Entry 2: June 23, 2008

This past weekend four of us girls had our compasses set north towards Akureyri, Iceland. We toured the Althingi on Thursday with one of the MPs from the Left-Green Movement named Lilia. It was awesome getting to spend time with her discussing the environment issues that Iceland faces and more about the way that the Althingi works. We were the first group of American students to be invited to dine in the Parliamentary dining room, and it was delicious. Once we concluded our meeting with her the four of us grabbed our overstuffed bookbags and hiked up the main shopping street to our guesthouse for the night. We dropped our bags and went out to explore Reykjavik one last time. We went to the National Cathedral, which was having some minor work done to it so the pictures were not as pretty as they could have been. We walked inside and I immediately turned around and looked up and saw the most amazing organ that I have ever seen. From the church we walked around some more, grabbing dinner and heading back to the guesthouse to take a nap and then maybe go out and experience some of the famous Reykjavik nightlife.

That experience never came however because we all slept straight through the night, which was likely a good thing because we had to be up at 5:30 the next morning to walk to the airport to catch our flight to Akureyri. That walk turned into a hike and we ended up on the wrong side of the airport, so we had to take a taxi around to the other side. Other than that the rest of the morning went smoothly. The flight into Akureyri is beautiful. You can look down and see the barren highlands and parts of one of the glaciers.

After climbing off the plane we had to figure out how to get into town because it was too early for the city buses to be running, and they don’t go out to the airport anyway. So we sucked it up and hiked the 6 km into the city center. After reorienting ourselves we turn and face the hill that would be the bane of my existence for the rest of the weekend. Every time we wanted to go into town we had to walk up and down this hill. Finally, after many breaks to stop and catch our breath and wipe some sweat off our brows, we made it to the guesthouse. More like fell in the front door but we were all sweaty and visibly exhausted. The first order of business was to take a breather and get situated in the place that would be home for the next two days. the rest of that day was spent hanging around town and shopping.

We grabbed dinner and ate at the guesthouse, waiting for the right time to go out and watch the SUMMER SOLSTICE! at around 11:30 we start walking to find the best place to watch it happen, and we settled on sitting on the docks where the huge fishing trawlers are in port and watching the sun slip down and graze the water. it was freezing cold but worth it. There is nothing else that could match the natural beauty that was provided for us to watch on a cloudless night in Akureyri.

After the sun did its thing we went back to the guesthouse and tried to warm back up by watching Law and Order and falling asleep. The next day was spent exploring the Church, visiting the art museum, and walking some more around the city. That night we went out to dinner and then listened to a band named Sputnik. They were really good too. We finally dragged ourselves up that hill one final time and went to bed.

Cell phone alarms woke us up Sunday morning telling us to get up and pack so that we could catch our flight back to Reykjavik. We ate lunch quickly then started the hike back to the airport again. All in all we hiked around 17 miles in 3 days. it was intense but so worth it. The plane landed back in Reykjavik and we walked from the airport to the bus terminal where we met up with some of the other girls taking the same bus back to Selfoss. Over all it was a pretty awesome weekend, even though my feet hate me today. Over all I would recommend Akureyri to everyone.

Entry 1: June 17, 2008

I have been in Iceland for over two weeks right now and I am in love with this place. We have had many opportunities to participate in some very interesting events. We have toured the church in Skalholt, visited Reykjavik, spent the weekend at the magic glacier, walked 5 km in the rain for a Pepsi, and have seen two of the most beautiful waterfalls in Iceland. It’s sad to say that we are leaving in less than two weeks, but this weekend four of us girls are heading up even further north to see the summer solstice.

We are getting amazing opportunities to visit Parliament later on in the week also. Last night we got to meet our host families and A.C and I were together. We went to visit the farmer in Skalholt and it was awesome. He runs a dairy farm so we spent a lot of time helping with the cows, while playing with the cats, dog, horses, rabbits and chickens. They had two daughters, one who was our age and another who was 12. They were so sweet and let us ride for a little while on their horse. Just before we walked back to school they drove us out to one of their fields and we got to go and visit with the other horses that were out in pasture. It was awesome. This place is more magical that Disney World. I hope to have many more updates in the near future.