Iceland Part 4

Wednesday, October 17: The ads for the Blue Lagoon often show a happy young lady in the warm waters on a sunny day which happens we believe once a year. For us photos alone don't do justice to the day's 50 - to 60 mph winds and temps in the forties. The conditions were due to the hurricane that went through Ireland. One must shower, nude, under supervision of two matrons to be sure that NO ONE skips this step and the women’s showers had a long, slow line, which meant that Kris and Marv had been in and out of the water (a miserably bone chilling experience when out) several times looking for us before we made it out. They were basically totally over The Blue Lagoon by the time we showed up. But Heidi and I had a wonderful time exploring the silica mud pots to apply to the skin, the sauna, the steam bath, and even the far pool, which had less than a dozen people in it. We would probably count it as one of the high points of the trip, while Kris and Marv might have counted it the lowest of the low. And we found out later that pretty much every town has its own very popular geothermal public pool, where locals hang out daily like a sort of coffee shop, that we could have attended at a fraction of the cost of the Gate 1 bus tour we did for it. Our advice to anyone going to Iceland is to skip the very expensive Blue Lagoon and find one of those public pools!!

The Blue Lagoon (Icelandic: Bláa lónið) geothermal spa is one of the most visited attractions in Iceland. The spa is located in a lava field in Grindavík on the Reykjanes Peninsula, southwestern Iceland in a location favorable for Geothermal power, and is supplied by water used in the nearby Svartsengi geothermal power station. The warm waters are rich in minerals like silica and sulfur and bathing in the Blue Lagoon is reputed to help some people suffering from skin diseases such as psoriasis. The water temperature in the bathing and swimming area of the lagoon averages 99–102°F. The Blue Lagoon also operates a research and development facility to help find cures for other skin ailments using the mineral-rich water. The lagoon is a man-made lagoon which is fed by the water output of the nearby geothermal power plant Svartsengi and is renewed every two days. Superheated water is vented from the ground near a lava flow and used to run turbines that generate electricity. After going through the turbines, the steam and hot water passes through a heat exchanger to provide heat for a municipal water heating system. Then the water is fed into the lagoon for recreational and medicinal users to bathe in.

How the Tourism Council wants you to see The Blue Lagoon

How it appeared from inside the main building the day we visited.

Kris got this one single picture of Marv and me in the lagoon before Marv retreated to the building.

That afternoon, we did a free walking tour (donations accepted) of Reykjavik. Our guide, Sarai, was a high school history teacher who was very knowledgeable about the history and culture of the country, and fiercely proud to be a true Viking woman. She had a great sense of humor and taught us many useful tips, like about the local swimming pools and that the best place to get somewhat reasonable food is in the Old Harbor area. Kris and Heidi always recommend doing these free city walking tours wherever they are offered and now we see why. They are very informative and less costly than commercial tours.

Iceland's Parliament Building. Note the lack of flags (noticeable on most buildings)
or armed guards. The only armed building in Iceland is the American Embassy. 😕 

We met our tour guide (in the yellow jacket) under the statue across from the Parliament Building. 

The oldest remaining church in Iceland.

Entering the Old Town of Reykjavik.  Most of the old wooden
buildings were wiped out by a huge fire. 

The oldest wooden buildings and warehouses by the harbor were once
dilapidated and mostly abandoned. Now they are the most expensive
and desirable Real Estate in the city!

The name plate on this house is dated 1852.

Part sculpture and part utilitarian, these vertical pipes carry
geothermal water and are a good place to warm ones hands. 

Streets and roofs throughout Reykjavik (and much of Iceland)
are heated by geothermal action and snow removal is never needed.

The Prime Minister's home; again, no flags or guards.

The hill topped city park beside the Prime Minister's house.

This impressive statue of Ingólfur Arnarson by famous architect Einar Jonsson is atop a hill at the center
 of a grassy park. Ingolf was a settler from Norway near 870 and is usually considered the first settler
 of Iceland. Thanks to a recent Gay Pride parade, his lips are painted pink to reflect that Iceland is
open to LGBTQ rights. All of Icelandic Pride activities start from here. 

ÓÞEKKTI EMBÆTTISMAÐURINN
Lækjargata, port
Artist Magnús Tómasson
The Unknown Bureaucrat is a popular favorite, as it manages to be both humorous and provocative, while truthfully depicting something that most everyone can relate to, the trivial existence of the working bee. The block of rock is a perfect metaphor for how everyday life crushes down on us, while at the same time depicting the narrative of the faceless official who is only a cog in the wheel, and never a person to most of us. Even the location is a thoughtful comment on the trivial existence of the Unknown Bureaucrat, in a closed off back alley.

Sarai took us by this old Harbor bar, which we returned to after the tour for
its Happy Hour craft beer, which was "only" $6 instead of $12.

It had a great atmosphere similar to the Cheers Bar and had a huge stuffed
Boarshead on the wall, making me wonder if that was the name of the bar. 

Here's the Arnarson statue at night. Our tour taught us that coming by him
was a good short cut back to our hotel from the Old Town district.

Iceland Part 3

Tuesday, October 16: Today we explored the west region of Iceland. It was very windy (40-50 mph) with rain on and off. The country side is very different than the South, less green and with larger expanses of land running to the ocean. The stunning coastlines are deeply cut with fjords and we saw very, very few other cars on the road. In the town of Borgarnes we visited The Settlement Center and learned about the fascinating history of the country, mostly through their spoken record of Sagas. The museum had two parts that we could explore at our own pace with audio earphones giving commentary in English. The Vikings were the first humans to discover and settle Iceland. Back then it was heavily forested, but it no longer is. We were sorry to find out that Climate Change and warmer waters have resulted in a steep decline in the sardine numbers. The sardines need very cold water so they have retreated to the north side of the island, therefore the iconic Puffins that used to reside on the west side of Iceland are no longer seen here. We drove all the way out to Snaefellsjoekull National Park and then to the town of Olafsvik (we figured out that “Vik” means town) where we got some snacks to sustain us until we got back to the hotel. The glacier (Snaefellsjoekull) was hidden in the clouds as we drove across the peninsula through the mountains to return to the main highway. When we got back to the hotel we found that, along with moving our stuff to our room, they had upgraded us to a larger room. With the wonderful dinner we all enjoyed at the hotel restaurant “on the house” that night, we felt well compensated for the small snafu with our original room assignment.

Huge farms were tucked at the foot of the mountains, few and far
between. The ocean is behind us here, with farmland reaching to the shore.

The tunnel under Hvalfjordur, the fjord on the left here,
saved us many miles of driving. 

Inside the tunnel

Looking back across the mouth of Hvalfjordur when we came out of the tunnel.

The top of Borgarfjordur with snow capped mountains looming.

This magnificent basalt cliff ran for several miles, seemingly in the middle of a flat plane.

The farther west we drove, the gloomier, rainier, and foggier the mountains looked.

Like to the south, waterfalls were everywhere but fell from even higher
cliffs on this side. This is  Bjarnarfoss, whose roar we heard clearly from here.

The wind was blowing so fiercely that the water off the falls was blown back
up over the edge of the cliff. Marv got a good movie of this phenomenon. 

The sign welcoming us to Snaefellsjoekull National Park

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The Lóndrangar are a pair of rock pinnacles in the National Park. They are volcanic plugs
of basalt that have been hewn out from softer surrounding rock by erosion.

Beyond here, looking back to the east, are the mountains
and the Snaefellsjokull, hidden in the gloom.

Olafsvik had a coffee shop and a convenience store where we bought
pop and snacks, including soft licorice which is a favorite of all good
Icelanders (and yours truly!).

Iceland Part 2

 

Monday, October 15: We arrived at the hotel around 9:00 in the morning after a pretty sleepless, uneventful flight. We had our first of many very expensive meals ($25 per person) at the breakfast buffet at the restaurant on the top floor of the hotel, checked our bags at the desk, and when Marv and Kris returned with our rental car from the local airport, the four of us took off on our own to explore this stunningly beautiful country. They get a lot of rain in Iceland so we were lucky to have a nice sunny day with temps in the forties. We headed south, towards Vik to see waterfalls, especially. 

Despite the lack of English, you can figure out, as we did, that we left
Reykjavik and followed the main highway south and east through
the area called Sudurland (South Land) towards Vik. 

Iceland is barren of trees and has very little grass because the lava
that covers much of the land takes a long, long time to build up humus.
The green you can see here is lichen, moss and tiny green plants.

Clouds of white steam billow up everywhere in this valley and many
other areas as well, giving testament to the hallmark geothermal activity.

This pastoral scene shows a village church,
probably Icelandic Lutheran/Lutherist.

On a clear day like we had, we could pretty much always see a glacier in the distance.

A dormant (for now) volcano. One never knows when a volcano will awaken in Iceland.

We stopped by a new museum on Geothermal activity where they had several of these
topographical, lighted maps on the floor. This one shows the major glaciers (white)
and hot spots (orange) on Iceland.

This one shows the Atlantic Rift that cuts across Iceland and is responsible for all
the Geothermal activity. Two continental plates of the earth are separating along the rift.

The countryside was filled with fields of Icelandic horses, sheep, or both.

The lack of trees made for long, open vistas.

The waterfall above was just one of many falling off the cliff that ran for miles. As we walked
the trail along the bottom, we heard a hearty "Go Green" from up on the hill! We responded
with the expected "Go White" and were rewarded with cheers from our faraway fellow Spartans.

There were so many waterfalls, pretty much all with unpronounceable (for us)
names, but we did learn that the word Foss, which came at the end of  their name,
means waterfall in English.  

Heidi followed the path up to go behind this falls but as she got closer,
she realized how slick the mud on the path was and so she wisely retreated.

Skogafoss was the biggest falls we saw Monday. To the right there was a long
trail leading to the platform up on the hill. There was no way I could do it on crutches
and Heidi didn't want to try it either, but Kris and Marv made the climb.

This was the view with which they were rewarded at the top of the falls...

...but even more astounding was what they found when they followed the trail at the top!!

The people (below) climbing on the rocks in the middle of the falls
had ignored this warning sign. 

Kris got this picture of Marv at the top of the falls.

Heidi and I are two of the specks below by the river.

The sun shining on glaciers made them glow.

Jokull means glacier in English. The edge of this one was close enough to hike to.

This is what the glacial river looked like from the parking lot.

Down on the river flats you can see a group hiking out to walk on the glacier.
They are carrying cramp-ons and pick-axes and have a guide to keep them safe.
The glaciers in Iceland, like the rest of the world, are retreating at an accelerated
rate, much to the chagrin of scientists everywhere.

Our final leg of the journey was to the point near Vik pointing into the sea,
with its black sand beaches and fanciful rock outcroppings.

We drove up an improbable, rough, single-track "road" and found
ourselves at a parking lot with other intrepid explorers.

It was very windy up on the point, high above the water.

The lighthouse at the edge of the point.

There was actually a third arch that we could see from further out.

From way up high we had a nice view of the edge of the Myrdasjokull glacier. 

Those are The Three Sisters in the distance.

The city of Vik has settled up on the hill to keep it safe from tsunamis or other threats.

The sun was nearly setting as we found a little restaurant in Vik to get a bite to eat.
Kris soon realized the waitstaff was all speaking Polish so he answered in kind.
In English we found out that they, like many others, came to Iceland for work and
 have never learned Icelandic. They get by just fine with their English.
We found the same in a coffee shop later, where the barista was from Spain
but also has never even tried to learn the difficult language. 

It was around 9:00 when we returned to the hotel. We got our keys and luggage and stumbled to our rooms, wanting nothing so much as a good night’s sleep after Boston, the 7 hour flight, and a very full day of Iceland. But when we opened the door to our room, we were shocked to find it was clearly occupied by someone else! Luckily we found only luggage and crumpled bedding, not the traveler, so we closed the door and went back down to the front desk. The clerk hastened to assure us that the room wasn’t checked out to anyone else; she had made sure. We told her that it was indeed taken, and then she was quite flustered and muttered to herself about how “unprofessional” of them it was. She was very apologetic, and even more so when she realized they had only an “overflow” room on the first floor for us for Monday night. She gave us tickets for four dinners at their restaurant and told us they would be responsible for moving our luggage to the new room Tuesday morning. We told her we were way past caring where we slept; we just needed a bed so we stumbled to our ground floor room and fell gratefully into it.