What! Are you shaving?” my wife asks, looking at me in astonishment. “Yes, one must look their best. Everyone knows that a brown trout won’t bite the fly of an unshaven man.” This exchange between us was the prelude to the first fishing trip of the summer. Two small thermoses of cocoa and six kleinur (Icelandic doughnuts) were packed into the backpack, and an hour later, we had arrived at the bank.
The weather was mild. The temperature was around six degrees Celsius with a gentle southerly breeze. Ice crusts still clung to the western banks, but on the eastern side where we stood, the ice was gone. Welcome travelers had arrived; we both heard and saw them. The Great Northern Diver had claimed its bay by Arnarfell, a pair of swans flew overhead, and the song of the Redwings echoed in the evening stillness. We also heard the Common Snipe and the Ringed Plover, and an all-white Ptarmigan greeted us at the parking lot. Regardless of the coronavirus, the birds stick to their routine, though flightless bipeds were few and far between. We did see a few, however, all with rods in hand, chasing the trout just like us.
As usual, we drove the road along the lake. It is in terrible condition after the winter—I don’t remember it ever being this bad. The Road Administration has closed the road on the western side, so if you intend to fish south of Arnarfell, you must take the recently renovated Þingvallavegur. I suspect the state of the lakeside road is due to the heavy bus traffic it endured while Þingvallavegur was being repaired last summer. The trail along Arnarfell was also treacherous, though that was to be expected. This early in the spring, the mud is always deep, and there were three spots where we could have gotten stuck. We floated fairly easily over the muck in our mountain truck.
There is little to report regarding the fishing itself. The water was cold, and despite me being freshly shaven, the trout showed no interest in anything we had to offer. My wife, who usually fishes with a spinning rod, was forced to wield a fly rod, as only fly fishing is permitted in the lake until the first of June. I saw that she gradually gained a better feel for the line and could certainly have hooked a trout, had one only approached the shore at twilight.