For our Iceland week, we spent two days in Reykjavik when we first arrived and about 3 days at the end of the trip. That was a perfect ratio of city to countryside. Hopefully these pictures will give you a good idea of how charming it is in the land of Sigur Rós.
Lookout point towards the harbor
I tried to look Icelandic with Viking/Heidi-inspired braids. One cashier spoke to me first in Icelandic, then switched to English after seeing my "Uh, wuh..." expression. Yes, success!
Julie's Viking accessories were less subtle.
Let's be European and sit outside a cafe for 8 hours.
The cuteness just won't quit.
We went to the giant Kolaportið Flea Market and I thought about buying an Icelandic sweater, but my heart just wasn't in it. Instead, I bought a cool 1960s era postcard at the flea market and later, dozens of spools of Icelandic yarn for future knitting projects. It was around $4 a skein, very affordable compared to knitting shops here. I had so much yarn, I was shoving it into every pocket of my suitcase and then the zipper kept getting tangled in yarn, oy vey.
I went a little crazy with the shopping at the end of the trip, and I actually bought a bowtie similar to this one at an awesome vintage shop. Only it is tie-dye. A tie-dye bowtie. OH YES. This is happening.
I was able to resist buying this charming flask though. Girliest flask ever!
Some letters are tragically missing here.
If you go to Reyjkavik, you can not leave without going to the Sea Baron, a little hole in the wall restaurant with lobster soup so good that it's been written up by Mark Bittman in the NY Times. We got ourselves a smorgasbord with the freshest grilled fish ever, and the fisherman owner kept giving us freebies too, like this little waffle.
Struggling to finish our feast.
We didn't end up trying any scary Icelandic food, like rotten shark, puffin, whale or these sheep heads. I just gawked and took pictures. This photo was taken at a cafe, but I saw the same shrink-wrapped split-in-half lamb faces sold at a convenience store.
This is one of the major grocery stores. I dig the logo. Like Julie said, "Demented pig. A brand you can trust."
Did you know that hot dogs are the national food of Iceland? We went to Baejarins Beztu Pylsur, a famous hot dog stand and plunked down 350 kroners. OK, we went twice actually.
There is a french fried onion topping underneath the hot dog. Genius. Also topped with a brown sauce. Brown sauce is very important here.
Tallboy Diet Coke, where have you been all my life?
Fun graffiti everywhere!
Home of the blondies...
The first step is a doozy... (write your own caption here).
