Pad Thai With Mango Daiquiri: My Last Dinner in Sweden
The Thai Boat Restaurant, Near Hans's House
A Rainy Street Corner in Reykjavik The Night I Arrived. Note the Icelandic Flag.
T-Shirt in a Tourist Shop in Reykjavik
Lutheran Cathedral Near My Hotel in ReykjavikSurprise everyone! There is a free business centre in my hotel here in Reykjavik, and I can keep blogging. Maybe I should pick up where I left off...
After yesterday's post, I went back to my room to watch some TV and to relax a bit while waiting to meet up with Hans. He called my hotel room punctually at 6:00 p.m., and I went downstairs to meet him in the lobby. We walked a little ways to a great Thai place which was located in a replica Viking boat docked on the Hammarby canal, about half way between my hotel and Hans's condo. I had a mango daiquiri and the chicken pad thai. It was delicious! (But it still doesn't beat that place we used to go to, Nick. I brought Troy there a few weeks ago, and I think he was glad to be introduced to the place! But I digress...)
After dinner, we walked around for a bit on Södermalm, and we talked about all kinds of things: genealogy, the Millennium series, "Tales of the City", travel... It was great just to hang out on a park bench in the city, chatting and enjoying the dazzling sun! It was 25C degrees with no humidity! Beautiful weather indeed. And I am really tanned! At 9:00 p.m., I told Hans that I needed to pack for my trip to Reykjavik, so he walked me back to the hotel. I thanked him for spending time with me like this on my trip. It is certainly nice to have someone to hang out with when you visit a distant city, and his company was agreeable. Hans has promised to get me the latest Benny Andersson release when it comes out, a special piece of music that was commissioned for the royal wedding. And I promised him that I would reimburse him when I receive it.
With that, I went to my room and spent time trying to pack my luggage so that it wouldn't be too heavy. I transferred all of my CDs to my backpack and was also able to fit in a few heavy books in there as well. Exhausted, I finished packing and went to bed around 11:30 p.m. last night.
I awoke on my own this morning at 8:00 a.m., checked my e-mails, had breakfast, showered and got ready to leave the hotel. I thanked Johan for being such a good receptionist, and headed to the subway station. From there, I was able to get to Central station and hop onto the Arlanda airport Express shuttle. I managed to get to the airport by 11:00 a.m. My flight was only scheduled to leave at 2.10 p.m., but I wanted to get information about tax free shopping, exchange my Swedish kronor for Islandic kronúr, have lunch, and locate my gate. I had some teriyaki noodles washed down with pear cider at the airport, and it was quite tasty. Then, I settled into the lobby at my gate and read the liner notes for the newly-released Deluxe edition of ABBA's "Voulez-Vous" album, with -- get this -- a bonus DVD that features the "ABBA in Switzerland" special I tried to record as a child, the first time it has ever been officially released. Of course, it would have been difficult to secure the rights for all of the performers on that special, so it features only the ABBA segments, and not Roxy Music, Kate Bush and Ted Gardestad.
I boarded the plane as scheduled and had a very uneventful flight into Reykjavik. The seats on Air Icelandic are still as uncomfortable as I remember, but I managed to doze for about a half hour. The flight to Iceland from Sweden was three hours long, but at the same time, we gained an hour. So I arrived in Reykjavik around 3:30 p.m. local time. The cool thing about being in Iceland is that I can forget the table of 7... one Canadian dollar today is worth 118 kronúr, so if I simply divide the prices by 100 I should have a good idea of the exchange.
The international airport in Iceland is in Keflavik, about 50 km away from the capital, Reykjavik, so I bought a round-trip ticket into the city aboard the "Fly-Bus". It took a full hour to get into the city, because the bus made several stops along the way.
My friend Darren would be very proud of me because I have not studied at all for this trip, and I am not exactly sure what I should be doing, or going, or seeing. This leg of the trip is a total adventure.
As I made my way to Reykjavik, I admired the bleakness of the landscape that met my eye. I have never seen such sweeping vistas of rugged desolation. It was hilly, jagged terrain as far as the eye could see, evidence of recent volcanic activity, with the only vegetation being the moss-covered moors and dales. There were no houses, and we met very few cars on our way into the city. It was almost like an extra-terrestrial landscape, with the wide ocean on the other side of the bus. Apparently, the entire country has a population of 300,000 people, two-thirds of whom live in greater Reykjavik. The second largest city has 17,000 people. This makes for a very sparsely populated country! As for the language, needless to say, I do not understand a single spoken word. But the written language, being derived from Old Norse, as is Swedish, is intriguing to me. I seem to be able to make out certain words on the road signs. For instance, a billboard for a ostburgare, which I made out to be a cheese burger, because the Swedish word for cheese is öst. Or the sign for a sjukarhus, which I thought might be a hospital, because the Swedish word for hospital is sjukhus...
I got to the Holt hotel here in Reykjavik about an hour ago, and it was great settling in. The hotel here is way more luxurious than the Clarion in Stockholm, which I really liked. The main lobby here is grand in an old-style kind of way, whereas the Clarion was definitely a designer hotel. One thing is certain: Iceland will be expensive, although not as expensive as it was before their economy crashed in 2008 and their currency was seriously devalued. In 2008, one Canadian dollar barely bought 68 kronúr. I think 118 kronúr to the dollar is a better deal. Still, the average entree at the hotel restaurant here comes in at around 4400 kronúr, so somewhat less than 44 dollars...
This is pretty much where I am at now. The Icelanders have their dinners close to 8:00 p.m., but I may not be able to last that long, especially since I am on a different clock. After dinner, I might venture out for a walk, even though I am tired, because I would like to see a bit of my new surroundings. In some ways it feels like I have gone back in time by two weeks: it is overcast here, like it was when I first arrived in Stockholm, and the high for today was 13C. Definitely chillier... Oh, and as a side note, my blog is not a good name. I recently discovered that Iceland is not really recognized as a Scandinavian country. Who knew? I guess it's pretty much the same as Newfoundland not being considered part of the Maritime provinces.
So, in case you are wondering, I am now 5 hours ahead of Ottawa time, 4 hours ahead of Moncton time. I will make the most of my time here in Reykjavik, even though I am really looking forward to coming home. Thanks to Martin and Troy for both letting me know that my house is still standing and that my cats send me kisses...
All best,
M.
After yesterday's post, I went back to my room to watch some TV and to relax a bit while waiting to meet up with Hans. He called my hotel room punctually at 6:00 p.m., and I went downstairs to meet him in the lobby. We walked a little ways to a great Thai place which was located in a replica Viking boat docked on the Hammarby canal, about half way between my hotel and Hans's condo. I had a mango daiquiri and the chicken pad thai. It was delicious! (But it still doesn't beat that place we used to go to, Nick. I brought Troy there a few weeks ago, and I think he was glad to be introduced to the place! But I digress...)
After dinner, we walked around for a bit on Södermalm, and we talked about all kinds of things: genealogy, the Millennium series, "Tales of the City", travel... It was great just to hang out on a park bench in the city, chatting and enjoying the dazzling sun! It was 25C degrees with no humidity! Beautiful weather indeed. And I am really tanned! At 9:00 p.m., I told Hans that I needed to pack for my trip to Reykjavik, so he walked me back to the hotel. I thanked him for spending time with me like this on my trip. It is certainly nice to have someone to hang out with when you visit a distant city, and his company was agreeable. Hans has promised to get me the latest Benny Andersson release when it comes out, a special piece of music that was commissioned for the royal wedding. And I promised him that I would reimburse him when I receive it.
With that, I went to my room and spent time trying to pack my luggage so that it wouldn't be too heavy. I transferred all of my CDs to my backpack and was also able to fit in a few heavy books in there as well. Exhausted, I finished packing and went to bed around 11:30 p.m. last night.
I awoke on my own this morning at 8:00 a.m., checked my e-mails, had breakfast, showered and got ready to leave the hotel. I thanked Johan for being such a good receptionist, and headed to the subway station. From there, I was able to get to Central station and hop onto the Arlanda airport Express shuttle. I managed to get to the airport by 11:00 a.m. My flight was only scheduled to leave at 2.10 p.m., but I wanted to get information about tax free shopping, exchange my Swedish kronor for Islandic kronúr, have lunch, and locate my gate. I had some teriyaki noodles washed down with pear cider at the airport, and it was quite tasty. Then, I settled into the lobby at my gate and read the liner notes for the newly-released Deluxe edition of ABBA's "Voulez-Vous" album, with -- get this -- a bonus DVD that features the "ABBA in Switzerland" special I tried to record as a child, the first time it has ever been officially released. Of course, it would have been difficult to secure the rights for all of the performers on that special, so it features only the ABBA segments, and not Roxy Music, Kate Bush and Ted Gardestad.
I boarded the plane as scheduled and had a very uneventful flight into Reykjavik. The seats on Air Icelandic are still as uncomfortable as I remember, but I managed to doze for about a half hour. The flight to Iceland from Sweden was three hours long, but at the same time, we gained an hour. So I arrived in Reykjavik around 3:30 p.m. local time. The cool thing about being in Iceland is that I can forget the table of 7... one Canadian dollar today is worth 118 kronúr, so if I simply divide the prices by 100 I should have a good idea of the exchange.
The international airport in Iceland is in Keflavik, about 50 km away from the capital, Reykjavik, so I bought a round-trip ticket into the city aboard the "Fly-Bus". It took a full hour to get into the city, because the bus made several stops along the way.
My friend Darren would be very proud of me because I have not studied at all for this trip, and I am not exactly sure what I should be doing, or going, or seeing. This leg of the trip is a total adventure.
As I made my way to Reykjavik, I admired the bleakness of the landscape that met my eye. I have never seen such sweeping vistas of rugged desolation. It was hilly, jagged terrain as far as the eye could see, evidence of recent volcanic activity, with the only vegetation being the moss-covered moors and dales. There were no houses, and we met very few cars on our way into the city. It was almost like an extra-terrestrial landscape, with the wide ocean on the other side of the bus. Apparently, the entire country has a population of 300,000 people, two-thirds of whom live in greater Reykjavik. The second largest city has 17,000 people. This makes for a very sparsely populated country! As for the language, needless to say, I do not understand a single spoken word. But the written language, being derived from Old Norse, as is Swedish, is intriguing to me. I seem to be able to make out certain words on the road signs. For instance, a billboard for a ostburgare, which I made out to be a cheese burger, because the Swedish word for cheese is öst. Or the sign for a sjukarhus, which I thought might be a hospital, because the Swedish word for hospital is sjukhus...
I got to the Holt hotel here in Reykjavik about an hour ago, and it was great settling in. The hotel here is way more luxurious than the Clarion in Stockholm, which I really liked. The main lobby here is grand in an old-style kind of way, whereas the Clarion was definitely a designer hotel. One thing is certain: Iceland will be expensive, although not as expensive as it was before their economy crashed in 2008 and their currency was seriously devalued. In 2008, one Canadian dollar barely bought 68 kronúr. I think 118 kronúr to the dollar is a better deal. Still, the average entree at the hotel restaurant here comes in at around 4400 kronúr, so somewhat less than 44 dollars...
This is pretty much where I am at now. The Icelanders have their dinners close to 8:00 p.m., but I may not be able to last that long, especially since I am on a different clock. After dinner, I might venture out for a walk, even though I am tired, because I would like to see a bit of my new surroundings. In some ways it feels like I have gone back in time by two weeks: it is overcast here, like it was when I first arrived in Stockholm, and the high for today was 13C. Definitely chillier... Oh, and as a side note, my blog is not a good name. I recently discovered that Iceland is not really recognized as a Scandinavian country. Who knew? I guess it's pretty much the same as Newfoundland not being considered part of the Maritime provinces.
So, in case you are wondering, I am now 5 hours ahead of Ottawa time, 4 hours ahead of Moncton time. I will make the most of my time here in Reykjavik, even though I am really looking forward to coming home. Thanks to Martin and Troy for both letting me know that my house is still standing and that my cats send me kisses...
All best,
M.
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