On September 24, 2010, Eric and I left Austin for Iceland. This trip was in celebration of our 5th Wedding Anniversary. We got married in Hawai’i, so to mark five years we decided we should go someplace else at least equally as incredible. Iceland definitely did not disappoint.
After a less than restful “overnight” (4hr 40min) flight from Boston, we landed at Keflavík airport around 6:30am on Saturday the 25th. It was still dark and pouring rain. The bus ride to the main bus station and then to the Hotel Arnarhvoll in Reykjavík was underwhelming, mostly because there was nothing to see in the mist and low light. Check-in wasn’t until 2pm, so after we ate at the hotel breakfast buffet (mmm, fish for breakfast), we put our bags in a closet at reception and headed out into Reykjavík to see what we could see.
A nice walk up the hill took us to the biggest landmark in the 101 (central Reykjavík) - Hallgrímskirkja, a.k.a. the church of Hallgrímur. Construction began in 1944 and was completed in 1986. Though the outside is stunning, the rain left us no choice but to shoot inside.
The church is beautifully and dramatically lit.
The pipe organ is 15m tall and weighs 25 tons. It must sound amazing in that space.
The view from the nave is, well, stunning.
For about $6 you can take the elevator to the top of the church and get great shots of the surrounding city.
Even on an overcast day, Reykjavík is still adorably colorful. This is looking west down Skólavörðustigur, toward the City Center and the old harbor. After taking in the view we headed back into the streets on a random course and came upon all kinds of interesting sights.
The graffiti in Reykjavík is pretty impressive.
We window shopped down Laugavegur (the main drag) and stopped at a cafe for a coffee where we made a decision to hit the Culture House, where the original Icelandic sagas are housed. We stashed our photo gear in lockers (no pics allowed) and made our way around the museum. The sagas were absolutely incredible. These are the history of Iceland, written over 800+ years ago, and are as important to them as our Constitution is to us. The typography was awesome and the display was beautiful, and I just couldn’t help myself. I’d kept my purse with me, which meant I had my iPhone. And I have always sucked at following the rules. At least there was no flash used.
The Icelandic language has barely deviated from the Old Norse of 800+ year ago, which means that with only a little trouble, Icelanders today can read these sagas. Impressive.
After exhausting the rest of the exhibits at Culture House, one of which was a fascinating companion exhibit to the sagas about early book-binding techniques (nerd alert!), we returned to the basement to retrieve our gear from the lockers. Certain he was turning it the right way and it was just stuck somehow, Eric promptly broke the key off in his. Inside was every bit of his camera gear, his passport, etc. After a slightly disconcerting conversation with the girl who’d given us the keys (even if we could get the key bit still inside the lock out, there were no dupes), the security person came down and calmly tried about 10 things until he was able to get it open. They could not have been any nicer about the whole thing which helped us not to panic. Once reunited with the camera gear, we decided we should head back to the hotel and attempt to nap our jet leg away.
Unfortunately, the people two doors down decided that 3pm would be an excellent time to play Rihanna’s new auto-tuned-all-to-hell single “Only Girl In The World” over and over and over. Sounds like torture, but it was actually pretty funny. We were fairly punchy, and that song is way too catchy. They finally stopped and we finally napped around 4:00.
After much needed showers and a change of clothes, a short walk down to the old harbor took us to dinner at Hamborgara Búllan around 8:30pm. Iceland does great hamburgers and this little place was terrific. It was my first experience with a Coke tallboy - a half-litre of Coke in a tall, skinny can. No high fructose corn syrup used. Just plain ol’ sugar. THE WAY IT SHOULD BE.
We wandered around the harbor on our way back to the hotel.
Witness the jacked-up Nissan Patrol. These are 44 inch tires. My head comes up to the top of the tail light. What is this, Texas? Turns out the majority of the interior of the country can only be accessed by such a vehicle, so they’re pretty prevalent.
That’s Eric there on the right reading this restaurant’s menu. They were serving reindeer meatballs on a soft potato puree with glazed beetroots, cowberry jam and blue cheese. Yum!
On the way back to the hotel we passed the Reykjavík Art Museum. We didn’t have the chance to go (we focused mostly on history museums) but it had some great exhibitions listed.
Back at the hotel, we laid in bed and watched Sky News and BBC 1-4 until we fell asleep.
