Iceland: Land of Fire & Ice

In the last few years, Iceland has quickly become a “must go” destination, thanks in part to HBO’s Game of Thrones. The series showed vast and beautiful views of The North and Beyond the Wall; it was breathtaking. I’m not one for fads, but I’m definitely one for travel and adventure, so when the stars aligned and vacation time arrived, I was pumped to have the opportunity to see this place for myself.

I’m a superficial fan of Iceland, in that I love stories of vikings, and I love yogurt (yay for probiotics), so prior to traveling, I knew I needed to do a bit more research. I became intrigued by their lifestyle: I learned that surnames are created by combining the father’s (or as we learned from a local single mum, the mother’s) first name, with the suffix “-son” or “-dóttir”. This is a patronymic or matronymic method. For example, Eggertson or Olafdóttir.

I looked forward to trying traditional foods like hangikjöt (lamb the is smoked), skyr (yogurt), and laufabrauð (leaf bread). I was upset to learn that some people still eat whale meat, but somewhat comforted to learn that only two whaling companied remained in Iceland. One company hunts fin whales and mostly exports to Japan, and the other hunts minke whales which is mostly eaten in Iceland, but by tourists! Can you believe that it’s tourism that’s largely driving domestic hunting and consumption of whales in Iceland? Tourists: we have to be better! I understand that cultural identity and foods are important so I won’t get in any further about my objections to hunting whales in this section, but i’ll simply say that I object.

Other things I learned, the land is gorgeous and every waterfall is basically epic, their horses have wavy hair like Farrah Fawcett, it’s an incredibly expensive place to live in (GDP per capita is about $75,000 with a 5th place ranking by the IMF — USA is 8th, UK 20th, Nigeria 140th, and South Sudan is last at 186th), but the best part outside of the epic views is that the people are truly kind.

Here’s a quick breakdown:

Depart: Flight from Phoenix with an extended layover in Boston (12 hours) to visit friends.

Arrive: Reykjavík; Rented a car. Drove to Air BnB.

Plan: Go to as many places as possible in 5 days.

Activities included: exploring Reykjavik, driving ring road, seeing many many waterfalls, seeing the original Gyser, walking on an iceberg, relaxing in the blue lagoon, whale watching, and trying new and interesting Icelandic foods.

Highlight: Seeing the Northern Lights. We drove around ring road and other roads at night hoping to catch the northern lights. We didn’t… or so we thought. We we blessed on our flight, because there it was dancing in the sky, with us in the air, gazing at it through the window. Nothing short of amazing.

Pro Tip: Get a CarFi Wifi System so you can use your phone as a gps and also check emails, make calls, and of course, update your social media.