Half-Term Holiday: Iceland Day 7

17^th February 2018

We didn’t go to bed until 1am, so slept in a little this morning before breakfast and checkout. We lost our room key, but they didn’t seem to mind, which was good. We left it somewhere in the field where we had been watching the Northern Lights, but it snowed while we were asleep… We were only headed to Reykjavik today, so we decided instead of taking the 1 highway, which goes through a tunnel under water, to take highway 47 around the bay area to see the scenery. It only took about a half hour longer but was much more pretty!

We got into our Reykjavik hotel not long after 12, but we were able to check in, which was excellent. Then we headed for a walk around the city. We started with Hallgrimskirkja, the massive and beautiful church which is modelled after the basalt columns. It’s gorgeous, and you can go up the church tower – although we didn’t as the queue was massive and the lift to the top only took 6 people up at a time! The church was lovely though and it had a massive organ which was beautiful too. There’s even a statue of Liefur Erickson out the front.

Just down the road we fond a boutique I’d seen in an Icelandair promotional video called Gjoska. We bought a lovely scarf of Icelandic wool knitted into a scarf, with green merino felted in to represent the Northern Lights. It was expensive, but then again the best souvenir we got. Plus, Richard and I will share it (mostly).

By that point we were hungry, and we spotted a place called Block Burger which turned out to be an amazing burger place! Then we ducked back to the hotel for more jumpers. It was still cold, even though we wanted to look more ‘fashionable’. Then we just wandered some more. We walked across the city pond which was almost entirely frozen. We also found a cemetery, and walked through it in the snow. It was spooky and beautiful.

Eventually, we found ourselves at the Saga Museum. It only took 30 minutes or so but was very informative about the early history of Iceland, using wax figures and audio guides. Very cool. Next door was Aurora Reykjavik, the Northern Lights centre. We learned about how the Northern Lights happen, why they’re green (or why we saw green ones), and the different legends which other countries had. Lots of spirits and ghost stories.

Just up the road we found a local brewery, where Richard had a local beer. I tries the Icelandic sloe-style blueberry gin. It was delicious and I want to try and get some in London! ON the way back to the city we walked past the hot dog street stand which apparently sells the best hot dogs in Iceland, so we had one. Comes with onions, fried onions, special sauce, mayo and ketchup. It was pretty good but not as good as the one we had in Selfoss.

Then we moved the car to a better parking spot, checked out Sandholt, the best bakery in Reykjavik (pastries were delish, but almost the last ones!), had anther hot dog (different place, tasted better). We even spent 30mins in an arcade ‘museum’ (room where you could play games!) before heading back to the hotel for the night.

We are on our flight now – I got a special chocolate because today is Women’s Day in Iceland! Lucky me. But sigh, back to work tomorrow. Oh well.