Mirror-bright and steamy new addi­tions - cozy and hot

The days are whizzing past me like a hyper­active puffin on caffeine, and whoosh - suddenly it’s winter in Iceland. High time I finally put my toys aside and tell you a bit about my fast-paced life in West Iceland again. A whole lot has happened here in the past few weeks. And the high­light: We’ve grown!
No, sadly not a second sugar-sweet doggy colleague. Instead, two brand-new mirror houses. Yep, my two-legged fellows, Esther and Pierre, decided that even more trav­el­lers should get the chance to be happy in the wild west of Iceland. I don’t quite get them, they either have the memory of a demented Viking or they’re simply nuts. Hard to believe they’ve already forgotten how much stress and chaos the holiday-house-acquis­i­tion project caused the first time around. And how many nerves it consumed. Defin­itely more than I can gobble up in treats.

The two of them dove right back into that plan­ning swirl full of emails, phone calls and meet­ings with all sorts of fellow humans. It kicked off an organ­isa­tional maze of finan­cing, building permits, holiday-house ordering, trans­port over land and sea, plus a craftsman ballet involving elec­tri­city, water, sewage, roads and found­a­tions. You’d think the second time would be smoother. Ha! Nope. This time, too, there was drama, plan changes, delays and crying (not from me, I only howl over real prob­lems, like full moons).

One example: After the truck trans­port of the holiday houses from Finland to Denmark went smoothly, the houses got stuck there in the harbour. The sea journey to Iceland had to be post­poned several times due to heavy storms on the North Sea. With a delay of almost three weeks, they finally chugged off. This affected all further logistics in Iceland, so everything had to be pushed back and re-coordin­ated: trans­port of the houses to Búðardalur, flights and accom­mod­a­tion for the Finnish installers, all Icelandic craftsmen, etc. And last but not least: no house, no guests.

But woof, one obstacle after another was jumped over (or bull­dozed through), and after a little more than half a year, the houses reached their final destin­a­tion at the begin­ning of October. Elec­tri­city and water were hooked up in no time, only the terrace took a bit longer. But wow, does it look fancy. I’d imme­di­ately put my bowl and dog blanket on it and admire the sea view. In any case, everyone is now incred­ibly relieved and super happy that the project succeeded.

Visu­ally, the two new holiday houses look almost exactly like the first two. Meaning: they once again have those gigantic mirrored glass windows through which you can observe the sea as if you were a secret bird spy. Anyone trying to look inside from the outside just sees them­selves and the surround­ings reflected. I have to admit, seeing my furry doppelgänger still confuses me somehow…
Of course, the huge skylight above the bed is back too, mainly for the northern lights and the endless sea of stars. Kitchen and bath­room are there again as well. All very wow-wow-worthy.

So nothing new? Oh, yes! A gigantic extra, the ulti­mate showstopper, the mega upgrade, the sensa­tion… drum­roll, please… I’ll reveal it: a HOT POT!

Yep, at one of the new holiday houses the two-legged folks can now sit in hot water while admiring sea views, sunsets, northern lights or simply the wild nature. Maybe even with a glass of that red magic potion I’m never allowed to try. I think they call it “wine.” Sounds inter­esting, smells weird.

At the end, Esther and Pierre wanted to pretty up the area around the new houses and the Hot Pot, but winter had already arrived and the ground was frozen solid. Well, tough luck when you want to dig and the shovel just goes "clonk". Even my magical paws can’t fix that. It prob­ably won’t thaw until spring.

Well, main thing is, the Hot Pot is ready for action. But guess who isn’t allowed in? Exactly. ME! So unfair. Some­times it’s tough being a dog. Woof!

Sif
Head of Enter­tain­ment
Mystic Light Lodge