for starters today, two unnamed waterfalls[008,011-021] and a good-morning troll[019]. next we crossed a lava desert covered with moss[022-038]. absolutely strange landscape. very soft to step on, you almost bounce on the moss. next we came to vík í mýrdal[039-064], the southernmost village in iceland. right next to the center is the reynisfjara[040-064] beach, a black pebble beach. the sea was rough and there were pretty big waves. yet i thought it's save to walk along the beach, as i clearly saw how far the flotsam (and thus the water) usually got. but my observation had a flaw, because for one moment, when i was distracted, a big wave flooded the place where i was standing[051]. of course this was the only spot the water got that far on the beach, and of course it didn't happen again at the time being at the beach. i think i can consider myself very very lucky. i put off my totally wet shoes[052,064]. of course there were trolls[040-041,050,057,058]. according to a folk tale the three trolls were caught by sunlight when they tried to pull a ship to land. poor trolls, but i guess those bastards are responsible for my wet trouser legs and shoes. rumour has it, the beach is one of the ten most beautiful beaches on earth, and vík is the wettest place in iceland. back to the car we were heading for the campsite þakgil. on the way there we found an abandoned small village[065-082,139-140]. the guidebook it was most likely some film set once. metal hooks in the ground made this sound pretty plausible. in any way, it was a wonderful place with an awesome overview[068,071,073,077,083-084,140] of the surrounding area. heading on to the camping site we crossed the - to me - most beautiful place[087-116] in iceland i have seen so far (of course again with trolls[074-075,085-086,111] along the road). also we had to cross our first ford[115]. just a small one, but yet, pretty exciting if our little toyota would make it through the small rivulet. also we were concerned if we would get back again, since it was raining and the water level might rise too much, so our car wont make it another time. but we took the risk and it was worth it. our guidebook already told us the campsite has a heatable lava cave[125,128-129,132] and an abri[128,132] for grilling. since the camping site was already closed for winter we were - once more - they only ones there (besides the obligatory sheep group of three, of course). we guessed this must be a great place to camp or stay in one of the huts[117-118,126-127,133] available there. also the swings[120-123] were great - hehe. on our way back we enjoyed the small abandoned village we already came by earlier again. it's really impressive and so awesome to be all alone in this landscape[140] :) but by now it already got pretty late and we still had to get to a hostel. we decided to spend the night in the HI hostel in vík. so we drove back there, booked a double room, and drove on to the cliffs of cape dyrhólaey[141-146] with a lighthouse[144,146] nearby. the gravel road that leads there was one of the most bumpy ones we've seen so far. pretty shaky. but the sea in the twilight was amazing. also the sound was, as usual, overwhelming. pretty late we got back to the hostel. what a wonderful day.