As is the way of travel, both Friday and Saturday were more or less eaten up by the process. It went about as smoothly as is possible, and STILL took up an awful lot of time. We were first or second in line to drop off our bags, somehow got priority screening from TSA folks who were all in a good mood, even cracking jokes while checking Lars’ backpack (and finding a pair of pliers he’d forgotten were in there), had a very tasty lunch at Mesa Verde (Concourse A, second level), and got to our gate 10 minutes before boarding started. The plane was not delayed in any way.
The real time-eater has to do with IcelandAir scheduling flights from North Americas so that they land in Reykjavík at 6:30 a.m. This makes for a VERY long day! We left the house at 1 in the afternoon, so by the time our flight left at 4:30, we’d gotten through most of Friday. Then, landing at 6:30, there was a whole second day to get through before bedtime. Not conducive to writing blogs….
Lucky for us, our hosts at Eric the Red Guesthouse, Edda and Runar, are used to this schedule. When I wrote to ask if we could drop our luggage off, Edda replied that we would be welcome to have breakfast as well. When we arrived at 8, their assistant, Rakka, apologized that our room was “not QUITE ready” yet. We got into our room at 10:
We took a short nap, then dressed warmly (36F and breezy) and strolled downtown. Lunched at Kornið Bakeri (Grains Bakery) on lovely whole-grain sandwiches, watched a crew installing some heavy wooden beams on the building behind the café, walked back to Eric the Red, took another nap…pretty soon the whole day was gone.
We weren’t terribly hungry for dinner (that jet-lag thing…) so went to our old favorite Kaffi Loki. The familiar downstairs seems not to be open in the winter, but the upstairs was, and the meat soup (lamb?) and lamb paté on their lovely dark rye bread just filled the bill. Plus, we had front-row seats for the start of the night’s lighting display on Hallgrímskirkja! Still photos don’t really do it justice…it looked like someone was drawing on the church’s façade with giant Magic Markers. And then giant figures in blue started climbing the face of the church, using the windows and other architectural features as hand- and foot-holds. You can see one of these figures at ground level to the left of the door in the third photo, and then various places up the church after that.
This is the only lighting installation we managed last night, partly because we were so tired, and partly because the Winter Lights Festival’s website is hard to navigate. There is supposed to be something called “Architectural Lighting – an art walk through Reykjavík”, and I saw a map for the tour once, but neither of us can find it now.
We both slept great, and woke just in time to repeat the breakfast experience--a lovely spread of rye breads, jams, cheeses and cold-cuts (Sheila’s favorite is the hangikjöt, or smoked lamb), oatmeal, cornflakes, and fresh fruits. And coffee. STRONG coffee! All this in the company of six people from England, one each from Ireland and Belgium, a couple of Swedes, and a scattering of Americans. Breakfast starts late, at 8:00, but since it doesn’t start to get light until 9:30, people and conversations linger. This is encouraged by the collection of books strewn across the table…the Belgian gentleman and I spent some time with a lovely one of photos of Icelandic farms and farm families.
We dressed for the weather (“You think it’s windy today? This is just a light breeze!”—Runar) and headed off to the Saga Museum. http://www.sagamuseum.is/ This is a series of dioramas illustrating the best-known Icelandic sagas, and a bit of history as well. The figures are amazingly life-like, and the film showing how they were made was as interesting as the rest of the museum. The artist (and museum-owner) made full-body castings of friend of his…the young lady who took our money says it’s pretty surreal to walk through the exhibits and see people you know being burned as witches or hacked apart by swords…
We stopped for lunch at Icelandic Fish and Chips. Sheila had the ling—a sort of cod, but with a firmer texture--with “crispy potatoes”. Not really crispy, but oven-baked wedges, very nice. And the home-made lemon-ginger soda was refreshing. Lars had the lobster bisque with cibatta. We were browsing in the hands-on volcano museum, where you can pick up all the rocks, and sift your hands through various sorts of volcanic ash, when Sheila ran into her friend Sonia Pearson-White, taking a break from the year-long nyckelharpa course in Tobo, Sweden. What a surprise!
IF we can find more info on the Architectural Lighting walk, we may do that this evening, although it’s rather chilly and drizzly out just now. We shall see. We have to at least go out for supper, but may not want to walk farther than needed.
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