Iceland - Day 4

Hello Again,

A word about Icelandic sheep. I am not sure if it is because we have been away for 5 days, but Teri sees Big Papi in every one of them. Granted, they are very furry (Does wool count as fur?), about his size, fairly skittish, and some even have black fur. But it is more likely she has a bit of a problem. This would also explain the song she just made up, sung by Big Papi in first person, about how Big P will be joining us on vacation next summer.

Anyway, today we are in Akureyri. It was a bit of a drive from Stykkisholmur. And it was spectacular. More mountains, more fjords. We saw our first real rivers and salmon fishermen, as well as countless of the aforementioned sheep. As pure and original as the Icelandic horses, the sheep have really dense wool that puffs out. It doesn't so much curl like the sheep we're used to seeing, but sticks out like Side Show Bob's hair.

We had beautiful weather all day to drive through and arrived in Akureyri just around lunch. As Teri mentioned we are staying on a farm, in our own cabin, 100yds from the water Akureyri rests on. The city is in the crotch of a huge fjord that opens to the ocean due north. I don't think either of us will be this far north again. A ferry's ride away is the arctic circle. Mountains are on all sides and some are covered by glaciers. One of the city's claim to fame is that it boasts the world's northern most golf course. Had we arrived 6 weeks ago, we could be playing with a tee time of 12am. It's an artistic city with a really nice church (seems to be common in Iceland) and botanical garden.

Also, Teri loved that all of the stop lights were hearts. The picture above is tough to tell, but trust us, every red light in this town is a heart. It's a good vibe. We are going to hang here for another night. This will allow us to sleep in and since tomorrow's agenda is up in the air, casually figure out what we're going to do. There are some pretty cool things to explore in the area, but we wanted to come back to the farm for another night. Until then...

Iceland - Day 3. Brought to you by Glaciers

This morning we left Reykajvik, and our comfy Guest House, to pack up our tiny car and explore the country of Iceland. We started off heading north to the Snaefellsnes Peninsula – a quick 2 hour drive had us completely out of the urban scene, as we were surrounded by lambs, waterfalls, moss covered mountains, ocean, and Icelandic horses.

We made our way to Stykkisholmur (our home for the night) got everything set in with our hostel, and set out to explore the rest of the Peninsula. It was unbelievable – everything from lava fields to lush green hills of horses, to glaciers and massive rainbows , to a shark farm for Iceland's famous snack of ferminted shark meat, to what seemed like thousands of waterwalls were discovered today. We had fun playing on a black sand beach – shockingly enough Matt got some of himself into the North Atlantic (his fingertip), though the water did chance him up on a rock a few times.

We drove over 400km in our trusty little tin can today, which lead to the only bad part of the trip thus far - $8 a gallon for gas. Turns out cars don’t run on hydrothermal energy. What gives? We ended the day back home in Stykkisholmur, just as the sun was setting. It turned into a beautiful evening and we were able to take some time to sit on this lovely hill just above the dock in our tiny fishing village. The photo above was taken from our hill at sunset.

Tomorrow we head to Akureyri, the send largest city in Iceland with 16k, were we are staying at a Guest House on a farm for two nights. This town sits on the edge of a fjord and I’m looking forward to a little bit time to relax.

(Note: Matt wants me to write “looking fjord-ward” but I just can’t do it.)
Gooa nott…

Day 2 - continued

Did I mention it was windy today?

A quick story, while we're here. Yesterday we were walking around Reykjavik and went into a very small church across the street from the current parliment. It was quaint and nice. Teri walks in and gasps. She loves it. So much so she says "You know, if we had gotten married in a church, I'd have wanted it to be like this."

Many of you were at our wedding. Do you remember that stone building with the dark wood interior. Do you remember the stained glass rose window? How about the pews? That was a church, correct? I mean just because Rhode Island was the first with religious freedom, doesn't mean its houses of worship are not churches, right?

Iceland - Day 2

Yep. That's right. Just some horses grazing by the road in the shadow of a glacier, not 200 yds from the most powerful waterfall in Europe, Gullfoss.Just your typical Icelandic prairie scene.

Today we were up early and on the road on a tour of the Golden Circle. It was an overcast and windy day that started at the Hydro Thermal Electric Plant. Do you want to know what would make me hate my job? If I worked in a place where it smelled like people were routinely making hard boiled eggs and letting them rot under my desk. On the bright side, I could fart all day long and no one would be the wiser. The sulfur smell is the price they pay for having so much hydro thermal energy. Cities run on it, farms run on it. They've got so much that many people lay water pipes in their yard and under their driveways so when it snows they just turn on the water and melt the snow from underneath. Not bad. Iceland is extremely green and to prove it, we also saw the first hydrogen gas station in world.

But in a day packed with highlights, this was minor. Our first real stop was at Pingvillir. Besides being able to actually see the Mid Atlantic ridge splitting here, this is also the site of the world's oldest continuous Parliament. Icelanders have been coming here since the 950s to make laws and behead criminals. The splits in the earth are quite dynamic. Large cliffs of rocks jut up out of the earth in long lines that go for miles. Today we literally drove from Europe to North America, then back to Europe. Pretty cool.

Next was Gullfoss; a powerful waterfall in the middle of a moss covered moon scape. Literally no trees from horizon to horizon. What seemed like rain was actually the mist coming from the waterfall and blowing all over the place, because it was, as I mentioned already, very windy (ok plus a little rainy). The waterfall itself cascades down two large steps that split the earth like it was part of the ridge, but it isn't. Above the waterfall the picture above was taken. We were lucky to see a corralling of about 30 horses coming in from a day out grazing. These four were ahead of the rest. In the background you can see some mountains and what looks like clouds except it was actually a glacier. The Icelandic cowboys brought a bunch of horses over from the fields in the background, and made Teri's day. These horses are quite beautiful with very furry manes and tails. They are a bit squatty, but they are as pure as the glacier melt streams. No other horses have infected their gene pool since they were brought over here by the vikings over 1000 years ago. Kind of like the Amish.

Our final stop was Geysir, site of two large geysirs, boiling hot pots, and mud pits. These litter the mountain sides, but this site actually sits atop the ridge line and therefore is extremely active. Once erupts every 5 or 6 minutes. Scalding water spews to the sky and retard tourists downwind from the explosion scurry to avoid certain catastrophe. I've never been to Yellowstone, so these were my first geysirs.

We made it back to Reykjavik late in the afternoon. On the way home we learned about the "hidden people". The people live unnoticed in the mountains and do not like to be bothered. If you leave them alone and don't tread where you shouldn't, they will protect you. If you happen to scorn them by trouncing one of their homes, they will see to it bad things happen. Like rocks falling down the mountain sides and crushing your house. Also, these guys are elves. And invisible. Yet 80% of the country believe in them. So much so that there have been highways diverted around large rocks as to not to disturb these hobbits. Weird.

So that was our day. Tomorrow we head out to a different town. One on the Sneafsellnes Peninsula. It's going to be fishing villages, mountain hikes, puffins and seals all day tomorrow. For now, we are going to eat dinner and crash. 7am came early this morning. Until tomorrow.

Iceland - Day 1

Gott Kvold from Reykjavik. We arrived late last night to our Guesthouse keeper sleeping on the couch with the door unlocked so when we came in, he would wake up and show us to our room. Though we didn't get to sleep until about 3, Teri proclaimed it the best sleep she's had since she's been pregnant. Did I mention we're in two twin beds at opposite ends of the room?



Today we trekked all over old town Reykjavik. What you see in the picture above is the sculpture curiously named Sun Craft. Though there was no sun today, we saw plenty of rainbows out over this body of water which happens to be the North Atlantic Ocean. We missed the 40.000 person celebration of the lone medal for Iceland in the Olympics by one day. Apparently yesterday, everyone gathered in front of the Hallgrimskirkja to boast about a silver medal in handball. It was as large as their Independence Day celebrations are we were told.

We also went to the Saga Museum, ate skyrr, saw parliment (shockingly small and unassuming), walked down the oldest street in Iceland, and ate hot dogs just like Bill Clinton. Reykjavik is really a neat place. It seems all buildings are painted in primary colors which adds to the view when you look down on the town from atop the Saga Museum. Not bad for a days work considering we slept until 11.

Tomorrow we head out to Pingvellir - a park and site of the first Parliment in the world; Geysir - pretty self explanitory; and a huge waterfall and park called Gullfoss. The route is called the Golden Circle and should provide for some great pictures. Check in tomorrow for a taste.

For now we are off to see what the Reykjavik nightlife people keep mentioning is all about. Then we'll return home to catch Obama on the internet.

I love technology; always and forever.

Today's the day!

Tonight we head out to Iceland and we are beyond excited. Here's one last stock photo before we post our own shots.

In baby news, I went to the doctor this morning; our ultrasound results have been read and everyone looks healthy. One concern - this kid has long legs, long arms and apparently is in the 96% percentile for weight. So, we're having a giant. I'm still just 5 mths along, so they are pretty confident that it will all even out and the baby will be a perfectly normal size. Here's hoping ...

We'll be reporting again soon from the land of fairies and elves!

Happy Anniversary

Congratulations! Your marriage has now lasted longer than the life of Jesus Christ himself.