Reflecting on Iceland

Johnny-on-the-Spot … by John Foster …

My bride and I just returned from a 6 day trip to Iceland.

I have some thoughts.

I still don’t enjoy commercial air flight. I feel like “mooing” as I’m checking-in baggage, going through customs or doing the TSA’s “barefoot shuffle”.

Don’t know if I actually feel safer or more annoyed.

Iceland has about 400,000 citizens and 100,000 horses.

The pony-sized Icelandic horse will never been seen “Running for the Roses” at the Kentucky Derby but those sturdy critters fair well in the harsh weather while performing their unique five types of gaits.

The “Northern Lights” are worth the price of admission.

Our guide said roughly 1 in 4 tour groups gets to see a show like we did and it was spectacular.

But the “Aurora Borealis” is a skittish performer, best seen from September into April.

You can go on-line for the “northern lights forecast” providing readings from KP0 to KP9.

The higher the number, the better the light show.

I think the night we saw ours, the forecast was for KP4 and it was superb.

In the military, “KP” was something you didn’t want to experience too often.

“Icelandic hotdogs” (Pylsa) are big for the locals and it might be due to the fact they are mostly lamb combined with some pork and beef.

Lamb is big on Iceland since they raise a lot of sheep.

The “Pylsa’s” we had did not come with lots of extras (mustard, onions, ketchup) piled on.

I’m not used to consuming a “neat” hot dog.

Iceland is a lot more than ice.

The land is quite rugged.

It sits at the meeting point of the North American tectonic plate and the Eurasian tectonic plate.

We actually visited the area at the juncture of the two plates and it was fascinating to know how the Earth’s crust is moving, no matter how slow it might actually be.

That’s why the island is home to lots of earthquakes, volcanic action, hot springs and geysers.

There are fields of grass and straw to be found but large portions of Iceland are covered with ice-capped mountains, glaciers and fields of moss and lichen-covered lava rock.

We actually drove over a lava flow that had cooled enough in a few weeks to allow that to happen.

That was on our way to the “Blue Lagoon”, a geothermal spa not far from where the earthquake and volcanic action has been most-intense recently.

The area just recently reopened so we were able to bask in the the magma-heated waters (about 102 degrees F) and enjoy a silica mud mask.

It’s said the silica will take 10-20 years off your face.

It felt good but I don’t think I’ll need a new driver’s license photo.

Icelanders have to be resourceful, especially when it comes to food.

We paid a morning visit to a greenhouse tomato farm and sampled some of the best-tasting cherry tomatoes I’ve ever eaten.

I also had a a “Bloody Mary” there before noon.

Any day with morning alcohol is a good day.

But the tomato greenhouse farm was amazing.

There is a highway that travels the entire circumference of Iceland but you can head inland and encounter roads that simply dead-end at the foot of mountains, glaciers and snow fields.

We visited one of those locations and I remarked at how remote it felt.

Those sneaky Vikings and Norsemen named the place Iceland but it’s much milder, thanks to the Gulf Stream.

But, the warmer waters from the Caribbean mixes with the colder Arctic air and it can make for a windy and quickly changeable weather pattern.

We stayed in a small town known as Selfoss, southeast of Rekjavik, the nation’s capital.

About a third of the island’s population lives in or near Rekjavik.

The town has all the amenities you’d ever want but I most enjoyed the modern cathedral “Hallgrimskirkja” which has a huge organ with more than 5,200 pipes inside.

We visited on a Sunday morning, just before services were to start.

The Harpa concert hall and conference center is a remarkable structure with glass panels that look like Coke bottle glass but reflect sunlight in numerous colorful tints.

By the way, I took German in high school and always thought it was a somewhat “harsh-sounding” language.

Icelandic uses a lot of the “K’s, G’, J’s and V’s” in their language that we don’t.

No disrespect, but speaking Icelandic sort of sounds like clearing your throat.

While my wife doesn’t actually have a bucket list, she did want to witness the northern lights.

Mission accomplished.

She even ate some baked salmon and one of those “lamb dogs” but she drew the line on the “lamb steak with gravy”.

Not me though.

It was tasty.

For my two-cents worth, if you ever get a chance to go to Iceland, take it. Icelanders drive on the same side of the road as we do.

Pedestrians have the right-of-way at crosswalks but it was a leap of faith for me to step out into the road without first making eye-contact with the driver.

My guess is, when summer arrives with the midnight sun, it could be quite beautiful.

But we still experienced a lot of colorful things in March.