Wednesday, January 29, 2014

Learning to spell Reykjavik

I'm glad to see all of my Texan readers have survived "snowapocalypse". I never thought that London winters would be milder than TX ones...yesterday it was sunny and about 50-60 degrees. Nevertheless, I do hope that all of you have enjoyed these days off of work for the "snow", and I hope that you don't have to make the days up! 

Today I am going to recap our day in Reykjavik. Thank God Blogger spell check has Reykjavik in its dictionary, or that weirdly consonated city would be spelled differently every time on this blog. It's the "y-k-j" that gets me everytime. 

On the mid day of our trip, we decided to spend the day in Reykjavik. It meant Daniel wouldn't have to do a ton of driving, and it would be a relaxing day. Here are my thoughts, accompanied by pictures that probably have nothing to do with said thoughts. 

Reykjavik is the world's most northerly capital, so we put it on our schedule. Looking back on it, I think we would have enjoyed spending the day doing something more"naturey", but then we would probably always wonder what me missed out on in Reykjavik (spoiler- not much).
Reykjavik was pretty small and it was easy to walk around the main city center. There really wasn't much to do there- not many museums, architecture is fairly new, and it was too rainy to actually enjoy just wandering around. 
We did enjoy the half frozen pond in the middle of the old part of the city. Afterwards when we would see a duck or goose fly past our farm house, we would say it was off to this pond! I feel bad for them- they must all be freezing! Why don't they fly south for the winter? I think it's because how well fed they are here! 

I did enjoy lots of coffee. It was pretty much all we could afford there! A glass of wine was about 20 dollars, and a beer was about 10. And who wants just one glass of wine or one pint of beer? So coffee it was! That's how it was almost everywhere in Iceland...if you go, and you love wine, bring your own bottle with you! Even at the store, buying a bottle that would have been 6 bucks in the US was $30 (looking at you, Yellow Tail). 
I was surprised how hip Reykjavik was...street art was adorning nearly every empty wall, and the people were just downright cool there. I kind of picture there being a Reyklandia sketch TV show there, staring an Icelandic, blonde Fred Armisen.

The main attraction (other than drinking loads of coffee and getting rained on) is to take the lift to the top floor of the space ship church in Reykjavik for the panoramic views of the city. We are good, honest people, therefore we paid the $14 to get on the lift. If you want to be a thief, it is VERY easy to not pay for this- there is nobody to collect your tickets that you buy from the other side of the church. But really- stealing from a church? That is a new low.


Loved all of the different colored houses. Side note- Iceland, especially Reykjavik, was often described to us as a mix between a US and European city, and I totally agree with that. We felt like we were (and yes, I am obviously aware that we actually were) closer to home being in Iceland, vs London.

We were treated to a beautiful sunset on the drive home from Reykjavik.




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