Iceland Part 1: How come there are no bears in Iceland?

It's because there are no woods for them to shit in.

Iceland has been on my bucket list for awhile.  I’ve heard good things, but it definitely went on the list when Prometheus came out.  It was a very shitty movie, but the intro scene of the flyover of Iceland was impressive.  It looked absolutely alien, yet of this planet.  With this period of funemployment, Iceland was pretty much the top of the must do list.

Tourism has been booming in Iceland over the last few years.  I think because of their financial crisis in 2008, they had to find a new influx of money.  They’ve been expanding their flights as well.  Icelandair has direct flights from Denver to Reykjavik.  When booking the trip, I made sure to get the nonstop flight instead of having a connecting flight in another city.  I don’t like being on planes so might as well minimize the time getting there.

I landed in Reykjavik early in the morning on Friday, August 5th and took the bus to city center.  Wandered around a bit and found a place for breakfast and coffee  The problem with getting into a city that early is that my AirBNB wasn’t ready until later in the day.  Luckily, I stopped into a tourist info center and they offered to hold my luggage.  Whenever I’m in a city, I tend to wander around and just find stuff.  There will be things that I must see, but I like walking instead of taking the bus or taxis.  I also try to have more relaxed vacations where I plan on doing 2-3 things in a day instead of having an extremely tight agenda and packing in 8 sights in a day.  With 5 days in Reykjavik, this was definitely a more relaxed itinerary.

Chill coffee shop on the 1st day.

Downtown Reykjavik on a sunny morning with Harpa in the background.

Harpa up close and personal.  This building is really, really cool.

With the full sun, I got some great pictures.

Reykjavikurtjorn, a lake that is near downtown Reykjavik.

Tiny cafe on a street corner.

The bipolar nature of Icelandic weather right here.

Icelandic lamb dinner at Ostabudin.

Leif Erikson statue, given to Iceland by the US, in front of Hallgrimskirkja.

Hallgrimskirkja with stock filters from my iPhone.  This will be cropped, printed, and put on my wall.

Saturday was a chill day with more wandering around downtown Reykjavik.  It was gay pride weekend that weekend and Iceland is definitely more progressive in equality for all people.  There were a ton of people out for the parade that day.  They also had some photographs from gay and lesbian weddings and they were absolutely fantastic pictures.  Unfortunately, a couple of them were vandalized by some asshats.  I went to a few museums, but just continued wandering around.  I know that sounds boring to many people, but I really enjoy it.  At night, I went out, met some people, and had a great time.

This is a kleinur and it is absolutely delicious.  It is kind of like a donut, but a lot less sweet.  I don't even want to know how many I ate while in Iceland.

People gathering for the Pride Parade.

Asshat vandals!

My favorite of the pride wedding pictures.

Rainbows Steps which is done every year.

A random pink Toyota Corolla.

Wandered through the cemetery a bit and took lots of pictures.

Very interested to see cemeteries from different cultures.  This seemed more like a wooded park than a cemetery.

Tito's Vodka, from Austin to Iceland.

Sunday was the big day and the center for the entire trip.  Remember that I mentioned Prometheus earlier?  The exact bucket list item was a helicopter tour of Iceland.  That happened on Sunday, August 7th.  I used a company called Nordurflug and took the Essential Iceland tour.  It was about 4 hours and included 3 different landings.  I always asked how much it cost and I’ll just say that the helicopter tour cost more than the flight to Iceland.  It was on my bucket list, and I budgeted for it.

I got there on Sunday morning and shared the ride with a couple from NYC.  There was supposed to be a 4th person, but they were a no show.  Because there were only 3 passengers, we each got a window seat.  I rode up front first.  When we took off, which was my 1st helicopter ride everywhere, the pilot basically went sideways instead of straight ahead.  That was unnerving to put it mildly.  We got up and flew over Reykjavik a bit and it was pleasant seeing the city from the air.

We headed east and saw a lot of the sights along the Golden Circle.  We say the lake that where you can dive between the continental plates, we flew over Geyser, and we flew over Gulfoss  The parking lots for both were packed.  The pilot was very friendly and informative and gave a lot of details about Iceland.  He mentioned Thingvellir, some of the geological features, and other details about Iceland.  If we had questions, he was very happy to answer them.

WARNING: Get ready for a lot of pictures.

Thingvellir National Park where you can go diving between the techtonic plates.

Gullfoss from the air.

1st landing at Háifoss.

Both falls at Háifoss.

Rainbow at Háifoss.

Absolutely gorgeous.

2nd landing.

Rainbow from the boiling mud water.

Watch where you step.  I took a step to take a picture of a hot spring and the ground caved in.  I sunk to about my knee in the ground and got flash boiled a bit by the steam for a second.  I was lucky it wasn't worse.

Glaciers are awesome!

Sediment on top of ice.

3rd landing.  We had lunch here.

See all that dirt?  It is covering ice.  All of it.  Just a bunch of loose sediment over ice.  It was tough to walk around at times because of the extremely loose soil.

I dug down about 15cm here and hit ice.

So alien looking.

See that bit of blue in the middle?  Yep, more ice.

Out of this world.

Glacier melt on the way back.

Finally, after the tour was over and a few days later, the company send out this video.



Yes, you just watched a piece of my helicopter tour.  It was expensive, but definitely a worthy experience that I have absolutely no regrets taking.  The lunch, the video, and the service were fantastic.

Once I got back, I walked back to my hotel and took a nap.  I walked the horrible 15 minutes back downtown to have dinner and a few drinks and saw a play.  One of the things that Icelanders are around of are the Icelandic sagas.  They are a collection of different stories from the history of Iceland.  The concert hall by the pay actually puts on a play called the Icelandic Sagas.  It is in English and definitely caters to foreigners, mostly Americans, by giving a 75 minute overview of the Icelandic sagas.  It was hilarious and well worth the price of admission.

Inside of Harpa prior to Icelandic Sagas.

Monday was a trip to the Blue Lagoon, a geothermal spa near Reykjavik.  It is probably one of the most popular and recognizable sights from Iceland.  I’ve heard mixed reviews about the place.  Some people have said it was very dirty and unhygienic and others have said it was really cool.  I think it was really cool and typical of a spa.  It was pricey, as everything in Iceland, but it was a relaxing 4 hours.  I didn’t think it was dirty at all, but it was definitely touristy.  The line getting in was crowded, but the actual water wasn’t so bad.  There’s a single swim up bar though and they probably could have used a 2nd or 3rd.  It was just too far to swim for another beer.  Or maybe that was a good thing.

One of the few pics I took at Blue Lagoon.

The bike racks are shaped like bikes.

Tuesday was doing a few final things such as museums and stuff.  More wandering around and getting a little bit of sight seeing in.  You remember that corner cafe from up above?  Well, I ended up having an afternoon snack there as well as reading and writing.  That evening, I ended up hanging out with some locals and a few other solo travelers.  That was a good time as well just talking about how Icelanders view America and how Americans view Iceland.

Back side of the Hallgrimskirkja.  I really loved the architecture of this church.

Afternoon snack at Hannesarholt.

Rhubarb cheesecake and wine while I read for a bit.  BTW, 1491 is a great book.

Just a T-rex on a street sign.

One of the locals with his awesome Daffy Duck shirt.

Shenanigans!

At night, Harpa has a light show on the side of the building.

A pic of Hallgrimskirkja at about 2am on the way home from the bars.

Wednesday was my final day in Reykjavik.  I wandered around to do some final shopping to get some gifts and to get a towel.  Yes, I said towel.  The next part of the trip was me renting an SUV and driving around Iceland.  I wanted to dip into a geothermal pool or two and didn’t have anything to used to dry off.  Had to stop into a sporting good store and get a microfiber towel.  Luckily, there were plenty of these stores around.

Turnaround point of my final run in Reykjavik.

A monument for the partnership of the US and Iceland.

And the details about the road trip will be in the next post.