Iceland: Reykjavik

Having returned Radio Flyer, my Flying Companion and I now found ourselves relegated to places reachable by foot. Lucky for us, Reykjavik is an entirely walkable city, and boy howdy did we ever walk it. What follows is less of a linear account, and more selected highlights, which you will read about it in the order I remember to write them. Or you could just jump randomly through the paragraphs, if you’re one of those rebels.
We found ourselves at one point in a restaurant on the docks, where we enjoyed a buffet of fresh fish of various species, including Salted Cod, Arctic Char, Arctic Wolf Fish, Salmon, and even more Cod, along with a delicious red pepper soup. It was easily our favorite meal of the trip, and my Flying Companion in particular was obsessed with the Arctic Char. The closest thing to a letdown was the Arctic Wolf Fish, whish was only “pretty good,” while everything else was amazing.
We went into a great many shops, searching for our souvenirs. Originally, we’d been set on a lopapeysa, the traditional Icelandic wool sweater, but the wool proved too scratchy for my Flying Companion, and the more I thought about it, the more I realized that I wear sweaters like once a year, so I instead found a beautiful green wool blanket. I use blankets pretty frequently. My Flying Companion eventually found for herself a lovely necklace, created by a local artist using small lava stones set into a silver disc and attached to a silver chain.
Also in these shops we discovered that vikings and puffins are the big thing for touristy tchotzkes, and can be found plastered on everything from thimbles to functional drinking horns, which are made from ox horn, according to the signs put up by every display we saw. These shops are fun for a while, but very similar, and if one spends too much time in them, begin to impart a bit of theme park feel.
     A great way to recover from this feeling is to check out some of the cool bars, my favorite of which was The Irishman, a breathtaking bar with plush leather seats, intricately carved woodwork, friendly staff, and two Englishmen who played darts and made fun of each other in a loud and very entertaining manner. I expect my Flying Companion preferred the Lebowski Bar, a bar themed after the movie with which it shares its name. I admit it was pretty awesome, lots of rugs, multiple versions of the white russian, and on the night we went, a music quiz which we did not win.
     There was also, diagonally across from our apartment, a small convenience store where we had tasty hamburgers and met a friendly young lady from the States, who’d moved to Iceland about six months ago and seemed quite happy there. And just a few paces further down that road was a place where we enjoyed many servings of the drug of choice for Iceland: ice cream.
     We were told before our trip that ice cream is a big deal in Iceland, but that did not actually prepare us, so allow me to try and prepare you. Imagine if you were walking down a city street in the US, but instead of every phone you saw, there was an ice cream cone. You know how in old movies, everyone is constantly smoking? It’s like that, except it’s ice cream. Or like how everyone has their own water bottle they’re always carrying around like a baby with a bottle?
     Yup. Ice cream. And let me tell you, friends and neighbors, it’s contagious. We definitely ate more ice cream than either of us does in any given three month period, and thoroughly enjoyed every minute of it. Try the rhubarb.
     At one point we met the friendliest man in Iceland, and his dog, Leo. Now, let me be clear: we did not meet any particularly rude people there, but generally it’s not a place for small talk. Not a lot of the fake pleasantries we’re used to from the shop employees or waitstaff, which was honestly a breath of fresh air for us both. All of the extroverted friendliness seems to be concentrated into this man, whose name we did not get. He instead treated us to some excellent tidbits, including a recommendation to ask any Canadians I meet about Kiefer Sutherland’s grandfather, his intent to take his dog for a pee, and a glimpse of his highly prized Costco card.
     This gentleman managed to unseat as favorite interaction an elderly Russian woman who, upon noticing us reading a flyer for a risque comedy club, leaned in conspiratorially and whispered, “I’m interested, too” with the sly smile of a mischievous rule breaker.
     There are a great many small things we discovered in Reykjavik I’ve omitted here, partially because I like to keep a few things for just myself and my fellow travellers, but also because I highly recommend people do their own exploring, and find their own things to love about the places they visit. So, in lieu of any further detail and description, I will end this episodic recounting of my travels by saying Iceland is an amazing fantasy world of a place, and well worth the visit.
     But please don’t stay there, because I’m thinking of retiring there someday, and I’d prefer not to see an increase in human population when I do.
-John

Iceland, Days 3, 4, and 5

     Days three, four, and five turned into a blur of driving all over the country, punctuated by stops of wondrous and breathtaking things. By now I think those of you who are still with me get the idea that my Flying Companion and I are both bad sleepers who like good bread, and also recall my account of the Icelandic countryside well enough that I can eschew recounting both topics. If it helps, feel free to take a moment between the following events and mentally insert a paragraph about igneous rocks, stubby grass, and sheep. Make it flowery.
     And don’t forget to pepper in mentions of Cinnamon Rolls and Sourdough Bread, here capitalized due to their singular deliciousness.
     First on this list of recountances is Geysir, which is exactly what its name suggests. The odd and sad thing about Geysir is that, as were told after our visit, it is “broken.” This is because people were placing detergents and similar chemicals in it in order to make it erupt more often, and now it doesn’t erupt. It turns out, people are kind of idiotic all over the world. Fortunately for those of us who think a natural geyser is cool enough, Geysir itself is surrounded by a few other geysers, one of which still erupts every few minutes, and let me tell you, friends and neighbors, seeing a big spout of hot water erupt from the ground is cooler than some of you jaded souls might think.
     We next found an unexpected stop along our journey, a small canyon with steep, close in sides and a good amount of sheep (we assumed) excrement to avoid. About halfway through, we came to a small platform with a sign on it explaining what this place was, and get this: it’s where they used to execute people back in yore! There was a rock nearby where the beheading took place, another, higher up rock from which thieves were hanged, and even a little pond where they would drown criminal women, a practice which I suppose could be seen as sexist or chivalrous, depending on your point of view. Personally, I find sexism and acts of chivalry often overlap in some uncomfortable ways, so I’m going to end this paragraph here.
     The pinnacle of day three was undoubtedly Gullfoss, a multi-tiered waterfall that, based on our view from the top, pours over its final cascade into a bottomless opaque mist, and though I’m sure all that water ends up in the ocean somehow, I like to imagine it just magically keeps going down. Which it sort of does, when you think about it, down to a river, then down to the ocean, following the same endless cycle of life and movement that keeps this whole weird world going.
     Science is magic, ya’ll!
     Day four began with a tour of a Lava Tunnel, here capitalized because it blew my mind and was awesome in the way that it truly inspires awe. We joined a group of fellow adventurers, and were led by our whimsically entertaining guide around 300 meters into a cold, damp tunnel created thousands of years ago by, you guessed it, flowing lava! We found ourselves surrounded on all sides by multihued rocks, each given their color by lava of different degrees, as well as large boulders and disparately sized rocks that had fallen from the walls and ceiling of the tunnel over the years. We reached the final platform of our tour, and here is where our guide -after giving us a warning- turned off all the lights in the tunnel, and treated us to total and complete darkness. We were also asked to be as silent as possible for a small while, and then heard only the drops of water falling in the cave.
It was one of those humbling moments where I remembered how tiny I am in the span of space and time. It was also cool, and a little disorienting.
From the Lava Tunnel, we made our way to a nice big crater, which had a pretty little pond at its base, and smaller craters in its vicinity. We walked along the ridge of the crater, stopping momentarily to see if the two idiot Instagrammers would go tumbling down the steep rocky sides as they edged further down in order to take pictures of each other standing around and smiling as though this galactic reminder that we live on an insignificant speck in a vast and open universe was really just background for their all important selfies.
They did not fall, and my Flying Companion lamented.
We then spent about an hour searching for another waterfall, which was supposed to be right in the center of this idyllic little town. Unfortunately, after consulting the GPS and large map at the main road (twice), were unable to find it and forced to deem it imaginary and a scam. This disappointment left us worn out and in need of relaxation, and so we headed to the Secret Lagoon.
The Secret Lagoon is a hot spring, full of very relaxing water that is also very dark due to the black sediment at its bottom. It adjoins a small geyser of its own, which shoots up small spires of water every few minutes, and is totally worth the awkward public shower required for entry. It also has a fish and chips stand out front with the best battered fish of our entire trip, and crisp, cold beer, which also helped abate our disappointment in the imaginary waterfall.
Day five was our final and most disappointing day with Radio Flyer in our party, as we attempted to visit Snæfellsjökull, the glacier through which Jules Verne’s protagonists journeyed to the center of the Earth. Unfortunately for us, our Radio Flyer proved incapable of travelling the final 4.5 miles of gravel road that led to the glacier, and we were forced to view it from afar. Still beautiful, make no mistake, but not the up close experience for which we’d hoped.
There was one highlight on this day long drive, however: the Hvalfjörður Tunnel, which runs almost 550 feet under water, is over 3.5 miles long, and will freak your peanut right out of its shell.
The following morning we said goodbye to Radio Flyer, made our way back to Reykjavik, and along the way met the friendliest man in Iceland and his dog, Leo. More on that in the next and final installment, coming soon!
-John

Iceland, Day 2

Welcome back and thanks for coming, everyone. When last we left off, our party was blissfully unconscious, hoping to catch up on sleep and truly begin the journey through Iceland with something resembling clarity. Fortunately for me, I managed to rest as well as I generally am able, and so awoke from my slumber feeling fairly refreshed. My Flying Companion did not fair so well, and having been up for some time, had already procured breakfast from the bakery down the street. The pastry she’d chosen was a wonderful creation, made with cinnamon roll dough, but flattened out into a square sheet. In the middle was a strip of delicious custard, to one side of that a layer of slivered almonds, and on the remaining side a light dusting of cinnamon and sugar. She also obtained a loaf of fresh baked sourdough bread, one of the greater decisions made by any traveler in humanity’s history.
     Appetites sated, we began day one of our driving excursions, determined on this day to find and observe the odd little bird known as a Puffin. We loaded up the Radio Flyer with supplies for the day, and headed east and south, with wonder in our eyes and sugary bread in our bellies. Once we made it out of the city, the road led us up into a high pass, where the fog became so thick we were unable to see more than twenty or thirty feet in front of us. It gave us a close and eerie feeling, as though this strange and magical land was hinting to us that our surroundings were going to be very different soon.
     The fog lifted as we came down the other side of the pass, and we were taken aback by what we saw. We were still fairly high up, and we could see for miles. As some of you may know, Iceland is a land formed by volcanic eruptions of yore, and great wide fields of igneous rock offer a singular and bizarrely appealing scene. It looks very much like a once rough sea, all crashing waves and conflicting currents, somehow became petrified, the liquid flow of water hardened into rough craggy rocks. Covering this strangely hypnotic scape is a blanket of short, stubby, mossy looking grass, making the charcoal colored rocky edges that jut through seem like crests breaking the surface as the waves collide. Rising up from this great green sea are huge and majestic mountains, often alone but sometimes in groups of two or three.
     The highway on which we traveled wove around these mountains and through these rocky fields, passing free roaming sheep and corrals of the shaggy maned Icelandic horses, and after a while our appetites returned. This seemed like a good time to try the ubiquitous and highly recommended Icelandic hot dog, touted as being the best in the world by pretty much everyone we spoke to. Included in this recommendation was the notion that we should try one with “everything”, which included both raw and fried onions, sweet mustard (a red flag for me), mayonnaise (my great nemesis) disguised as a remoulade, and ketchup. It is also to be noted that hot dogs in Iceland are made out of lamb, as opposed to beef and pork, and have a singular flavor.
     We found a nice looking little restaurant on the side of the road and pulled over. Despite the sweet mustard and dressed up mayo, I followed the custom and ordered one with the aforementioned works, as did my Flying Companion. Here I once again learned the lesson that just because people tell me to do a thing does not mean I should do it. The hot dog itself I had no issue with, but the “everything” proved too much by far. The poor hot dog had been drowned in condiments, and I made it two bites in before the slimy cream of mayonnaise and tangy-sweet of incorrect mustard overtook me.
     This would prove to be our only foray into the cuisine of hot doggery.
     From there it was a quick drive to the southern coast, where we saw, aside from the ocean, beaches of black sand, which despite the name still managed to surprise us by being so black and sandy, and nesting in the cliffs above, many examples of the Puffin, an odd and beautiful looking bird that seems like a cross between a penguin, a toucan, and a seagull.  The beach itself was closed off to humans, so we meandered along the cliffs overlooking the beach, getting close enough to the Puffins to make my Flying Companion positively giddy. We spent a good deal of time walking around, sighing heavily and making quiet oohs and ahhs at the beauty of it, but eventually had to move on, as we had one destination ahead of us yet, which I will skip ahead to now, because I don’t imagine you need to read any more of me rambling about the oceanic looking lava fields we drove by again.
     Skogar Falls, which is about 60 meters high, is fed by two glaciers, spelled Eyjafjallajokull and Myrdalsjokull and pronounced at your own risk, and it will take your breath away. Not only because it’s beautiful and you can play in the pool in which it falls (if you will), but also because the steps leading to the top of it are quite steep, and there are 370 of them. The view from the top is worth it however, as one can see all the way to the coast, which is roughly five miles off, and feel a little better about one’s cardiovascular health, as everyone else up there is breathing pretty hard as well.
     After filling our eyes with this watery wonder, we made the still long but also still beautiful drive back into Reykjavik, at which point my Flying Companion promptly passed out, and I took a walk, bought myself a $13 beer (Iceland, as I said, is expensive), and made the notes for what you’ve just read. I also took a walk around downtown, and made a few notes on places for us to visit later in our trip. That last sentence is what we call foreshadowing, and you’ll read more about those places in the future. Day 2 came to an end as the sun almost went all the way down around 11:30, and I made my way back to the apartment for another attempt at sleep.
     Day 3 and 4 coming soon, and thanks as always for reading!
-John 
 

Iceland: Day One

What follows is an account of my trip to Iceland, broken up into a few different parts. Before we jump in, however, I would point out that this was my first trip outside the country of my birth, so please allow for some perhaps extensive wide-eyed wonder and naiveté from your narrator. Also, travelling through Iceland is much akin to seeing the scenery described in a great many fantastical books, so there may well be some diction along that flowery line. Consider yourselves warned, friends and neighbors.

Also, I’m going to skip the part where we get on a plane and fly for seven hours, except to just point out that sleeping on planes is impossible, everyone who says they can is a liar, and anyone you see on a plane who looks asleep is only deceiving themselves. That said, my Flying Companion and I touched down in Iceland thoroughly exhausted, at what for us was considerably earlier than the local time of 9:30 AM. Thankfully, getting through customs in Iceland is fairly easy and efficiently planned. We found ourselves in a constant state of surprise as the snaking line moved forward, almost sure that time, like the currency, worked differently in Iceland, as what was surely a forty five minute American line took no more than ten. When we reached the front, an attentive but unemotional woman gave my passport its very first stamp.

This was, for me, one of those small moments in life one never forgets. One of those moments when somewhere far off a high note of joy is sung by a rich, reverential voice, and a warm glow courses through the veins while a soft golden light shines down from the heavens. A first stamp, a mark of passage, proof that life contains moments of progress made, a visible sign of one’s attempts to grow and become more.

For the woman in the glass booth with the stamp, it was likely ten seconds on a Friday morning wherein an American stared at her with the grin of a simpleton.

From there, my Flying Companion and I went onwards to the trial of customs, which after all the warning and worry sent my way by others, turned out to be two lines painted upon the floor, one red on the left that led to a small room for those with burdens to claim, and one green on the right, leading those with no burdens in hand to the duty-free store. Here we obtained for ourselves beer, a bottle of Scotch Whiskey, and an Icelandic blueberry liquor which had been recommended to us previously.

Our bags now were decidedly heavier, and thus we decided it was time to get ourselves some transportation, and subsequently seek our lodgings. I led my companion to the line which would take us to the appropriate counter, but alas! After a line wherein time worked in a more tediously American fashion, I was told that the company had changed counters, but their internet portal had as yet failed to change along with it. Another walk would be required, and so, good humor failing fast and bodies not far behind, we began yet another walk.

Thankfully, mercifully, this walk was not only short, but out of doors, and here we were treated to our first true experience of Iceland beyond the airport. It was still largely parking lot for us at this point, but I did my get first breath of unbelievably clean and fresh air, as well as my first hint that in Iceland, the ocean is never far away. Yes, I’m aware that it’s an island and a revelation concerning the close proximity of the ocean is hardly genius, but like I said in the beginning, wide eyed wonder.

After arriving at our true transportation obtainment destination, we were rewarded with a small, red, four doored vehicle, which would eventually be named Radio Flyer and be accepted as the third member of our party. We were warned not to take Radio Flyer onto any gravel roads, as it was not fit for such travels, despite the parking lot in which it was kept being entirely gravel. In our exhaustion, we found this thoroughly amusing, and laughed about it extensively as we made our way to Reykjavik and what we hoped would be comfortable beds.

The countryside of Iceland and the city itself are worthy of more space than I have left in this entry, and will get their due in due time. For now, however, and considering the state we were in, your narrator will give it a blurry pass by and merely say that the country is beautiful, and the city is lovely. We arrived at our lodging, a small studio apartment equipped with a tiny bathroom, an old but adorable oven with a range, a small refrigerator that never quite got cold, and thankfully, a very comfortable bed. We unloaded our burdens, but decided we needed sustenance before we could rest. We voyaged perhaps an entire block before we stopped at a fish and chips restaurant, ordered said dish from a wonderfully polite young English lady, also purchased a beer apiece, and sat down to wait for our food. 

Here I had my first moment of true concern and doubt over my decision to visit this country. You see, both of the beers we ordered, according to the young English lady, were local and the most popular around. My Flying Companion ordered the lighter of the two, myself the darker, as is my fashion. After being awake for roughly a day and a half, living on little in the way of food and drink, I’m sure you can imagine my anticipation as I raised the glass to my lips, and the quiet disappointment I felt when, to my tongue, the beer tasted decidedly like a pilsner.

Now, I’m not one to judge others for their taste in beer. If others enjoy a pilsner on a warm afternoon or whenever, more power to them, I say. To me though, a pilsner is basically what pastel yellow would taste like if it was food. Or perhaps if butter tasted far too much like itself. Unfortunately my Flying Companion’s choice was little better. I began to worry that this might be a ubiquitous unpleasantness. 

The food arrived soon after, and here I found joy again.The fish was a beautifully battered and fried cod, perfectly crunchy on the outside, and juicy and flaky on the inside. We spoke little as we feasted, truly tired beyond words and hungry beyond thought. I also managed to drain my glass, not only because I hate to leave a drink unfinished, but also because everything in Iceland is expensive, and not to be wasted. This meal, according to the calculations made by our brains and confirmed by our currency conversion application, set us back upwards of $50, and we would soon discover that this was more the rule than the exception.

After we finished, now truly overcome by exhaustion, we returned to our room and promptly passed out for many hours, awakening once more for a short walk and some ice cream (more on Iceland’s love of ice cream will come later), and then a few more times due to noises from passersby outside, and snoring of both party members inside. Thus our first day in Iceland came to an end. 

The journey itself continued onward, however, and more tales will be forthcoming throughout the week. Up next: Puffins, black sanded beaches, and an unexpected detour.

-John