Vacation in Reykjavík, Iceland
I’ve never written a travel blog, but having the time to do so, I thought why not 🙂
Tuesday August 25
Got up, out to a waiting taxi, to Gardermoen, fligh SK 4787 (plane LN-RRY) to Reykjavík, landed about 12:00 local time, Flybus to Reykjavík (whoever came up with that name, I don’t know, it doesn’t seem related to icelandic – airplane is flugvél – so where that fly came from, I don’t know). Checked in at Hotel Björk, which seems to have about as much in common with the artist as it has with the wood (björk means birch), that is, nothing. The hotel seems ok, and after helping the receptionist to patch the right network outlet, even networking works 🙂A moment I feared I was far from the city centre, given the look of the hotel’s surroundings, but it only took me a few minutes to get to Laugavegur, the main street, a rather narrow street with tourist traps all over. The traps include several really nice photo galleries – tempting… Before leaving the hotel, I asked the receptionist where to find decent and affordable food (not lots-of-stars-restaurants today), and he told me about Krua Thai, not far from the docks and their whale safaris and tourist junk stores. Krua Thai is pretty far from being a tourist place, more like a café with takeaway, but it’s ok. A small dinner (fried swine and rice and a half litre of a local beer, Egils gull – gull meaning gold) cost 2050 krónur – not bad.
Walking on around town more or less by random, I got to the central graveyard, possibly the loveliest graveyard I’ve ever seen. It is chaotic, somehow overgrown with trees everywhere and all sorts of graves. Fascinating! Then, crossing the central pond in a park (boring compared to the graveyard), I walked around the old central part of Reykjavík with embassies (at least, I found the Norwegian one) and houses and street names of the old norse gods. Walking on, I got to Hallgrímskirkja, before I went on down through the flock of tourists, passing the tourist traps and eventually got trapped in Enski Barinn, paying 800 krónur for a pint of (quite badly tapped and not too tasty) Guinness.
Below are some pictures from today’s discoveries.
roy
Den kirkegården så ut som et vidunderlig kaos. Våre ser vanligvis ut som et oppsstramma militær-regiment. Litt spennende løsning – eller antagelig en slags omvendt “preusser”-orden. Typisk “norsk”. Vi er internasjonalt kjent for vår mangel på orden. Og dette er våre gener.
Så det så.
Ser bra ut 🙂
Kirkegårder/gravlunder kan være utrolig fine – ta en tur innom Skogskyrkogården hvis du skal til Stockholm en gang: http://www.skogskyrkogarden.se/index.php
Den ligger – kanskje ikke helt overraskende – inne i en skog. Den er nok litt mer manikyrert enn den du var innom i går, men veldig flott likevel.
Også er Yanaka gravlund i Tokyo fin – tett i tett med graver og torier og altere i en labyrint. Masse forskjellige høydenivåer.
Unfortunately this graveyard is long filled up – no chance of getting rest there once I die. The other day we sang a funeral over this old lady, over 100 years, she was to be buried there. Quite amazing. The Fossvogur cemetery is a bit more square, but pretty full too. Gufunes is most used these days.
And Krúa’s great – if you go there again, be sure to have their Pad thai noodles!
hey! walked past my house and didn’t knock! Whaaaat???