ICELAND July 19, 2008: Americans in Iceland – Day Three

1:00 am in Budir, Iceland

After a rainy morning and a short walk in Reykjavik, we met up with Richard and Elizabeth and headed for Budir, one of the western peninsulas… about a three-hour drive from the capital… rained the entire way — which was unfortunate, but also intriguing as it cast an interesting light and mood over the countryside.. which is spotted with thousands of waterfalls coming out of the mountains. The landscape is spectacular with every conceivable shade of green and black/grey that you can imagine… acres and acres of volcanic rock strewn along the way and a simple one lane in each direction ring road that goes all along the island for about 3,000 kilometers.

We stopped a few times — once to see a typical church (there are hundreds of them — they have a state religion (Lutheran) and every few miles there’s another little church (probably from about 1800).. Each must serve a radius of only about 25 miles and maybe 25 people. We also stopped for lunch (Gee this is beginning to sound like an article from Gourmet magazine… maybe my next career) at a little roadside place — but like much of Europe the menu isn’t fast food. We had an assortment of herrings that were to die for.. four different kinds (in mustard, in freshly stewed tomatoes, pickled vinaigrette.. etc.)

Iceland is the least densely populated country in the world… 3 people per square mile… and frankly from where we sit tonight, I’d say that 3 per mile is pretty urban! Anyway, the church was delightful.. with a royal blue arched ceiling painted with silver stars.. and stained glass windows with simple but bright graphics (no religious depictions whatsoever)… Naturally the church was empty, but open.. with a little envelope to put a few coins.. (and no one steals the coins!)

We arrived at Hotel Budir (check it out. http://www.hotelbudir.is) which — like everything, especially the architecture in Iceland — is quite spartan on the outside (modest and simple) and a total surprise inside. It’s an extremely tasteful elegant and upscale hotel — right here in the middle of nowhere. The rooms and service would make it four star in the middle of Manhattan.

We took a hike (in the rain) to the ocean along craggy volcanic rocks and moss and grass — past another church that seems to exist for the hotel since there isn’t anyone else around… Came back totally soaked.
Had a spectacular dinner at the hotel’s 4 star restaurant… whale carpaccio for appetizer.. followed by cod on pureed sweet potatoes..
And after some conversation in the bar and lounge around the fireplace, came up to bed.

Having Elizabeth along is great as she has a wealth of knowledge about the country — its politics, the landscape, and the people. She also (to my great surprise) speaks Icelandic, among the 6 or 7 languages in which she is fluent.

It’s an amazing country with a strong economy, humane approach to social services, an excellent public education system, libraries everywhere, and what appears to be a very congenial, (very homogeneous), happy population despite a gloomy climate most of the year. It’s never very cold, but it does rain regularly…

I might not have mentioned that the other night we had dinner with one of Elizabeth’s nieces who is about to leave for architecture school in Glasgow. She was quite impressive. Apparently Iceland’s university just began an architectural program and they only accept 15 students each year (and that includes both Icelanders and foreign students) so she opted to leave for Glasgow (which has an excellent program).

Tomorrow we explore the region — it will be our last full day in Iceland. We head to Bath on Wednesday late afternoon.

Hope all is well. We’ve been watching Sky News here so we’re pretty up to date with politics and what’s going on in the US. Barack got good coverage here and they announced that if Europe would be voting in the US election he’d win by a landslide — about 85% in France and over 75% in England and Germany. It’s looking better and better over here. But much as I really like Iceland.. just don’t think 300,000 people could do it for me.

Tak –
Fern