for convenience, but it wasn’t very good.

I went for a walk and was immediately struck by the architecture in Stockholm – older, more ornate, and more interesting to me than Copenhagen. I headed to Gamla Stan, which appears to be the oldest part of the city and sits is on its own little island. There were a lot of tourists there, but I didn’t mind; I loved the narrow streets and old buildings. The next day, I had probably the best meal of the trip in Gamla Stan at the Ardbeg Embassy, a scotch whisky bar. It was essentially a fancy version of the Swedish meatball plate you get at Ikea, but it was very good.

I had one full day in Stockholm and spent it walking all over the city. There’s not much to describe specifically, but, sitting here, I can recall all these little memories and vignettes of the city. Things I didn’t really notice or appreciate at the time but that are really valuable now. I love that I can be sitting in Texas and suddenly visit another country in my mind. I think that’s the real prize of travel and the reason I believe it’s one of the very best things you can spend money on.

The next day, it was time to catch a train to Oslo. The landscape out the window was the same as it had been coming to Stockholm, but I really think it started snowing almost exactly as we crossed into Norway. It got prettier and prettier until we got to the city. I had been feeling pretty confident riding the metro in Copenhagen and Stockholm, but Oslo seemed to use trams or cable cars instead. I couldn’t find where to buy a ticket in the train station, so I gave up and walked the mile and a half to the hotel. The icy sidewalks and snow blowing straight into my eyes the whole weren’t fun, but I dumped my bags, got back out, and walked around anyway.

Oslo seemed much more modern than Stockholm, and I didn’t like it nearly as much overall. There seemed to be a lot of foreign embassies in the neighborhood around my hotel. I was imaging Jason Bourne running around there somewhere, but instead I heard a couple young kids speaking English in an American accent as they played in the snow.

It was sunny the next morning, which drastically improved my mood. By that point in the trip, my feet were really killing me, and most of the sidewalks were still iced over. I never ate it, but I came close a few times – lots of windmill arms. There was a botanical garden with very steamy greenhouses that was kind of cool, but mostly I just wandered aimlessly again.

The next day, I actually ended up visiting all four countries from the trip. I had to get back to Copenhagen for my flight to Helsinki. There was no direct train from Oslo, so I took a bus to Gothenburg, Sweden, which was pleasant enough. I was feeling pretty worried because I would only have ten minutes to catch my train in Gothenburg, but it turned out that my seat was in the first car of the first train I came to. Nine minutes to spare.

I got into Helsinki around 10:00 p.m. and took the metro into the city – another unknown that was very straightforward and easy. My hotel was quite close to the station, and it was nice enough. The interiors were a bit sterile, but the hotel breakfast the next morning was pretty epic. They essentially had two full buffets, one more Western style and one, I assume, was more traditional to Finland. Not amazing food, but plentiful, and very welcome since I hadn’t eaten much the day before.

I didn’t have much time to form an opinion of Helsinki, but I wandered around and saw what I could. Helsinki was snowy like Oslo but the architecture seemed older like Stockholm. It’s not at the top of my list, but I think it would be worth a second visit someday.

I walked past some kind of spa where men and women were coming out a sauna and jumping into icy water – it really seemed like it was just part of their pre-work routine. Crazy. Another example of “always try the door” was this older building I almost walked past not knowing what it was. But something intrigued me about it, and inside was a cool looking (if somewhat touristy) indoor market. Among many mysterious words (Finnish sound very strange, even compared to the other Scandinavian languages), I saw a sign in English for reindeer spring rolls and had to try one. It didn’t taste like much, but at least it cost a lot. I also got some reindeer jerky to share with my coworkers.

Back to the hotel, back on the metro, back to the airport. Flying west, it was daylight for the whole flight, and I think I finished an entire book. I don’t know why I never feel like watching movies on planes, but I almost never do. All in all, I didn’t have a ton of “fun” on this trip per se, but I’m glad I’ve seen these places, made some visual memories, and exercised my travel muscle a bit. I’ll have a lot more confidence going into the next trip. I turn 40 next April, and I’m thinking I want to take a big trip in the spring. Maybe Iceland or hit multiple cities in the UK. Time will tell. Especially if you’re reading this in the future.

P.S. you can see some of my film photos from this trip (which I like better than these) on Instagram @jackotrains

Salado Tornado 2023

Tagging along with my college-friend-turned-storm-chaser Lisa, I got to see and shoot my first tornado near Austin, Texas in April of last year. I believe it was only a few miles per hour short of being an EF4.

Romania 2019

Here are a handful of 35mm shots from my trip to Romania in 2019. I wish I had taken more photos, but I was there to shoot a video for SEND Romania, which you can watch here.

LEAP Global Missions – Mexico 2019

I woke up at 3:00 Saturday morning, even though my alarm was set for 3:30. This was fortuitous because I still needed to pack a few things (and still managed to forget a few things). Loaded the car, drove to the Park ‘n’ Fly—this time from Denton—and got shuttled to the international terminal at DFW.

At this point, the routine is pretty familiar. Meet the team, get the cases and duffle bags of medical equipment and supplies off the truck, check everything in at the counter, go through security, find coffee, wait for the flight. Unlike my first trip, this all went very smoothly.

We laid over in Phoenix for a bit and landed at Ixtapa-Zihuatanejo late Saturday afternoon. Getting the crates through customs took a while, but our in-country fixer, Xochitl (so-chee), came and helped us out. We headed straight to the hospital for patient screenings to see who’d undergo procedures. This trip was with a much smaller team than usual, but six patients underwent 11 procedures in two days.

This trip was all about ears. Dr. Eric Payne and Dr. Alejandra Garcia performed ear reconstructions for children born without them. I’m not using the right medical terms, but this involved taking cartilage from the patient’s ribcage and literally carving an ear shape from it on a cutting board before inserting it under the skin where an ear would be. Crazy.

Like Haiti and Belize, Mexico was also hot and humid, so, as usual, I mostly hung out in the OR because it was the coldest room and they had music playing. And that’s where most of the action was anyway. Though, truthfully, most of my trip consisted of sitting on a little metal footstool trying not to nod off or be in the way. Even so, I loved being there.

A typical LEAP trip consists of getting up at 6:00, breakfast at the hotel, hospital until after dark, crash at the hotel, repeat. Since this trip had a smaller team, we finished around 6 or 7:00 each night while it was still plenty light out to go to the beach, where we got photos and drinks and some people got their feet wet.

There was one seat too few in our two cars, so I always rode in the bed of the pickup, which may have been my favorite part of the trip. I love the feeling of being in another country, and getting to see Mexico backwards with no roof was great. Zihuatanejo is beautiful, if tricky to say; it reminded me a lot of Guatemala (except for the ocean), and it’s a lot less touristy, apparently, than neighboring Ixtapa, which is easier to say.

I’m tempted to get on a soapbox about how terribly the U.S. is treating Mexicans right now, but I’ll try not to. I’m glad I got to be around some American doctors and nurses who treated some Mexicans with love and skill. But the sacrifice wasn’t one-sided. One of the patients and his mom traveled 10 hours from Mexico city by bus for his surgery. And more than that, the mom had to quit her job to do it because they wouldn’t give her the time off. She didn’t care; it was worth it. Damn your racism. Damn your stupid wall.

On Monday evening, we were able to get everything loaded up at the end of the day so we could spend more time at the beach on Tuesday before heading to the airport. Dr. Garcia’s parents were from that area, and they, along with her husband and three kids, were there on vacation at the same time. Her parents knew the owners of an oceanside restaurant called La Perla, so after a long walk on the beach, we had local beers and fresh seafood. It was very nice.

I brought a film camera on this trip just for fun, and I like how these black-and-white shots came out. They look like gritty, old-school news photos to me, and it might be the closest I get to photojournalism. Of course I took color, digital photos as well, but it’s my blog and I can post what I want.

I’ve said it before: people who use their vacation days to help other people tend to be pretty nice. Until the next one.