Tag: Reykjavik

The coolest (not literally) country – Iceland Part 2

Let’s start off with homemade Icelandic breakfast: Skyr, (Skii-er) the local yogurt like cheese and it tasted…healthy. Blueberry skyr though, was good.

Note to self: follow what a local buys when doing groceries in supermarkets…

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Remember how in High School you studied Geography and you thought to yourself- when on earth will I be able to use these tectonic plates and currents theories ever? Well, I had my chances right here at Iceland. It was around 8 degrees considering its geographical location, it is extremely warm. This is because of the gulf stream that brings warm current all the way up from Florida.

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Iceland is really the perfect Geo field trip. You get to see Eurasia and North American tectonic plates, waterfalls eroding the cliff and volcanoes etc. Iceland thus have the privilege to utilize geothermal energy and they use a lot of water to cool off those plants and here comes the wonderful by-product- geothermal pools ALL across Iceland.

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They were amazing. Because we went in the low season, the pool was so spacious, water a creamy blue, just the right temperature with periods of mist passing by… We saw the sunrise and overlooked the black mountains all over.

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This saved my life. I wouldn’t be able to continue the trip if I did not have such a relaxing morning floating, lying down, drinking strawberry smoothie and just let the sun penetrates my skin and hair.

The latter part of the day we roamed around Reykjavik again under the flawless weather. The famous Dreamboat sculpture right by the bay… as if it is ready to sail out anytime.

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Watching young adorable children skating under technicolor graffitis with their parents watching over them

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It is that time of the day again, as the sun goes down, it radiates such soothing rays of light all across the sky, through the clouds and all the way into my heart. My whole body warms from inside out. I felt so peaceful in Iceland, it’s like calming music is playing in my mind all the time.

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Did that sound like the end of part 2? Well of course not because I still haven’t mentioned much about FOOD. This is Iceland’s best ice cream place according to Trip Advisor. We walked pass it so many times without realizing this is IT.

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Such a colorful and bubbly family-owned shop. The owner’s daughter told us that they open and close whenever  they FEEL like it. Imagine this business model in Hong Kong? Doomed. But right here, it’s just so lovely. I wish I own a crepe shop that opens and closes whenever I want to.

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Hazelnut ice cream with banana icelandic pancakes (= crepes in France)

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That’s my snickers ice cream with chocolate fudge sauce on pancakes. The more fattening the food, the better it tastes like – the number 1 tragedy in the world. oh well.

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This is frozen pancake with vanilla ice cream wrapped inside dipped in caramel and chocolate sauce on each end with coconut and almond toppings. Or to sum up in one word = heaven.

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Apart from the relaxing routine, we understood a little more about the history of the Icelandic people by visiting this sweet little open air museum. It’s basically a real life model of the lives of Icelanders back in the days before modern civilization.

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There were a small church that became someone’s house at some point and other civilian cottages.

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The tour guide demonstrated how Icelanders eat without a table (I want one of those), how they sit on skulls to milk the cows, how they make wool sweaters, how they cram many people under one roof because they were poor, and smoke ham right over their pot while cooking 🙂 Genius.

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In the kitchen, there was already a waffle maker, how cute is that? Icelandic people were even tinier than me and their beds were just like baby cribs.

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Who says Iceland isn’t cool? 😉 practically the only nice car I saw in 4 days though, Icelanders are rather modest.  All the more reasons to like them 🙂

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People in Iceland are funny, nice, and they don’t do things just to rip off tourists’ money. They genuinely want visitors to appreciate the country that they so very much loved. We had to beg the guys to open the souvenir shop for us.

End of Part 2

The coolest (not literally) country – Iceland Part 1

3 weeks after the trip to Iceland and I am still so excited about this country. I mean come on, it’s ICELAND. It is not an obvious country to visit in Europe but then again, I don’t always do the obvious 🙂

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Starting with the airline, WOW. yes WOW, it is a funny budget airline, their flight attendants looked like they were made from barbie moulds. Blonde, pale, slim and tall. Funny how the tour guide said when the vikings came to Iceland, they took all the beautiful women. If that didn’t happen, perhaps everyone in Iceland would look like barbies.

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Currency exchange: it’s such a pain that up North, they rarely use Euros. Kroners is fine but can they NOT be called the same when in one country it’s x1.3, and in another it’s /164? The rate is really good in Iceland though, the bank is also the most modern one I have ever seen.

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Of course to me, the most essential part of travelling, is the food. On the first day, we walked for almost 1 hour straight all the way out to the bay for this restaurant that serves lunch buffet for less than 10 euros. It was a very sincere and traditional Icelandic seafood buffet.

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For the price we paid, it was extremely worth the walk. (Especially for me, buffet is always a good deal 😉 The owner and staff was so nice too and I started to form a really positive image on Iceland despite the shitty ever-changing weather.

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On the way back, we walked pass the photography exhibition that I read about on the plane. I love reading those inflight magazines; they always tell you interesting things to see in the time that you are visiting. This photographer took photos 25 years ago with the idea of juxtaposing the past and present 25 years later. Isn’t that a really intriguing life-time project? It’s kind of like a time capsule, you see a new Subway here and the old building was restored … I could easily copy him and do the same but will I remember this silly idea after 25 years?

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We landed 1 am at night so we had a really chill first day. We explored Reykjavik really thoroughly: the main street was filled with exciting graffiti, interior design and window displays etc.

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I think Icelanders (sounds really cool, I’m an ICELANDER) are really amazing people, they value their heritage, they respect their nature, and they embrace arts and literature.

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The modernistic Harper Concert hall is nicely designed and it was dazzling to see it at night.

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Although the weather was cloudy and occasionally crazily windy and rainy, the city lake with swans and ducks was quite entertaining, especially to the kids. (and me.)

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This church is so different, so out of the box. 🙂 I liked it.

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The air there was revitalizing. Iceland is simply too remote to have any kind of pollution; their population helps too. If we think in a world with only HongKongers and Icelanders, you can only find 1 Icelander for every 22 HongKongers you meet!

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Icelanders claimed they have the best tasting water, and I would attest to that any day. It quenched my thirst with its refreshing and deliciously cold taste. It’s hard to explain how flavorful water can be, you just have to try it for yourself. It just felt like what water should taste like. Funny though, you must remember to turn the tap to the coldest side or else you get the hot spring water that smells like rotten egg. Yes we made that mistake like, twice. However, that water is extremely good to shower in 🙂

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At twilight, the ground absorbed the rain from earlier and was reflecting the traffic lights under the glowing lampposts. I felt peaceful and safe.

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Back to hostel, we cooked in the cutest kitchen ever with cheese that we thought was butter. And we rested. Realize I never use the word rest in this blog? Because we really never did.

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The day before, I dramatically tripped and landed on the floor at the end of a horizontal escalator like in a bad Mr. Bean show…

R: (Traumatized) shoot I feel like grandma

V: No you’re worst than them. At least they know that they’re weak so they don’t turn around talking on an escalator and then trip.

R: …

This is the 5th day of our trip and the 13th day of 6-8 hours walking. I really couldn’t stretch myself to the max anymore. I had the best night sleep in a long time snuggled up in my sleeping bag brought to me specially by a dear friend.

End of part 1.

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