At Sea and Akureyri, Iceland

            Wednesday, 9 Sep 2015 – We went to breakfast at 10:30 AM.  At that time, the seas were only “moderate,” but they became rougher later in the day.  In fact, some drawers of cabin furniture were sliding open unless stuffed with an item in the side to keep them closed.  On Deck 5 waves were hitting the sides of the ship hard.  We lounged around in our cabin until 3:00 PM; then went for a light lunch.

            We met Gail and Jim for dinner at 5:55 PM, where we joined two other couples:  Kirk and Linda from Toronto, Canada; and Mike and Jan from Tulsa, Oklahoma.   We talked a lot about the benefits of being Elite passengers on Princess.  After dinner, we danced to Jumari, then to the Alphard Duo.

            Thursday, 10 Sep 2015 – In the Horizon Court, it was the most crowded ever for breakfast because passengers were all trying to eat early.  We ended up sitting between other passengers, in a situation where the middle seats are usually left free.  At 9:00 AM we met our tour group in the Princess Theatre; and at 9:30 we climbed into our tour bus at the pier.  Our tour guide was Oscar and our Driver was Hanky (?) – or that’s what it sounded like!

            Today was a very windy day; at times, it felt as if we might be blown off our feet.  Oscar told us that earlier, the strong winds had caused some damage further south in Iceland.

            As our bus wound through the small city and then the countryside, Oscar said that Danish merchants were the first ones to come here 160 years ago.  Although Iceland’s climate tends to be somewhat more moderate than Iowa because it’s on the Gulf Stream from Central America, both their past winter and this summer have been colder than normal – possibly the only place in the world for that to be true.  On the sides of many mountains, snow can be seen, and usually it would have melted in July.  Now, Oscar said, it probably won’t melt before the snow starts falling again.  Only two days earlier, they had their warmest day of 2015, most unusual!



Boiling Mud Pools

Twilight Castles

            At first, we saw a lot of green areas, but very few trees.  Apparently, forests were used up many years ago for lumber and fuel, and the wind and sheep were not good for their re-growth.  Oscar pointed out some special horses that “can run in five different ways.”  (Now that sounds like quite a trick!)  Anyway, they sell these horses especially to Germans.  Fishing has become an expensive sport in this area of the interior, with a license costing the equivalent of $1,000 per season.  Much of the land here is very stark, with no green color at all – just large and small volcanic rock.  Iceland is the youngest of any place on earth, with volcanoes having created the country more recently than other places.  The continental plate between the Americas and Europe is located here.  We passed through rugged, volcanic landscape and dramatic lava formatiodense vapors at one of the most active volcanic areas on Iceland. Of course, we could smell sulfur.  ns.  Upon arrival at Namaskard, we walked near boiling hot mud pools that let out a steady roar and At Dimmuborgir, which means "twilight castles," we saw weirdly shaped lava formations that were left exposed in the bed as this former lava lake cooled and receded. Next, we headed to Skutustadir where large craters situated on the southern shore of Lake Myvatn are called pseudo or rootless craters. They were formed when lava overflowed the lakeshore's sodden ground.

            In school, children here learn English at 9, and Danish at 11.  Why Danish?  Iceland was part of Denmark for many centuries.  The Icelandic language is the oldest Scandinavian language; it has changed some, but other Scandinavian languages have changed more.  However, all Scandinavian languages are similar enough that those speakers understand one another.

            Our bus stopped at a local restaurant, where we enjoyed a sit-down meal with salmon as the main course and conversed with Diane and Stuart from Atlanta, Georgia.  From there, our coach continued to Godafoss Waterfall.  In the year 1000 the Viking Lawspeaker Thorgeir Thorkelsson made Christianity the official religion of Iceland; after his conversion, Thorgeir threw his symbols of the pagan gods into the waterfall. 

            Since we were tired, we decided to eat dinner at the Horizon Court at 6:30 PM and call it an early night.  However, at 11:00 PM we received a phone call from the Cruise Critic call chain that the aurora borealis was visible on the starboard side.  Although we didn’t relish getting up, we hadn’t fallen asleep yet and our balcony is on the starboard side of the ship.  (How lucky!)  Therefore, we put on robes and went to check it out.  Bright light was visible on the horizon.  Although we searched the sky above the horizon for any streaks of light or color going upward, we saw none.  However, there were some small clouds in the foreground higher in our view than the horizon which might have been concealing any other lights from our eyes.  But, we did see some Northern Lights!