My Icelandic holiday with Kevin and Perry

I’m currently on holiday in Iceland. I say ‘holiday’, but I’m with my three teenage sons so it’s more like being a supply teacher on a school trip. The scenery looks like a series of illustrations in a geography textbook – volcano, tectonic plate, glacier – but so far the boys aren’t impressed.

‘Every day is the same,’ said 17-year-old Ludo. ‘We wake up, drive somewhere, go on a walk, take pictures of a waterfall or a lava field, then walk back again.’ This produced murmurs of agreement. I told them they’d enjoy the sightseeing more if they looked up from their phones occasionally, but I don’t think this cut through. As we hiked across a mountain range on Monday to bathe in a hot spring, 15-year-old Freddie continued reading a graphic novel on his phone. When I asked him if he was ever going to read a real book, he defiantly told me it was about the unification of China in the 3rd century bc.