Where We Stayed: Cottage of the Dead Goose

The day before we arrived in Iceland, we received a message from our AirBnB host, Káritas, wondering if our flight that evening had been canceled. Canceled? We hadn't heard of anything, but our antenna were up for the rest of the day. As I packed and Joel worked, we obsessively refreshed the flight tracker, hoping the status would stay "Scheduled." A canceled flight would mean losing a whole day, as Icelandic Air only travels overnight from Boston.

Luckily, we were spared a cancelation, and arrived at the Keflavik Airport at 7:30am the next morning after a relatively easy flight, despite neither of us sleeping very much. After a lengthy FlyBus ride into Reykjavik through lava fields dotted with occasional, small huts near the angry ocean, we arrived on Óðinsgata - Odin's Gate - in the Neighborhood of the Gods. Our hostess Káritas's mother, Anna Maria, greeted us and took our luggage, apologizing for the dead goose in the back yard.

"We just found it an hour ago," she said, "in the middle of the road. I think it had a heart attack."Joel and I looked down at the wing protruding from the mound of snow. It was already almost totally buried.

"Worst winter we've had," she continued, leading us into the small cottage at the back of the house, where we would store our luggage until our apartment was ready. Lucky us.

When we came back a few hours later, we walked into a cozy, three-room ground-floor apartment, with the tiniest shower I'd ever seen, though I fit just fine. One thing I didn't notice when reading about Iceland is that their hot water is heated by geothermal activity, which means our showers were A. Heated by VOLCANOS, B. Always hot, and C. Smelled like rotten eggs. The third fact made us so nervous we went out and bought a bunch of bottled water, before we read in a cartoon book down the street at our local landmark bookstore (or "bookmark," obvs) that it's only the hot water that contains sulfur. (A quick check that night confirmed that the cold water is delicious and, to Joel's delight, egg-free.)

Our apartment was much like many of the others in the neighborhood. All the windows seem to have wide sills, and many residents decorate them with knick-knacks, lamps, and in some cases, pets. These decorations were fun to look at while walking around and in some cases, provided us with familiar landmarks.

We also had windows that flipped open from the bottom, to let fresh air in but not precipitation. We saw a lot of these windows cracked as we walked around and wondered why this was necessary, until the overactive radiators (also powered by geothermal activity!) had us cracking some of ours. However, we did not crack the one in the back, which is close to the ground - Anna Maria warned us that if we did, we'd have visiting cats for sure.

Cats are everywhere here, and we've seen some beautiful ones. Most are friendly and come up for a pet. Their presence is well-known and celebrated with t-shirts and postcards proclaiming, "Cats rule this town." Seeing them helped stave off the homesickness for our hairy babies back home.

Overall, we were very happy with where we stayed. The kitchen was stocked not only with tea and coffee, but also with butter (oh god the butter), bread and jam. But the best part of all was the bed: memory foam with a cushy comforter on top. We both had trouble leaving it every morning. It was like sleeping on a cloud, if a cloud felt more like it looked and not like cold water vapor. If I remember literally nothing else from this trip (which is impossible), I will always remember how it felt to sink into that bed.

If the dead goose was a bad omen of something, it must have been so subtle we missed it.

Thibaulstrop's Saga

I will begin this tale with three facts:

1. The Icelandic sagas (often called the first novels) are legends of the first people who lived during the Settlement Era.
2. The Saga Museum of Reykjavik is not in Perlan. 
3. The speed, in miles per hour, of a sneeze is approximately 55.

And so it dawned on the third morning in Reykjavik a promise of a day with less-than-perfect weather – even less perfect than the two days before. So less-than-perfect, in fact, that our travelers’ tour had been canceled. When our wary travelers awoke, they saw a deceptively calm, ice-colored sky, only to find their wireless Internet was no longer operational. The first few drops of frigid rain fell as they made their way to the C is for Cookie Café, where they dined on rye toast with butter, ham, cheese, and hummus while sending vital messages to friends, family, and the keepers of their inn’s wireless Internet. 

As they made their way into the world again, a cold rain had started to fall. A slight wind blew, though nothing, noted the travelers, tour-cancelation worthy. But the sidewalks – no less cleared than they had been the days before – had frozen overnight and were now slicked with a layer of rain, making their walk to the city center slow going.

Their first stop, the Settlement Expedition, pleased our travelers. Afterwards, they wished to learn more about these early settlers and their stories at the Saga Museum, so they caught a bus to Perlan. However, even though the buses were clean, fast, and many of them mustachioed (for men’s cancer awareness), the stop names were less than clear. While the timetable clearly stated a stop for Perlan, the stops announced on board did not, and thusly our travelers got off a full stop ahead of where they were to be.

Now, in normal weather, this would not be such a problem. Our travelers merely had to walk an extra ten minutes or so to reach the top of a hill where the museum sat within a glass dome with a blinking light on top. But the moment they got off the bus they understood why their aforementioned tour had been canceled.

In America, the travelers had heard stories of the rain being God’s tears, or God’s spit, or other bodily fluids of God’s. But on this day, in this Nordic land of ice, the rain that stung their cheeks and wind that shoved them along the path to the Perlan was nothing short of sneezes coming from the great nose of Odin himself. It was as if Odin had the worst cold in all of Valhala, and no one was safe from his torment. 

So the travelers leaned against the wind and icy mucous of the gods, trudging through slushy snow and wet ice to the top of the hill, that ten minutes feeling more like ten days. When, at last, they reached the top, the welcoming warmth and dryness of the Perlan – and the promise of the Saga Museum - was as comforting as a mother’s hug.

Except this was less like the comfort of a mother’s hug and more like the disorienting realization that this strange woman is not your mother, and your mother moved downtown last May, and how strange that it still says this address in all the guidebooks and websites. Pity. Care to see our cafeteria?

Our travelers sat next to one of the windows of the glass dome, listening to the wind whip over the building, watching the rain pelt the glass and the surface of the closed observation deck. It really was beautiful, this not-Saga Museum. There were lovely views of Reykjavik and the surrounding land, and a geyser-like fountain on the ground floor that erupted every ten minutes. Our travelers might have been more excited to be there were they not soaked, cold, and wondering how they were ever going to find the strength to walk back down to the bus stop.

They packed and bundled, ready to face the gods’ wrath, but got barely feet from the front door before turning back. The way was too treacherous – the wind too strong, the rain too sharp. Our travelers, heads hung in defeat, entered the Perlan again, greeted by the confused steward who, just moments before, wrested the door open for them to the harsh outside world. Embarrassed, they admitted their weakness. The bus stop was too far. They would need to call a taxi. 

The steward, our travelers’ hero, hailed a car that appeared in mere moments, which whisked them back to their inn in under twenty minutes and twenty dollars. Our travelers hung up their clothes on the radiators, settled down to relax, and celebrated the return of the internet…only to find out their tour for the next day, too, was canceled.

And so ends this story.

New Joel Journey (Plus Kate!)

Greetings from Iceland! Kate here. Joel has tasked me with keeping the records for our journey to the land of ice and fire. We just arrived this morning, and I'm excited to share our day with you -- as soon as I have a full night's sleep! Red-eyes flights are brutal.

Check back, faithful JJ readers! Until then I leave you with a tidbit from our long day's wanderings. 

YES, WOMEN! WELCOME TO ICELAND!
BATHROOM HERE!