Two days later, and a few dollars more expensive… but my flight from Greenland to Iceland was as quick and simple as I could have possibly asked for. My Airbnb host dropped me off at Nuuk airport, I checked my bags, I grabbed a latte, and our flight was delayed.
I read my book, accidentally tried to board the wrong plane (thank you, gate agents, for catching me!), boarded the correct plane, went through the quickest security check I’ve ever encountered, and… then we flew.
Over mountains and ice flows, glaciers and oceans.
Tuesday, 07-May-2024, through Thursday, 09-May-2024
I caught COVID.
After my sunrise hike, I felt low energy… which is normal, after sleeping 2 hours and then ascending a mountain in what felt like hurricane force winds, well below freezing.
The next day, I was a bit tired and congested… again, kinda normal.
The day after, I was fully congested. Okay, I’ve got a cold. Neato.
On Monday evening, while packing to fly out, I did a quick COVID test. It came back positive. I did a second test. Also positive. Okay, so that settles it. Good news – I don’t have a cold! Bad news – I do have COVID. Fuck.
I tried to sleep on it, to decide what to do. I didn’t have a major fever, so… maybe I could fly with a mask? I was planning on effectively isolating myself in Reykjavik anyways… so maybe it would be okay?
I slept fitfully, and when I woke up at 6am, I couldn’t fall back asleep. It didn’t feel right to fly with COVID. I checked the CDC recommendations, and the EU recommendations, and Sweden’s recommendations, and looked at my body temp, and… Decided that I shouldn’t fly. I rebooked my flights, then extended my Airbnb in Nuuk, and then confirmed that there wouldn’t be issues with my reservation in Reykjavik.
Then I went back to sleep. I was able to sleep better, after that decision.
I went to the grocery to get some food, took a nice long walk, ate lots, and took the time to relax and rest. Tuesday was a rest day for me – both mentally and physically. I let myself watch stupid youtube videos, and I kept my adventuring to light walking along the boardwalk, and to and from the grocery. Wednesday I’d focus on the trip work that I had planned to do anyways… but Tuesday was spent maintaining my mental health.
Wednesday I awoke nearly 100%. No fever, minimal congestion… still a bit tired, but nothing horrible.
I made the right decision, I guess.
Still, I laid low and took it easy. I did some trip work, wrote lots of blog posts, and took a nice walk around town to help clear the lungs and move the blood. I repacked everything that had gotten unpacked, and made myself some dinner.
It was relaxing, and healing, and a good opportunity to practice pivoting.
I mentioned that I was the only one in the museum at the time, and that meant that I effectively got a private tour? Well, we exchanged numbers at the end, with the promise to get dinner some evening before I left.
That did end up happening, but before we could even send a “Hello, how are you?” message, I ran into her again out around town. Turns out she had been grocery shopping, but had lost her wallet somewhere along the way… and was freaking out more than a little bit. Since my only plan for the afternoon was to wander around town, I offered my emotional support for the scavenger hunt… support which was readily accepted.
A frantic hunt ended at her house, finding the wallet safely tucked away on top of a dresser. Which then led to my invitation to a dinner party with a whole group of exchange students, and a follow-on invitation to a 4am hike up a nearby mountain to watch the sunrise.
I… realistically should have declined, and made sure to get the standard requisite sleep that a newly-minted long-term traveler really needs. But, equally realistically, this was exactly the type of spontaneous adventure that I had hoped I’d find when I first came up with the idea of this whole trip.
We spent the evening chatting among friends – Primarily English (thank you, everyone!) with a smattering of Danish, German, and French when English couldn’t suffice. I had brought my photo album, which was received with flying accolades (At one point the New Zealander in the group asked if I’d ever hiked any of the places in the photos. He hadn’t realized that it was my book… and I got an incredible ego boost when he realized who’s name was on the cover). We ate, we talked, and we finally got to bed sometime around 2am.
(As a side note – I was very glad to have squirreled a contacts case into my jacket, with a second one in my satchel. Definitely worth it for unexpected adventures like this)
At 4am, we headed out. A fun part of Nuuk is that it’s not huge… so we actually walked from the house to the trailhead. Some of the folks had crashed at the house, while others has camped out near the trailhead – we met them en-route, then headed up into the wind.
Of note – I’d originally had a water taxi tour scheduled for Saturday… but it had been delayed to Sunday due to the high winds. While I didn’t have my windproof layer with me, nor any of my standard mountaineering gear, the group had convinced me that they wouldn’t be necessary… I borrowed a rain-shell from my Art Museum friend, which ended up being quite warm enough to make the ascent.
An ascent which felt like a lifetime. The wind howled, nearly non-stop, and I fully understood why this would have been a horrid day to be on the water. As it was, I had to keep my head down the entire way, and keep myself moving throughout to avoid cooling off too badly… the temperatures in Nuuk were around 6 DegF. with windchill, and were well below zero up on the mountain summit if I had to make a guess.
That summit came, though, with beautiful sunrise views… even if my face had long since gone numb from the wind. We took shelter in the lee of a meteorological station just long enough to appreciate the views and the shelter, before starting back down again. In told, the whole adventure (door to door, including the walk back to my Airbnb) took around five hours. It felt like a lifetime, and I’ll freely admit that I fell into bed immediately upon my arrival back home.
It had been glorious – I couldn’t have asked for a more amazing start to my trip.
