When Erin Johnson and I arrived in Iceland yesterday morning around 8:30, tired and bedraggled, wanting nothing more than to sleep, it was pitch damn dark and absolutely pouring rain. The rain in Iceland I'm used to, but the darkness here is new for me. I've been here 4 times before in the summer when the sun never/barely sets, so while I was expecting the winter darkness on this trip, I had never experienced it firsthand. The dark is far more off-putting than I thought it would be. 9am...9:30...10am passes, and still it is almost middle-of-the-night black. Finally around 10:15 yesterday I noticed the sky brightening, turning gradually more grey. There is really only about 4-5 hours of true daylight at this time of the year, though from what I can tell most of it is cloud covered. The reality of it is far stranger than I would have thought. I keep looking at the clock and thinking it should be much later than it is.
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| "Sunrise" a little before 11am |
So, on day one, Erin and I arrived in Reykjavik after having taken the Fly Bus in from the airport. We dropped our bags off at a friend's house until our apartment was ready for us to check-in and went to wander the dark, incredibly icy streets looking for an open coffee house. It was a rather apocalyptic view as we walked around the city. Not one I was used to. The only people we saw shuffling around in the dank morning were other visitors; people I recognized from our flight, and one lonely trash collector, making the rounds with his truck. Normally this would not be a problem, as Erin and I are both pretty familiar with the city streets and various business locations. Apparently at 9:30 on a Sunday morning the week after Christmas almost nothing is open. We finally stumble into a shop that looked open. It looked like a guesthouse breakfast buffet room and so we asked a man behind the desk if we could buy breakfast. Our companions in the cozy little room were a group of young men that had been on our flight from Minneapolis, a woman who may or may not have worked there that was drinking beer and wearing a beret, and the semi-surly proprietor. We had what ended up being a great breakfast and then walked back over to our friend's house to chat and wait for the apartment to be ready. Other Erin (Jones) joined us, and soon after we were able to get settled in the apartment.
Our jet lag was crushing, as neither of us had slept for even a second on the plane, but we managed to go to the nearby grocery store and stock up on a few things before taking a several hours long nap. We made spaghetti and garlic bread for dinner (well, Erin Johnson did) and then we just sat around reading and chatting for several hours. Erin Jones lives here in Iceland now and is getting a degree in Icelandic language, so we had some catching up to do.
Here is where the adjustment to the time difference gets interesting/annoying. We went to bed at a completely respectable hour. It couldn't have been later than 11:30pm. I don't think I've ever gone to sleep that early in Iceland. "What a marvelous night of sleep we would get!" (We foolishly told each other). "We'll wake up fairly early in the morning and start a day of adventuring!" We could feel the excitement building. Reykjavik was ours for the taking!
How naive we were. At 2:30am Erin Johnson and I woke up and could not get back to sleep. We were wide awake, tossing and turning and swearing. We finally turned on the lights and read for an hour. Around 5am we finally went back to sleep, promising, "We'll get up around 10am at the latest. We want to get up and take advantage of the daylight hours." At 1pm we woke with a start, and more swearing ensued. Not our intention to sleep through half the day. In our defense, that's 5am at home.
Erin's cousin Oli came to visit as we were getting ready for the day. We went to walk around downtown with him as he did some shopping. Christmas lights are strung up everywhere and a soggy sleet/snow began to fall. It was incredibly festive and pretty dang crowded. We went to one of my favorite places, the City Hall, where they had a small Christmas display, and dumdumdum...! The big map! I love the big map. I've waxed poetic about it in previous posts, so I won't go on about it this time. We also saw the town Christmas tree. Usually the city of Oslo, Norway sends a tree to Iceland. This year (and also last year) the tree they sent got damaged in a storm when they put it up for display, so ended up replacing it with a local tree. Rumor has it that Norway is done sending trees. After our shopping and walking adventure we stopped at Te og Kaffi to have tea and coffee. It was getting dark by this time, and we had to head back to the apartment to regroup for our dinner plans.
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| Ice skating rink set up in one of the town squares |
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| City Hall Christmas display |
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| Big map! |
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| Christmas tree |
Erin Johnson's cousins Ingibjörg and Reynir, along with the rest of their family in Reykjanesbær were going to have us over for dinner. Ingibjörg picked us up near the apartment and drove us out there (practically back to the airport). We had a delicious leg of lamb dinner and great conversation. I'm not good at speaking Icelandic, but I do understand a fair amount, so was happy with the level at which I was able to follow the conversation. I wish I knew more, but I guess it isn't bad considering that I don't get the chance to learn it with any regularity. We enjoyed a great evening with the family and then Ingibjörg drove us back. Now we're settled in at the apartment again, getting ready for bed as snow sporadically flies outside our windows. It was a good day, even if we did get a terribly late start.
Tomorrow we are going to go either to the pool or to the Reykjavik City museum, Árbæjarsafn. We have plans to visit with our Snorri afi, Almar Grimsson, in the late afternoon.
Góða skemmtun at Árbæjarsafn museum! Sjáumst fljótt!
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