Woke to heavy rain which has now turned to snow. Wet snow, not that lovely dry fluffy ski stuff. The temperature has dropped to 1 degree (real feel -10) I'm sure everyone at home enjoying 28-32 is dead envious... not.
I went out and photographed for 90 minutes or so and in that time saw sun, rain, sleet, hail, snow, and heavy snow.
I have been surprised at how many buildings are tagged and how grubby the city is. For some reason I expected Nordic citizens to be cleaner & more concerned with the environment. Drivers here are extremely courteous to pedestrians and will wait for you to cross the road even when they have right of way. The red bikes (see below) are actually gates used to block the road to cars. The cathedral is an amazing building unfortunately it was also full of tourists. The statute out front is of Leif Erikson. There is conjecture that he found America before Columbus.
We are mooching about doing chores in preparation for leaving on tour tomorrow.
We had a nice evening, meeting the rest of the tour party & had a lovely dinner. They had Minke Whale on the menu which didn't impress me. There is a saying here that Icelanders will eat anything & potatoes. Apparently they also eat the Icelandic horses (god forbid that you call them ponies) and even the puffins. We are out of season to see the puffins which is a shame.
The water is fantastic, so pure its tasteless. We've been told to keep drinking water as its very easy to get dehydrated - people don't drink enough coz its so cold.
So tomorrow we have an earlyish start in our full cold weather regalia including artic boots & crampons, the whole nine yards!
I went out and photographed for 90 minutes or so and in that time saw sun, rain, sleet, hail, snow, and heavy snow.
I have been surprised at how many buildings are tagged and how grubby the city is. For some reason I expected Nordic citizens to be cleaner & more concerned with the environment. Drivers here are extremely courteous to pedestrians and will wait for you to cross the road even when they have right of way. The red bikes (see below) are actually gates used to block the road to cars. The cathedral is an amazing building unfortunately it was also full of tourists. The statute out front is of Leif Erikson. There is conjecture that he found America before Columbus.
We are mooching about doing chores in preparation for leaving on tour tomorrow.
We had a nice evening, meeting the rest of the tour party & had a lovely dinner. They had Minke Whale on the menu which didn't impress me. There is a saying here that Icelanders will eat anything & potatoes. Apparently they also eat the Icelandic horses (god forbid that you call them ponies) and even the puffins. We are out of season to see the puffins which is a shame.
The water is fantastic, so pure its tasteless. We've been told to keep drinking water as its very easy to get dehydrated - people don't drink enough coz its so cold.
So tomorrow we have an earlyish start in our full cold weather regalia including artic boots & crampons, the whole nine yards!