After several hellacious and painful final days preparing to depart KC (which will undoubtable be told with great fanfare on the Cannon Chronicles at the conclusion of this trip), we find ourselves between houses and between jobs so the obvious thing is to go on vacation! We took Buddy to the kennel, parked our cars at an airport hotel, and headed to KCI to take one of the new transatlantic flights to Iceland. We had planned this several months ago and it seemed like a very logical and sensible thing to do. A few weeks ago, Iceland Air offered me the opportunity to “bid” on an upgrade to business class. (The economist in me thinks this is brilliant BTW) and our bid of an extra $250/person was accepted and we were off to the ranks of the high flying elite.
And boy did we need it! From the wide seats and sparkling wine before take off to the unlimited booze and 3 course meal and new movies, it was just what the doctor ordered. One thing to mar the perfection: the promised gluten free meal did not materialize so I needed to make due. The salmon was lovely and the contamination from the Israeli cous cous it sat on was minimal. A second small quibble is that the flight was actually not long enough or timed properly for us to sleep. Iceland Air started this service out of KC a week ago to much fanfare- for the first time, flights from the heartland could be across the pond in about 7 hours direct. Departing at 5:15 pm with a 5 hour time difference, the flight was due to land about 5:30am local time. That means we left KC at dinner time and landed at about bedtime CDT. Even with all the chardonnay and Bailey’s, there was no sleeping on the plane. (I therefore feel less bad about spending a chunk of the flight watching “The Shape of Water” – retelling of “Splash” anyone?)
The sky outside the plane never got dark and we landed at 5:30, picked up the rental car and headed into Reykjavik under bright but grey skies. The 45 minute drive goes through terrain very reminiscent of southern Idaho (which is to say barren) and we arrived at our AirBnB flat with very little trouble. It’s a comfortable granny flat below the owner’s house in a convenient but quiet part of town right by the harbor. Because we hadn’t slept a wink on the plane, we broke our “no napping” rule and spent about 2 hours trying to get some rest. Then it was time to get up and shower and start our day.
Because it is Sunday, we had very low expectations about what entertainment would be available. As it was also our “24 hours of stupidity”, our ability to enjoy much in the way of entertainment was limited. We wandered along the harbor to find a lovely cafe that reportedly could do gluten free breakfasts and touts itself as the oldest restaurant in Reykjavik. My ham and cheese omelette was just what the doctor ordered and we squeezed into the cozy cafe with about 20 bicyclists. Now it is about 45 degrees and slightly drizzly out and there are nearly two dozen people tricked out in cold weather cycling gear (in JUNE!) having breakfast before riding out again into the chilly grey day. My hats off to them. We barely managed to make it back to the apartment to put on warmer shoes – Keene’s were just not cutting it – and make our first foray to an Icelandic grocery store to stock up on supplies.
Food here – like most things – is insanely expensive. My omelette plus Frank’s smoked salmon and scrambled eggs with two lattes was about $45. I am WAY to cheap to spend that on breakfast every day. So we picked up eggs and what we think is Canadian bacon (streaky bacon was around $23/pound!) as well as the famous Icelandic Skyr yogurt and fixings for sandwiches. That mission accomplished, it was time to orient ourselves to the city and get some fresh air, all part of the plan to just stay awake. We wandered down to the tourist area and puttered about for a bit until we found ourselves ready for lunch. So back to the flat for cups of tea and ham sandwiches (the GF bread is quite good) and then off to the main attraction of the day: the Blue Lagoon!
Arguably the most famous spot on this island, we decided to book a visit on the day we though there would be nothing else to do and we couldn’t be trusted to do anything cerebral anyway. I had splurged on the “premium” package which included robes, towels, an algae mask (!?!) and a glass of sparkling wine at dinner among other things. For the uninitiated, the Blue Lagoon is 9 million liters of warm geothermal spring water heavy in minerals like silica and sulphur. (BTW, sulphur is everywhere. The smell of the water in the shower is an eye opener in itself.) The water ranges from 98-104 degrees and is just heavenly to soak in. While I had been here for a quick visit many (14?) years ago, the operations we encountered we so far from what I had seen before. Two swim up bars, on serving alcohol and one serving up various face masks, waterfalls, steam room, sauna and massages. It was just what we needed to soothe sore muscles and invigorate the soul. We spend about 90 minutes soaking and masking before showering and heading to the onsite restaurant for an excellent dinner – I had lamb and Frank had wolf fish. For dessert, Frank chose the Icelandic cheese plate. Holy awesome dairy products! What amazing cheeses we had! It was so good that we stopped at the local 24 hour grocery store to pick up our own gull oster and blue cheese and enjoy it with a lovely Oregon pinot noir that happened to find it’s way into our case. Oops.
So we have now made it to a reasonable hour to hit the hay. Of course it is still broad daylight – the sun won’t set until 11:30pm and then it rises again at 3am – so we’ll need the sleep masks we invested in before we left.
And of course we need data for the day:
Steps taken: 16,909 or 6.7 miles (not including laps around the lagoon)
Hours slept: Approx 2
Shoe changes: 3
Minutes soaking in the Blue Lagoon: 107
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