Iceland Summer Dispatch I - Friday, 26th July 2013

Dear Friends, we are loving Iceland and I thought it would be good to give you some impressions before we set off for home on Sunday, which will be a very long day with an early flight from Reykjavik into Gatwick, followed by a car trip from there to Heathrow and an evening flight to Melbourne via Dubai & Singapore, arriving back in Daylesford sometime on Tuesday morning.

When I last wrote we were off to see Passion Play with Zoë Wanamaker leading a sterling cast in a play about infidelity from the male and female points of view. During interval we discovered that the Royal baby had been born...at last.

We said goodbye to Jane, David, Terry and Annette the next morning at breakfast, then off to Victoria Station with a very helpful cab driver, who deposited us at the exact spot for the Gatwick Express. Once we arrived Wes took our spare suitcase and put it in storage, we checked into Wow Airlines and caught the shuttle to the North Gatwick airport, found the Emirates desk and arranged our pick-up from Gatwick on Sunday to Heathrow.

Our first glimpse of Iceland

The trip to Reykjavik was, as Wes described in Facebook, very like being in Coles Cafeteria. We were underwhelmed to say the least, and very pleased when we finally touched down in Iceland. We had tickets for the coach which dropped us off at our Hotel, where we had a comfortable bed, separate doonas, a stand-alone shower and free wifi. We asked for recommendations for seafood and enjoyed a lovely meal before collapsing into bed, exhausted, only to be wakened at 2am by the noise from the next door nightclub. Our room has no air-conditioning except for open windows, so we could hear everything from the nightclub balcony.

Breakfast was completely self-serve with some interesting food on offer – fruits, meats, cheeses, various breads, unidentifiable cereals and cold or lukewarm eggs. We headed off for a long walk around the Old Harbour in the fog. Everyone was rugged up in jackets and scarves, while we were wearing our footy polos and enjoying the feel of cool air on our skin.

Sculpture Tribute to Lost Seamen at Modern Wharf

We visited the Settlement Museum and learned that Iceland is a comparatively young country and that everyone was baptised a Catholic in the 1200s, and later everyone converted to Protestantism during the Reformation. I had thought Iceland was not big on religion, but I was wrong and there are plenty of parish churches, as well as a stunning Church on the hill in Reykjavik – Hallsgrimkirjka. Wes was worried that I would want to climb to the top, but the only option was by lift so we did that and gained stunning views of the capital. The Church contains an obscenely huge shining organ inside, which exactly matches its architecture, but was placed there some years after it was built.  

We had agreed before we left home that we would each buy an Icelandic jumper, so after our sight-seeing we headed to the shops and I easily found a black-and-white number that fitted and suited, but Wes tried on quite a few that weren’t quite right. We went to another smaller shop and found the perfect navy blue and white jumper for him, and as they are quite lightweight, there should be no problems with the 20kg luggage limit on our return Wow Airline trip.

That afternoon we were collected by a young man from Europa Cars and picked up our Suzuki Swift which we have until tomorrow. Not only is it frightening to drive on the other side of the road, but the gears are in the wrong spot, as well as indicators and windscreen washers. Wes did very well to get us back into the City Centre with the help of the GPS we hired. After parking the car we went to the Volcano House to see an hour long film on the two most recent big eruptions….we saw amazing footage of 1973 and 2010, with big advances over that time in how to combat the eruptions and clean up afterwards.

Fortunately no-one visited our nearby nightclub, so we had a good night’s sleep after enjoying an authentic Icelandic dinner at a local café near the Church. Wes parked the car as close to our hotel as he could and we were easily able to get our suitcases in yesterday morning before going back to our favourite car-park, where parking is very cheap and plentiful right on the harbour.

Traditional Icelandic Fare

We went for a long walk along the shore, admiring the wonderful sculptures and looking at the various styles of architecture. Then to the Viking Museum, which is dedicated to celebrating the life of Icelandic seamen. Apart from room after room of boats, nets, clothes, photos and information, we were able to see a 20-year old film showing a day in the life of a home to us the hardships they undergo just to bring in a day’s catch. These men were all farmers in Summer and became fishermen in Winter.

The day before when we had been wandering through the old part of town, I followed a couple of Japanese women into the only open building looking for the toilets. There were only two toilets and one remained occupied for ages until a frustrated older American woman emerged and asked plaintively Can anyone help me flush this toilet please as I can’t find the flush? I stepped in to help her and discovered she had been looking for a small button to push or wave her hand over, however the big shiny contraption that she thought was the cistern was actually the flush, so I solved her problem, used the toilet myself and went back to find Wes.

Sometimes things are meant to be – my long absence in the loo meant Wes had been reading everything on the walls around him and found a poster advertising a talk by Ysra Sigurdardottir (the famous Icelandic female crime writer) at the Concert Hall. We had gone to the Hall, checked out that this was correct and that all we needed to do was turn up to the café at 12 yesterday and we could see and hear her. So we did just that and it was a magic experience. She has a good sense of humour, explaining that Iceland is the safest country in the world and murder is very rare, so it is interesting that she and Arnaldur Indridason have become such prolific crime writers. I bought two of her books and we chatted together while she signed them for us. What a thrill!

 

Reykjavik is the sixth UNESCO City of Literature and the only non-English speaking one to have that honour – the others are Edinburgh, Melbourne, Iowa, Dublin and Norwich. According to what we read, there are more books published per capita in Iceland than nearly every other country in the world. This talk we attended was part of the UNESCO involvement, and they were sponsoring weekly talks during July.

We then hit the road and drove here to Budin, about 180 kms from Reykjavik, where there is the Atlantic Ocean, a hotel and a church, some sheep and two Labradors and a stunning view of all these things from our room at the top of the hotel. Wifi is only available in public areas, but being able to sit here typing to you with the sound of the ocean on my right and three inquisitive sheep watching my every move more than makes up for it.

View from our room this morning

Everyone speaks excellent English, we enjoyed a very yummy meal in the dining room last night, followed by nightcaps in the bar – just about every liqueur known to man, except Dom, is available and they even have a book of Hendricks Gin Cocktails to choose from!

This morning we had a yummy self-serve breakfast in the dining room with each table laid with a different hand-embroidered tea-cloth. Sheep and dogs watched us and the odd bird swooped around outside. It rained overnight and is delightfully cool. We will go for a long walk after I send this off and perhaps a drive this afternoon. Tomorrow we take the car back to Reykjavik and spend our last night in Iceland in a different hotel before heading off to the airport for a 6am flight!

Our bed - underneath are two pillows & a doona each!