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DARK DISCUSSION BLOG 

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paranormal, lit, stay lit

Looking for Icelandic Elves on Stokksnes Beach


There's really not a location too remote for me to want to investigate. I feel like we, as a society of human beings, have invented enough machines and methods of travel that I can likely use an app to book everything I'd need to 6 months in advance. Then land somewhere in the middle of Siberia or Antarctica just fine and gain some Hotels.com points. I'm serious. That said, I definitely took 3 close friends to Iceland with me, with the full intent and purpose of getting to an extremely remote and dangerous beach on the Southern coast. All in the name of the supernatural! Myself and Jody, Jen and Stacy spent just over a week sleeping in a cozy cabin near a spewing hot glacier (sexy), and drove around the Ring Road and various sideroads seeing some of the most incredible natural wonders that country offers. It's a volcanic, Martian looking landscape, dotted by turbulent glacial waterfalls, (go watch Vikings and see some), black sand beaches and rocky, snow-swept peaks.

Traditionally called the Huldufólk or hidden people in Icelandic, the elves of the island nation are an old belief, coming with settlers to the country in 800 AD. They've since become the ghosts and ghost stories of Iceland, inspiring strange stories of encounters throughout the years. A popular segment on TV several years back mentioned road construction being diverted in order to spare the homes of elves in the hillsides, and the story has stuck around since then, but may have actually been a matter of misinformation. While driving the side roads of the small towns, we came upon several sets of small houses, about the scope of an average dollhouse, nestled onto the lawns and hills of people's homes. They were fully painted and decorated, and I realized that the reality of elves is more equatable to the possibility of an energetic Other, that exists on or within the land, than literal elves themselves.