Iceland - The final 1.5 days - Reykjavik and the Blue Lagoon

We were finally back in an urban landscape, one which had gained a reputation for being one of the hippest cities in Europe. We saw proof. Reykjavik over the weekend is one crazy party city. It starts on Friday night, and doesn't really stop going until Sunday.. or maybe later, since we left on Sunday morning. We were wandering around late evening Friday, and the parties were already starting. In the wee hours of Saturday morning, the parties were going strong. And when we left for the airport early Sunday morning, they were just stumbling out of the bars and clubs. Bravo for party stamina, Iceland!

OK back to sightseeing - we started out the day at the old city center.

 Radhus, or City Hall was an interesting, where there was a large relief map of Iceland. A nice stop just to get a overview sense of the areas we had driven through. The building itself is built on the edge of Lake Tjornin, which dominates the old city.

City Hall

By the way, the cool weather here bred some spectacularly bright flowers.

We had a fabulous time at a one-of-a-kind museum  called the 871 ± 2 Settlement Museum. The numbers refer to the Viking longhouse unearthed at that spot that is believed to date to the year 871.

Photo Credit: CT Goh

What is remarkable about this museum is the use of multimedia tools to bring out the story of the Vikings, based on this one longhouse. For example, you could press a button which highlighted the kitchen area of the longhouse, and there would be options to show a little animation or narration on how this would look, what kind of tools, decoration, structural elements were used, the people who used them etc. In short, from one small sub-section, you would learn about a whole culture and way of life. It's hard to describe it, but the museum is cleverly done and very interactive. For someone who has been to many, many museums, this one really stood out. Because of the low light in the museum I couldn't get good pictures. I highly recommend a visit though, so no pictures mean no spoilers.

Next stop was the newly renovated National Museum of Iceland, also a pretty well-done museum, lots of Viking paraphernalia. Unfortunately, we didn't have a lot of time to linger so we had to breeze through this one in about an hour.

National Museum of Iceland

With the rain starting to let up, we rounded Lake Tjornin and headed to Hallgrimskirkja, the iconic church we had seen the night before. It was time to head to the top of the tower!

We could see our destination from the lake 

Lake Tjornin

Hallgrimskirkja

Pretty flowers near the church

The view downhill from the church. The statue is of Leifur Eirikson "Discoverer of America". It was a gift from the US to Iceland on the occasion of the 1,000th anniversary of the Althingi (Parliament) in 1930. 

The church doors

Can we call this minimalist Gothic? Interior of Hallgrimskirkja.

View from the top. The dome in the distance is Perlan ... which we explore later that day

I thought these kids' drawings of the church were so fun!

A cold-ish summer day presented the perfect opportunity to visit the Blue Lagoon (it was also close to the airport, where we were dropping off SC for her flight). It was a nice hot soak, although the water was not uniformly warm, which made for some funny moments of us reacting to waves of close-to-scalding-hot water, and alternate waves of cool shiver-inducing water. We didn't take our cameras into the water as we saw some tourists did - double zip-loc bags and raising their arms high above their heads - but we got some on the way out. It was a pleasing experience, and despite its touristy feel, well worth a trip.

The lagoon is actually pretty large, so you don't really feel to cramped in. There are also lots of nooks and crannies where I suspect ... ahem... stuff was happening. 

This part of the lagoon had particularly hot water!

All clean and spa-ed up, we headed to Perlan or "the Pearl" - essentially the city's water storage tanks dressed up with some shops and restaurants. We had a lot of fun taking pictures around the glass dome and taking in the city from a slightly lower height.

Giant Water Tanks

Funny sculptures outside Perlan

Interior.

The Glass Dome

Sunset over Reykjavik

Too much fun. 

Returning to the city center, we did a little bit of shopping. I was amused by the great wall murals around Reykjavik, and the quirky window displays!

As it got later in the day, we got together for our last supper in Iceland.

We had a tremendous time in Iceland. The scenery was postcard perfect, no matter which way you turned. It was a clean, safe, and accessible country. It's not the cheapest place to visit, but it's worth a visit, and as fun as Reykjavik was, a trip to Iceland is defined by it geological and natural wonders. It was my first time to Iceland, but hopefully won't be my last. Next time, I'm throwing in a hike through some of the West Fjords - which we had to skip because of time constraints - and a cruise to Greenland. Greenland!

Now, where else in the world shall I go munching? Stay tuned...