Sunday, June 11

the plot:

The first thing you see when you arrive in Iceland (besides the airport) is a vast expanse of lava fields. It's really stark empty and you feel almost as if you've landed on another planet until you get to the city. It's hard to explain. My pictures from the bus window aren't good enough to convey it.

Moving on,... when we checked in at the hotel (web site) at 8am local time, I was told (as expected) that my room wouldn't be ready until early afternoon. So, I got breakfast with Cathy and Chris (another grad student for the conference and her husband), and then wandered around town on my own. My Lonely Planet Guide (web site) had an architecture walking tour, so I entertained myself with that for a few hours, catching what was advertised to be the "world's best fish and chips" halfway through. (Tangent: While the fries weren't anything special, the fish was some of the freshest I'd had in my life. Reykjavik is the least polluted city in Europe, and you can literally *taste* the difference in everything.) Around 1pm, I found myself in the Radhus (city hall) just as it started pouring rain, so I made a nice hour of sitting around and reading their tourist brochures until I could run to my hotel in the rain and expect to have a room to dry out in. :)

Compared to walking 8-9 miles around Reykjavik during the day, my evening was fairly tame. I had dinner at a pasta restaurant with Walter, a professor from Swarthmore there for the conference, rehearsed my talk, and then tried to sleep. Tried is the important word here. Although technically the sun sets in Reykjavik just after midnight and rises again just before 3am this time of year, the city really does earn its name of "land of the midnight sun". I frequently woke in the middle of the night due to the light, and I can honestly say, even at 1:30am (halfway between sunset and sunrise) it's still as light as it is in NJ half an hour before sunset.... Adventures continue on Monday... :)

the pictures:

• first view of Iceland
  • keflavik airport
  • the whole country is seriously covered with these purple flowers
  • view of the lava fields looking inland
  • view of lava fields looking towards the shore (and an icelandic sheep!)
  • almost there
• around and about Reykjavik in the rain
  • statue of the first icelandic settler
  • the current building of the alpingi (icelandic parliament)
  • flag and crown on the top of the alpingi building
  • randomness
  • cool square in reykjavik's old city center. there's a hot spring river flowing under the pavement and steam comes out the pillars at the back of the picture
  • cool mural
  • who knew elvis and mary had so much in common?
  • leave it to me to inadvertently walk into a parade
  • the hallgrimskirkja and leif ericson (more on this on friday's entry)
  • viking ship sculpture in the fog in reykjavik's harbor
  • radhus (city hall). it's a really cool building built over the Tjorn (a big lake full of birds in the center of town).
  • happy small child feeding birds at the Tjorn
  • kamikaze bird
  • non-kamikaze birds :)
  • the tjorn
  • giant 3D map of iceland in city hall

where to next?