new taste for coffee or my annoying habit of having sleep for dinner
(a favorite meal in college by the way). Anyhow, for the second
evening in a row, I'm up at 1am too tired to read and not tired enough
to turn my brain off.
Sunday afternoon I hit the indoor flea market with Regina and Ingvar.
There weren't too many things of interest from sellers buy Ingvar did
give us a nice explanation of the different fish, meats, and other
delicacies for sale in the food section. Some interesting bits that
you don't see back home were sting ray, shark, and horse meats and the
first milk of a pregnant cow which when sold in a plastic water
bottle, looks like it could be orange juice. Black licorice is a very
popular candy and flavor here. It flavors everything from drinks to
chewing gum (salty licorice Extra?)
We had a couple of hotdogs from the stand made famous by Bill Clinton
a number of years ago. A typical Iceland dog is thin, made of lamb,
and served with crispy fried onions, fresh onions, ketchup, mustard,
and remoulade sauce. Tasty little buggers.
We ended the day early at a cafe, sipping coffee and playing cards.
Two cups of coffee ended up making me walk the streets listening to my
iPod at 1 in the morning. The streets were almost completely dead with
the few drunk tourists stumbling here and there. A stark contrast to
the midnight-6am partying of the night before.
On Monday we hopped in a van and went out to the national park where I
did my diving. This time I headed below the earth into the underworld
of a lava tube. Icicles dropped from the ceiling as we climbed through
melted rock chunks. At one point we stopped for a hot cocoa break,
turned our headlamps off, and took a moment to wonder in pitch
blackness. Your brain gets a little weirded out as your eyes search
the surroundings for any bit of light to adjust your vision. But
there's nothing. The pap of water on my wind breaker made me flinch.
The vulnarability of blindness made me raise my guard against funny
business. I was sure our guide was out to spook us after telling us
the legend of a farm girl who disappeared into these caves and was
said to appear topside wearing golden shoes. But after a few minutes
we were off again and later emerged from a snowy hole.
Other activities left for the week include museum hopping Tuesday
followed by the last holiday dinner if the Christmas season, a glacier
hike on Wednesday, and possibly a visit to the famous geyser and falls
on the Golden Circle tour. Though I may skip that because the weather
is poor and so is my bank account at this point. Afterall, I've got
New York to reckon with next week. Ah but I did prebook a stop at the
Blue Lagoon geothermic baths on the way to the airport. That'll make
my tourist checklist more complete.
Labels: Iceland
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