Thingveller National Park in Iceland.

 Saturday, I went on a wonderful daylong tour of three major sites here in Iceland.  At the end of the day, our guide remarked Monday is their Labor Day, so everyone is heading off for the weekend.

We had a great trip on the bus out to Thingveller National Park.  This park is important for three different reasons.  The picture to the left is one of the churches I saw on the way. 

There are churches here and there.  We saw one church that was built so a man could bury his wife on their land because a body cannot be buried anywhere other than on church property. So a man and his brother built a church I hope to provide a picture tomorrow.

 Every seat on the bus had a tablet with the route shown on a Google Map.  Each point represents an important point on the trip.  As the GPS indicated we were at the site, the tablet displayed the appropriate information.

In addition, Freya, our guide would provide commentary on certain points to fully covered by the tablet.  The huge lake you see is where we stopped for a visit in Thingveller National Park.

The bus parked at the top, by the visitors center to drop us off.  The guide warned us that if we wanted to use the facilities here, we'd pay 200 Kr.  she also told us it was the only place that charged for use.

At the top, one found multiple maps showing the whole area.  I liked this map but to the left, one could look at a 3 dimensional map.

The white area on the map represents the second largest glacier. As this water melts, the water seeps down through the volcanic rock before traveling for 20 or 30 years until it reaches the lake. 
From the visitors center we strolled down the board walk  between two sets of rock.  This Park is where two plates are moving away from each other at about 2 cm per year.  One plate is referred to as the American plate while the other is the European plate according to the guide.

At one point, one of the walls of this fissure fell down and had to be dug out so people could continue this walk.  There is even a small sign to the side showing where it happened along with all the details.

The way the tour is set up, no one has to climb up the walkway.  The bus met us at the bottom on the other side past the waterfall.


This church and houses form the summer place belonging to  Iceland's President however it is only used for social events with visiting dignitaries.  It is at the bottom of the valley surrounded by water and easy to walk to.

No one was there when we went through so lots of visitors followed the walkways across the valley.  I didn't have time to wander over so I got close enough to snap these pictures.

Now for the second reason this National Park is important. 

Back in 930, a governing assembly began meeting and continued meeting till the mid 18th century.  This assembly meet for two weeks every year.  Representatives made their way to this location so they could discuss and create laws.  It was the first known assembly every.

When the assembly gathered, people showed up, built temporary buildings known as booths.  The flag to the left marks where they believe the "Law Rock" existed.

Side note here: Icelandic is a language closest to what the Vikings spoke.  Even now, students can read historical documents  with little difficulty.  In fact, anytime words develop such as computer, Iceland creates a new word for it.  The word for computer means "Number Witch".

So back to here.  This is where it was decided Christianity could be an accepted religion as long as Pagans were allowed to continue their beliefs back in 1000AD.  Iceland is the only country in Europe where Christianity came in without any blood shed.
Late on when the Lutherans took over as the primary Christian faith from the Catholics, things were not as nice. The third thing the park is known for has to do with change.

If a woman broke certain laws such as committing adultery, she'd be condemned to death by drowning.  They'd put rocks on her body before throwing her in the "Drowning Pool" till she died. 

If a man was convicted of the same offenses, he'd be beheaded.  This continued to the Witch Trials.

The area is so beautiful and tranquil.  In fact this area is part of a river, the only river in Iceland, that flows directly into a lake.

Water tumbles over the rocks down to the lake.  It flows between the rocks before curving to the right, plunging under the walkway before joining the river.

The drowning pool is the quiet part to the front left portion of the picture.  The clear beautiful water looks so serene that one would never know women had been drowned all those years ago.

Tomorrow, I'll share more pictures I took of the Golden Circle Trip.  At one point on the trip, they put in a short visit to a farm for ice cream.  Within the past four years, the owners remodeled the building, redid everything and are known for their wonderful ice cream.  It was so smooth and delicious.  I suspect the ice cream has a higher percent of butter fat than that you find in America.

The tour guide said last week, the Icelandic Prime Minister stopped for ice cream at the same time her group visited.  Apparently, people will even drive to this place in the middle of winter to enjoy the treat.  There is an Icelandic word that means going to get an ice cream. 

So more tomorrow. I hope you enjoyed the pictures.  Unfortunately, the pictures I took do not do justice to the beauty in real life of the area.  I already know, I want to come back to visit Iceland sometime.  I need more time.  See you tomorrow.

Magnificent!

So cute!

Day 2 In Iceland

 Today, I feel much better although I did end up taking a 2 hour nap.  Part of it is that I'm still a bit sleep deprived but the other part is we spent 2.5 hours wandering around a local shopping mall. 

I am staying at the Capital Inn which is a guest house and not a regular hotel.  In this case it is sort of like a hostel but it serves breakfast if you want to pay a bit more. 

Check in is on the landing off some stairs heading to the basement which has small lockable dormitory style rooms with a shared bathroom, social area, and kitchen. 

The rest of the building has apartment like rooms with a private bathroom or shared.  I chose to go with the shared bathroom so I have a bedroom with lockable door in a apartment with a total of four bedrooms and a kitchen.

The floors are wooden and the room has tons of plugs but they are not the usual plugs. They are round and strange but I have an adapter which allows me to charge all my gear.

I did not know when I booked my room, it came with a shared kitchen.  In the picture above, my room is on the bottom floor to the right with the shades drawn. 

Its not a huge bedroom but it has a large bed and desk.  There appears to be a television in the room but I'm not sure its hooked up to a signal because I've not been able find any thing on it.

The kitchen has everything a person needs to fix a quick meal including a hot water heater.  I love that because I adore having a hot cup of tea regularly.  Since I'm going on a tour tomorrow of the National Park and other sites, I wanted to hit the grocery store for a few things like fruit, yogurt, and cheese. 

The front desk gave me directions to the local shopping center complete with a decent sized grocery store.  The shopping center was about 15 minutes away by following a walking path.

I took the picture to the right as I headed for the mall.  I'm a few minutes away from the guest house, facing away to catch all the housing on the hill. 

I have never seen anything over 10 or 12 floors since arriving here.  The roadway is one of the major highways heading out towards the airport.  I had a great walk over but it rained while I was in the mall.

I am further along the path, closer to the  mall.  The yellow bus is one of the many providing public transport.

I spent part of the walk identifying familiar plants such as Dandelions, Yarrow, Clover, Timothy grass, something similar to Sour Dock, Roses, and a few I didn't know the name of but recognized.

The owner of this place has some sort of Josta or Current he covered so the birds could not eat all the fruit.  He wanted it for preserves.

The mall turned out to be a three story affair with a theater way up on the 3rd Floor.  The Dunkirk movie had opened there but it was not open quite that early in the morning.

There was some sort of sidewalk sale going on with lots of clothing marked down but I didn't buy anything because I didn't need it.

I found a nice bookstore where I bought a book on the geology of Iceland and a magnet with a wonderful shot of the Aurora over a small house.

Several shops were not one thing or the other but kind of mixed.  I went through several stores and found a few things I wanted but could not justify their purchase because they were extremely heavy such as a Marble pestle and mortar set or a cast iron Japanese tea kettle. 

 This is a place I stopped to pick up a meal for later in the day.  It advertised itself as having Indian street food.  I'm not sure spiced sweet potatoes are considered Indian street food but I got some anyway.

The nice thing about the restaurant?  It had a menu in both Icelandic and English so I could figure out what I wanted.  In addition, they had symbols to let people know if things were Vegan, Vegetarian, or heavy in dairy.

I purchased a Naan roll-up filled with vegetables and chick peas.  It resembled a burrito but smelled quite good.

My final picture is of the garden just next to the Inn.  It has tons of lettuce and it looked quite good. 

The temperatures in Iceland do not get super hot, nor do they get below -20 C.  It has something to do with the location of Iceland in regard to everything so it stays fairly mild all year round.

I hope you enjoyed this short view of my hotel and trip to the mall. Tomorrow, when I get back to the hotel, I'll down load pictures and share several from the tour.

Sunday afternoon, I head off to Helsinki, Finland where I'll be till the 12th.  I hope to take pictures every day to share with everyone.  I want to come back and visit Iceland sometime in the future so I can see more of the country.

Have a good day everyone.

The Trip Over and Day 1.

View of Dulles Airport from arrival gate.

 I left Alaska at 1:30 AM, mostly awake but not recovered from the previous trip.  I was only home 23 hours before winging away to Iceland.   The first flight got to Seattle but we had to wait a while before the plane could get to the gate because the other plane had not left yet. 

In Seattle, I took the same plane to Washington, DC where we got there and had to wait almost an hour before the plane at the gate moved out so we could finally park.  Fortunately, my connecting flight was not for another couple hours.

I had to go from gate B35 to A20 so I had a wonderful walk between the two.  One of the unique things I discovered that blew my mind, is the smoking lounge I found.  Its a closed room where smokers could go to enjoy their cigarette before heading off to take their plane.

There were several people in the room taking advantage of this opportunity.  I think this is the first airport I've seen with this particular advantage.  It was hidden away between two restaurants.

I guess this is a nice facility but if someone who was extremely allergic to smoke walked by as the door opened, they might have a problem.  Other than that, it worked quite well.
 

 On the way between gates, I discovered this wonderful little spa for people who need to relax a bit from the stress of traveling.  If I hadn't been so tired, I might have taken advantage of it.  I was afraid of falling asleep during the massage.

It was on a corner part way to the gate.  I love the title but it describes how I feel when I get a good massage.  Years ago, just before I had eye surgery, I had a wonderful body massage to fully relax me so I wouldn't worry.  It worked beautifully.  In fact, I was so relaxed, I appeared almost drunk.

 Further down the way, on the left hand side, I found a Chapel for those who needed solace.  While I waited for my flight I heard an announcement of a Christian service beginning at 7:30 for those who wished to attend.

I grabbed a picture as I walked by.  I'm not used to seeing many Chapels at airports.  They might exist in most airports but I don't usually find them. 

This one looked as if had someone on duty when I strolled by.

 The gate for my flight is here.  It was moved a couple of times before it settled at gate A20.  I arrived early enough, I saw Air France loading up its huge plane destined for Paris.

They loaded by area calling out the numbers beginning with one and it was done in both French and English. 

Although the plane was due to leave at 8:35, it did not leave the gate till a bit later and once on the  runway, the pilot stated we'd be delayed another half hour to 3/4th of an hour due to storms out over the ocean. We finally got on our way just before 10 PM.

The plane had 7 seats across in a 2-3-2 format with toilets placed along the way so they were not all in the back.  That meant, you didn't have to struggle back if you were only at row 15.

The picture to the right was taken from the airplane.  I saw a sliver of light flashing across the sky but it disappeared before coming back.

I do not know if it was the northern lights, aka Aurora Borealis or sunrise, either way it was absolutely breathtaking.  The picture did not do justice to the deep fiery reds at the bottom.

 Finally, we reached Iceland about 5 hours later.  This picture is taken of Iceland as the plane approached for a landing.  The ground is flat and of a color reminding me of the tundra from my part of Alaska.

In fact, even after landing, it was rather desolate without any hills, trees, or green.  It was totally flat but you could easily see the ocean from the ground. 

The airport is located about a 45 minute ride from Reykjavik and requires some sort of transportation to get between the two.  I paid for a bus to take me directly to the hotel rather than trying to figure out how it works.

When I get to Finland, I will try to figure out the local bus system because I have time. 

The plane parked way out at the edge of the tarmac to debark and catch a bus to the terminal.  since we were running a bit late, one of the first things I did was to find the restroom.

It is very different to those in the United States. There are individual stalls with sinks and toilets.  The picture to the right is of the sink.  You place your hands under the center end to get water but when you want to dry your hands, you put them by the outer wings to activate a flood of air.

It looks odd but it was sooooo cool.

 I found this on the wall as I wove my way to baggage claim.  It is obvious, they are redoing the airport so things are a bit strange but I loved the sign.  In addition, it does not say baggage claim this way on its signs, it says "Arrival" so you follow those signs.

As soon as we got off the plane, the area had a huge self service restaurant just next to the stairs taking you down to the bathrooms.  There is an elevator for those who cannot do stairs.  It is fast and easy to use.

Every so often, I found information booths, small nooks with a latter i on the outside.  Fortunately, most people here speak English in addition to Icelandic so that makes it easier.

There are also tourist spots advertised on the wall giving people a chance to find out what is available.  Even my hotel offers to get you on tours should you want to go on one.

I followed the signs leading to baggage claim but first I had to go through Passport control.  It was easy and they had people available to help you find the correct line. 

As soon as you get out of passport control, you end up at the baggage claim area.  It took a while for our luggage to arrive due to parking so far out. 

My two bags were among the last off loaded.  When you have your luggage, it is time to go through customs but it is recommended you stop at the huge duty free shop.   Customs was easy as I had nothing to declare.

 Once out of everything, I found the bus to get on for a ride into town.  I grabbed a picture of this sculpture found on the outer edges of the parking at the airport.  I have no idea what it is made of but its quite pretty.

It is almost like the rest of the rainbow tore away, leaving only this.

We took the road out of the airport, heading for Reykjavik.  It is a beautiful two lane road each way filled with roundabouts and exits for people to hike, picnic, or just stop to view the scenery.  

It took quite a while to get to town because the speed limit was never over 60 kph which is about 35 or 40 mph.  I had time to enjoy the view as we drove.

 As we drove into town, I saw some clouds in the distance by a hill which might have been vapor plumes from a geothermal entity.  The ground got rougher and I started seeing hills off in the distance.

We passed small towns filled with low rise apt buildings, saw the rough shores filled with black volcanic rock, or trails which seemed to go nowhere.

This picture shows the two lane road going toward the airport.

This area shows small bodies of water found inland.  The shore is quite rough but there are more hills so the countryside does not have as windswept a look as earlier. 

If you look carefully to the right, you see something resembling a crane used at a port.  We ended up driving right by it.  There were tons of shipping containers.

It seems as if none of the towns we passed were ever far from the water.  I even saw a freighter chugging out in the ocean, parallel to the shore.

I finally go to the hotel around 9AM but we had to wait till 2 to check in so I spend time dozing in a chair  I tried not to sleep but couldn't help dozing off a fair bit.  As soon as I got my room, I fell into bed and slept for 5 solid hours.  As soon as I get this written and my other blog updated, I'm off to bed.

Tomorrow, I am going around town to shop for a few things to eat and check out some local sights.  I'll have more pictures for you including my hotel.  Its more of a hostel than a regular hotel.  I got a room with shared bathroom to save money.  The wonderful thing is it comes with a shared kitchen and free internet.

Check back tomorrow for additional information. Saturday, I'm scheduled to take a day long tour of the southern part of the island so I'll share the photos either later Saturday or Sunday.  Let me know what you think.  Have a great day.

On My Way To Iceland.

  Good morning to everyone.  I hope you are well today.  I write this as I await the next leg of my journey to Iceland. 

I sit in the Seattle Airport, in the North Terminal just a couple gates down from where I sat the other night waiting to go home.

I was home less than 24 hours before I started this journey.  No, I did not take time to do laundry from the trip to Los Angeles.

I knew I'd have such a short stop, I packed three suitcases before I left for Los Angeles.  Two were for the trip to Los Angeles and the third for this trip.  While in Los Angeles, I purchased a bunch of beautiful taffeta in several different jewel tones, some patterned red velvet with golden threads running through it in a regular pattern, and a few other things.  One of the suitcases was empty because I knew I'd be shopping.

So for this trip, I have one check through with coat, hoodie, hiking boots, and some professional clothing for the conference I'm attending.  All my electronics ended up in my back pack along with a few other things.  I splurged on a travel pillow for the Washington D.C to Iceland in case I get tired enough to sleep.

I seldom sleep on any airplane unless I am exhausted and even then, its a maybe.  I have not been able to sleep on planes since a BOAC flight between Australia and Hawaii, when a young girl woke people up to offer them a snack.  Since that day, I've never gotten to sleep.

I'm due to arrive in Iceland around 6:30 in the morning, their time.  I plan to take pictures from the airplane as we come in for a landing.  I should be able to post my first pictures of Iceland.  I'm told its absolutely beautiful, with temperatures in the 50's and 60's.  I gave myself a couple of days before I go on a tour of the southern part of the island. 

The southern part has lots of volcanic and geothermic activity.  I can hardly wait to see it all but before that I plan to do a nice walking tour of Reykjavik, checking out the place.  The day I arrive, I'm going to sleep a bit because I'll have gone about 24 hours with little to no sleep.  My boss gave me orders to take lots of pictures so I will and I will share some of those photos with all of you.

I am off to get a few other things before I have to board for my connecting flight.  Have a good day and let me know what you think.

Airports on the Way To Burbank.

I've included a few pictures of some of the things I found interesting at various airports on the way down.  By the time you read this, I will be finishing up my packing so I can head out again to Iceland and Helsinki Finland.  I will post pictures of my travels and a bit about the conference I'll be at. 

 This trip started out in Fairbanks.  The picture is of a display of items from the local Air Museum.  The Uniform is from Weir Airlines which eventually became a part of Alaska Airlines.

There are posters talking about some of the early air pioneers who began flying to Alaska back in the teens and twenties.  If you talk to people you'll find the current library is where one of the early airports was.  I think it was the one before the current one.

Johannson  Parkway runs through the old private airport but when that went out of business, Giest was extended so people had a direct path across town.

Its over near Gate 2 and is next to a book stand filled with books you can read while waiting for the planes.

 This is a shot taken looking down the hall from Gate 2 in the Fairbanks Airport.  There are a total of 6 or 7 gates so it is not a big airport.  About half way down is security and the two restaurants, along with the only store. 

I am probably sitting in front of the display from the last picture.  I love the beautiful wooden floors.  They rebuilt this a few years ago and its about the same size as the previous building.

 I did not take any pictures of the Sea-Tac Airport because I've shared so many photos this summer.  This is taken at the San Jose Airport where I had a short stop on my way to Burbank.

It is quite impressive with its soaring curved ceilings, marble walkways and open feel.  I never got out of the area because I was tired after flying all night. 

This shot was taken near my gate as I strolled back from the restroom.  I love exploring airports and it gives me a chance to stretch my legs.

 On my way to the bathroom, I came across this robotic creature.  It was not working quite right because just before I snapped this picture, the printing on the screen showed it needed to be rebooted. 

I think it is there to provide answers and show people things about the airport.  I have never seen a robot like this wandering around any airport.

As you can see from the picture, that day, it was near the Peets Coffee and Tea stand, down near gate 25.  There were quite a few people but it was not heavy.

Side View of Robot.

I traveled with someone, so they watched my luggage while I strolled around the area, looking for unique things.

This is the side view of the robot who may be female based on the fact it has a skirt which hides the wheels underneath.

I love the beautiful green and white outfit it has on. 

 This children's play ground continued the robotic modernistic theme.  As I walked buy, there were children having a wonderful time playing inside the area with parents perched.

It does not have a huge gate, so the children just climb over and in.  Notice it has a couple of small robots inside.  To the right is a board with all the information about the area.

This is the outside of the Bob Hope Airport which serves Burbank and Hollywood.  I went to my conference in Woodland Hills and use this airport because it is much smaller than LAX and a bit closer to my hotel.

I refuse to rent a car in Los Angeles because I'd rather rubber neck than drive.  Yes, I can and have driven there but I still prefer just relaxing.

I have been going to this particular event since the first time it was held so many years ago.  It has grown bigger and become more well known.

I hope you enjoyed this.  I hope to start sharing pictures tomorrow of part of my trip as I fly to Iceland.  Let me know what you think.  Have a great day.