View all the photos from Reykjavik
We caught the red-eye from JFK to Reykjavik, Iceland. It’s around a five and a half hour flight that leaves at 8pm local time. You do the math. We arrived at 6am local time to a rough landing in driving wind and rain, a filthy dog of a day. We got out of the plane and on to a cold shuttle bus to the terminal, not really what your body wants to be doing when it thinks it’s the middle of the night. We then caught another shuttle bus into the city which dropped everyone at their hotel door in typical Scandanavian efficiency. Unfortunately we were last to be dropped off and eventually got to our hostel at 8am with barely a glimmer of light showing on the horizon.
Happily the pain ended there. The rest of our travels in Iceland were unbelievably smoothly run and organised. Iceland has been dominated by Denmark and Norway in its history and Scandanavian design has rubbed off on everything here, from the toilet flush to the alcove to place your bags, everything is simple and functional. It’s much like living in an Ikea catalogue without having to assemble anything. The only weird thing was the complete absence of double beds, everywhere had two singles pushed together, but after soaking for two hours in a hot tub (or hot pot as the Icelandic call them) these sort of details take on an insignificant air.
One of the pools in Reykjavik actually recommends a good soak in a hot pot as a remedy for jetlag and we can confirm that it is indeed a very pleasant way to overcome the grey fatigue associated with air travel. On our first day, after a brief sleep, we went to a nearby cafe which we chose mainly because the driving rain made wandering around looking for other choices an unattractive proposition. Happily, Cafe Haiti served an amazing creamy fish soup with a bit of spice as well as beautiful smoked salmon on toast with a creamy horseradish sauce on the side. It truly hit the spot, probably the best meal during our time in Iceland. We then walked through the cold grey streets, buffeted by a murderous wind and light drizzle, to a suburban pool about 15 minutes from our hostel. $4 each to get in and access outdoor hot pots of four different temperatures ranging from 36 to 42 degrees. All the locals were out as well enjoying a break from the beginning winter. It was truly blissful to lie in warm water as our hair was ruffled by the wind and dampened by drizzle. The sun, which barely made the effort of getting out of bed, was gone by this time and just the soft lights of the outdoor pool remained.
Kids practiced their swimming in the nearby 25m pool. The instructor/lifeguard yelling at them from outside the pool was dressed in a heavy duty hooded parka and boots with the pant cuffs taped shut. This was not a balmy summers day scene but bizarrely the pool was still packed. After a reasonable two hour soaking and a few laps we dragged our water logged limbs off to the supermarket for some food. Iceland has a reputation for some bizarre food, the most horrible sounding being purifying shark, which we didn’t see. They also eat puffins but numbers are on the decline so this particular avenue of gastronomy might be in trouble. The only weird thing we saw at the supermarket was a cooked sheep’s head, packaged much like a roast chook. They also sell ready-to-eat packets of dried fish which taste truly horrible but obviously do something better for the locals.
We conservatively chose to get some skyr which is a delicious yoghurt-type drink. Most of the food is imported. Iceland catches a lot of fish and has a lot of sheep roaming the hills with fleece that looks like a huge mop has been draped over their back, but apart from a few greenhouses not much of the land is arable. It probably doesn’t help when volcanoes deposit masses of ash all over the place. It’s probably partly because of all the food importing that eating out in Iceland is insanely expensive. It’s not unusual to see mains at $40-$70. The average price is around $30 for a typical restaurant. In fact, everything is pretty damn expensive in Iceland which explains why we only had six days to drive around the country.
The following day our rental car was delivered to the hostel and we paid on a portable credit card reader. They picked the car up at the end of the trip as well. And with that we hit the road for our Icelandic road trip.
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