Blow me far away to the northern lites - 07/02/08

Greetings from Reykjavik.

The last mail I sent was a Christmas greeting.  As long ago as it now feels it was a nice break. I cooked a Czech Christmas dinner on 24th December, Monika cooked an English one on the 25th and we went to my bosses (Sandra) for an Icelandic Christmas dinner on the 26th.  News Years came and went in a low-key fashion, which suited me fine.  I was a little bit nervous that we would get caught up in an mass Icelandic New Years party but luckily it was not the case. We ended up going to an exclusive, intimate party hosted by our head chefs, who provided litres of tasty punch, and followed by joining half of Reykjavik outside the Cathedral to watch the 1200 tonnes of fireworks exploding on the of stroke midnight.  Downtown was surprisingly quiet.  We could not get into Damon Albarns bar, on the weekends or special nights like New Years you need to some sort of celebrity to gain entrance, especially if Mr. Albarn is in residence.  It is surprising for a small pub of red corrugated iron on the outside with a London Underground sign above the door and containing a generic pub wooden interior.  During the week it is no problem however as it is almost always empty and the odour (or aroma?) of stale beer can be smelled from several streets away.  We eschewed NASA, one of the posh clubs, as it looked empty, later we found out Quentin Tarantino and Eli Roth had spent all night there.  I was not disappointed however, more relieved that I didn't get dragged into any of the clubs.  It must be stated that there is no real concept of celebrity here, everyone just treats everyone in the same way, which is really refreshing.  Tommy Lee was here last week and ended up slouched on a bar with two of our chefs.  The last two times I have been swimming I have shared a hot tub with a variety of Icelandic actors and actresses, all in their designer swimwear.  However I have to admit that this attitude goes out of the windows regarding DJ's.  Everyone here seems to be under the impression that each DJ who visits Iceland is the biggest in the world.  Last year the whole of Reykjavik was brought to a standstill by DJ Tiesto and last weekend Benni Benassi was in town.  Everyone was star-struck and babbling about how Reykjavik was one of the clubbing capitals of the world.  Despite being allergic to clubbing if these DJ's are so famous surely I would have heard of them?

Since then things have been pretty quiet here.  The weather has been the most exciting aspect of our lives.  For much of 2008 we have been walking on several inches of snow and the sea at the bottom of our road is frozen for several feet off the shore.  Last weekend was the pinnacle (or nadir?) of the cold snap, the temperate hovered around the -15C mark.  I can see the temperature on the sign of the petrol station next to my work and check it several times an hour.  I have developed a condition where I get nervous if the temperature exceeds 0C, I am enjoying living in sub-zero temperatures!

Sub-zero Sea

We have new neighbours in our guesthouse.  An elderly Russian couple, Nikolai and Svetlana,  have moved in for three months whilst they visit their son who is living here.  They are very slow in all that they do and spend all day in the kitchen, breaking the world record for longest time peeling one onion whilst boiling a variety of slops and monopolising our precious few pots and pans.  They also have the tendency to leave taps running both in the bathroom and kitchen and always spend an eternity in the bathroom just when I am getting ready to leave for work!  Oh, and they collect their old yoghurt pots, or more precisely leave them sitting around filled with water  and they fill the fridge with all manner of strange foodstuffs.  At least they are quite quiet however, the only noise they make is the occasional hum of Nikolai practising the violin or snippets of classical music emanating from their room.  Which I guess is much better than some young Polish guy with a passion for ear-bleeding loud techno music, an affliction which it seems many long-term guesthouse dwellers over here suffer from.

On the bright side we have inherited a car.  A friend from work, Marianna, bought a new car a couple of weeks ago and rang us and asked if we wanted her old one.  Of course we said yes.  It is a 1996 Hyundai Accent.  The gearbox and clutch are knackered and none of the windows go up or down (luckily they are all stuck in the closed position) but it runs OK, as long as you don't try to get over about 55mph.  Unfortunately the MOT is up in March so we have to wait and see what will happen.  So in the past fortnight I have been undergoing a self-taught crash course in driving on the wrong side of the road and no longer try to put my seatbelt on from the wrong side or try to change gear with my window lever (not that it would make any difference in a car with a dodgy gearbox and non-functioning windows!).

Gardur Lighthouse

We took a trip in our new beast last weekend.  We were joined by Simona, Monikas friend from Czech Republic who moved over here a couple of weeks ago and her friend Petra (also Czech) who lives in her guesthouse.  The sky was clear and bright blue but the temperature was between -16C to -20C so we didn't spend much time at each place we stopped!  We drove out to the Reykjanes peninsular, about 40km west of Reykjavik.  The middle of the peninsular is occupied by Keflavik International Airport but around the coastline are a group of very small, picturesque fishing villages.  The first one we stopped at was Gardur, on the northern tip.  Gardur has a very nice lighthouse and amazing views back to Esja looming over Reykjavik.  On the western coast of the peninsular we passed through Sangerdi enroute to Hvalsnes, a very small village with a beautiful church and graveyard. We suspect it was used as a location in the Icelandic film 'Myrin' that we saw not so long ago.  In fact this film was part of the reason we wanted to explore the peninsular.  Heading back south past the airport again we stopped at Hafnir, another very small village with a church, this one not so beautiful but apparently important in the Icelandic church circles.  The other fact I learnt about Hafnir is that it was the site of a deserted ghost ship that came ashore many years ago.

Hvalsnes Church

Most of the Rekjanes peninsular is uninhabitable lava fields dotted with steaming sulphur springs.  It is stunning scenery to drive through, especially with the coat of snow on top.  Heading towards Reykjanesta (the Icelandic version of Lands End) we stopped at the 'Bridge between Continents' a man made ugly bridge across the ravine caused by the Euro-Asian and North American tectonic plates moving away from each other.  It attracts bus loads of tourists who want to walk across the continents!  After a few months living here it is evident that it is not just geographically but also culturally that Iceland is right inbetween Europe and America.  Their shopping habits, cars, interests, even their allergy for walking is more in line with those to the west than the east.  This is not a bad thing, far from it, it makes life here all the more interesting.

Around the Blue Lagoon

At Reykjanesta is one of Icelands oldest lighthouses and from the hill where the lighthouse is situated there are nice views across to the isle of Eldey, a tiny rock just offshore and home to one of the worlds largest colonies of gannets.  From here we headed back towards Grindavik on the south coast. Grindavik is one of Icelands most important harbours and home to the Salt Fish museum.  Unfortunately by the time we got there we did not have time for the museum so we just had a look at the harbour and left.  On the way back to Reykjavik we stopped at the world famous Blue Lagoon, a natural hot spring that has been turned into a spa resort. If the sky had remained clear we would have paid the admission and stayed for a few hours, perhaps even catching a glimpse of northern lights whilst relaxing in the hot tubs. As it was the sky had become cloudy so we just had a look around, took a few photos and soon left.  I am sure we will be back there at some point so I was not too bothered.

Did I mention northern lights?  Last weekend was the best weekend for northern lights this winter.  On Friday we squashed five of us into our car (Monika, our housemate Francesca, Simona, Petra and I) and headed to the Seltjarnes peninsular, just a couple of kilometres away in the west of Reykjavik, for the best views.  Somebody had the secret out however as there were busloads of loud British and Australian tourists, smoking cigarettes and laughing and joking, seemingly oblivious as to the performance going on above them.  The sky was full of bright greens and ghostly whites, an occasional dash of purple, it looked like a giant pair of curtains being drawn across the sky.  We have seen a few tastes of the aurora borealis but never this strong.  The lights were actually moving, dancing across the sky.  On the Saturday night, after we returned from our trip they were even stronger.  This time we (Monika, Francesca and I) just walked down to the coast at the end of our road where we were treated to a private performance.

Northern Lights

Our next plans for trips include the Snaefells peninsular where Jules Verne set 'Journey to the Centre of the Earth', the famous 'Golden Circle' route, and driving through the Seltun geothermal valley to Krisuvik.  We have already informed Serrano that 18th May will be our last day of work and after that we plan three weeks driving around the ring road, either in our car or a hire car.  After that we plan to move to the countryside to work for the summer.  At the moment we have a possible contact to work at a hotel in Vik but we have to wait and see what develops.  We made this contact through Francesca who works for the owners horse farm in the summer but soon found out just how small Iceland really is.  Steingerder, the main manager at Serrano, told Monika that her sister was the manager at this hotel last year and then Monika found out that the Polish guy working in the cafe next to Serrano in Smaralind was working there also!