I'm dreaming of a white Christmas......
Trip Start
Dec 16, 2001
1
7
15
Trip End
Ongoing
Reykjavik,
Iceland
Thursday, December 25, 2003
Stand up!
Have you seen Schindler's list? The entire film is black + white, except for a brief moment of color where a small girl in red coat walks through. This is Iceland in the winter. Snow over the ground, black volcanic landscape breaking though and clouds that stretch off to the horizon. Its very hard to distuish where the horizon is. Then there is the flash of color amongst the grey. Brightly painted buildings that leap out and assault your retinas. At night the lights come on everywhere. Even the gravestones are wired up! Ancestry is important in Iceland, much kudos can be gained if you can trace your ancestry back to the first landing of the Ingolfur. The 'Sagas' of Icelandic history and geneology are maintained on ancient vellum parchment in the national museum and worth a look
Aesthetically challenged church
. The Golden Circle is the regular tousist track. En-route a thermal oasis offers respite from the cold and there is convenient souvenier shop if you want to start spending. After that the real tour begins. The Gullfoss waterfall was a bit tricky to photograph. It's very difficult to get a focus when everything is just varying depths of white from sky to ground! I've learnt to keep my batteries tucked away nice and warm to keep them running, but my fingers did not have the same luxury. Around the great geysir was a much warmer environment. Past a series of mountains that are rumoured to contain a buried silver treasure and on to the end of the tour, a walk down through the rift. The rift is a gap that has been torn apart by the movement of the American and European tetonic plates. It looks like a giant zipper has peeled apart the rock.
Icelandic horses are supposed to be an indication of wealth, so it's a touchy question to ask 'how many horses do you have?' Also, don't make the mistake of calling them ponies! The govenment used to tax people per horse, so generally you could be certain that the number they claimed to have was lower than reality. There are a lot of them about today, inflation has been rampant. We did manage to fit in a ride on a mild day but it was fairly short.
Christmas day approached and the snow continued to fall. Neither Katie or I had experienced a proper white Xmas......well except for some fake Santa snow, but I don't think that counts. More used to donning a t-shirt and swatting flies away, it was a different experience to be able to go outside and have a snowball fight!
Bring on the food!
Saving the best for last, the Blue Lagoon! 38-40 degrees, its a big geothermal pool that supposedly has healing properties. I certainly felt better after each visit! :)
