8 October, 2013

 

Reykjavik, Iceland

 

The flight was uneventful. Some informative videos about Iceland, and several hours of Miles Davis, Pink Floyd, and Rodrigo y Gabriella provided a soundtrack for my attempts to take several naps. I saw the Northern Lights for the first time through the window. Absolutely beautiful! An eerie green glowing curtain in the sky. I am in awe of the universe once again. I tried to take a picture, but the camera just wouldn’t cooperate. With any luck, the sky will clear while I am here and I will try to get a picture that probably won’t capture it.

 

Pre-dawn moonscape from the FlyBus. 

 

Wow, what a day. We landed at Keflavik before sunrise this morning. The airport was tremendously easy, there was a brief line for passport control, and then it was on to baggage claim. I was right on to the bus, where I used the onboard wireless to make a quick post and send a few messages of arrival. The drive in was almost surreal. The highway cuts through lava fields that looked like a lunar landscape covered in the season’s first snow.

 

 

I was dropped off at Reykjavik Lights Hotel shortly after 8 am local time (2 am in the Rocky Mountains where I had left nine hours earlier), and had no problem checking in. The room is fantastic – the bed is quite comfortable, and the shower has made me an instant convert to the rainfall shower head! I ate breakfast in the lobby, and took a brief nap before securing a pocket full of the local currency and catching a bus to the city center.

My room.  I like the modernity of Scandinavian design.

View across the harbor out my window.

Really cool bathroom with fantastic shower and heated towel rack. 

 

At the end of my first day here, I can say that I like this place. I cannot get over how beautiful and friendly the people are! I worked with a Frenchman many years ago who advised that a man should fall in love once a day. I don’t think I will be able to hold it to just once here in Iceland!

Hallgrimskirkja and statue of Leif Eriksson given to the Icelandic people in 1930, commemorating the 1000 year anniversary of the founding of the Althing (Iceland’s Parliament). 

 

As both the video on the flight, and the lovely Eda at the information office suggested, my first stop was to go up the tower of Hallgrimskirkja, the Lutheran church that sits on the hill in the old part of the city. From Wikipedia:

 

 The church is named after the Icelandic poet and clergymanHallgrímur Pétursson (1614 to 1674), author of the Passion Hymns.

State Architect Guðjón Samúelsson‘s design of the church was commissioned in 1937. He is said to have designed it to resemble the basalt lava flows of Iceland’s landscape. It took 38 years to build the church. Construction work began in 1945 and ended in 1986, the landmark tower being completed long before the church’s actual completion. The crypt beneath the choir was consecrated in 1948, the steeple and wings were completed in 1974, and the nave was consecrated in 1986. Situated in the centre of Reykjavík, it is one of the city’s best-known landmarks and is visible throughout the city. It is similar in style to the expressionist architecture of Grundtvig’s Church of Copenhagen, Denmark, completed in 1940.

 

Nave

Prayer Candles

5275 pipe organ

 

 From the church I ventured into the downtown and the shopping district.

 

When it came time to eat, I really had no choice but to go to the “Lebowski Bar.” It would have been very un-Dude of me to pass up the opportunity to steal one of their menus. (They said it was ok, they are not fancy or expensive.) The experience was clearly not about the “Walter Bacon-Burger,” though it was not bad and reasonably priced. The days of White Russians are behind me, and in a lapse of memory I did not inquire as to whether they had a good sasparilla, choosing a cola to go with my meal. I may have to return for a quick lunch and use of their wireless in the next day or so. The décor was somewhat eclectic; they could really use some rugs to tie the place together.

 

 

It’s been such a long day that I can’t really recall when it started – thousands of miles and six time zones away from here – nor am I precisely sure what day to call it. Tuesmonday? Goodnight!