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Published: August 6th 2007
Corrugated Metal
All the buildings in Reykjavik are made of this stuff...not incredibly classy. Blue Skies, Blue Water and Corrugated Metal Skyline
Before I even get started with the normal blog stuff, let me ask that question which I know is being formed in your thoughts as you read this: “Why did you go to Iceland?” When initially planning this trip I had the hair-brained idea that we would island hop across the Atlantic on our way home to the US sometime this November when our year is ending. A hop and a skip through Iceland and Greenland would be the perfect way to end the trip and would break up our journey home. Rather stupidly I never even thought about the weather in this part of the world. After a little research I discovered that it is never a good idea to spend much time north of the 60th Parallel during winter. Temperatures here get COLD!!! The right time to travel here = now. July and August are the best times for Icelandic travel and, thus, our Icelandic addition to our Scandinavian leg was planned.
Does that really answer the question…no, it only gives the why for timing not for interest. So why would we be interested in Iceland’s capital
Frikirkjan i Reykjavik
A church of corrugated metal. Reykjavik? This question takes a little more explaining so bear with me for a slight diversion into the past.
As with all family stories, this Turner family legend began with just a normal everyday event that grew into a legend over years of retelling. But as with any legend it has all the important parts and pieces: an underdog, multiple feats of strength(or intelligence), an amazing ending and a moral to tie the whole story together.
Like any other middle class American family of the era, my parents and I got a kick out of proving our intelligence, or lack there of, by playing the original test of everyone’s useless information store, Trivial Pursuit. The date of this story, sometime around the mid 80’s on a weekend night when TV proved not worth watching. We three Turners sat around our kitchen table with 70’s era green wallpaper as our backdrop attempting to beat each other through the maze of useless trivia in order to walk away from the table in triumph. Little did we know that this night would end with more than just triumph, it would end in heartbreak as well.
As the game neared its
midpoint my father had gained a bit of a lead over Mom and I. As remains the case until this day, Dad is full of useless information which at times seems almost encyclopedic. With the midpoint approaching, my mother picks up a card to read the question to my father. She is just starting to get frustrated with my father’s uncanny ability to answer even the most obscure question and thus is getting a bit punchy with the possibility of stumping him. The card in her hand causes her to stop a moment and smile. She intros the question with the fateful words, “You’ll never get this one!” The proverbial gauntlet has been thrown…the contest just stepped up a notch. The question, “What is the northern most capital in the world?” The answer, without a moment of hesitation, “Reykjavik, Iceland.” My mother’s jaw drops and my father steps up a notch in my young esteem; as with all sons, my father was, and is, always number one so it didn’t take much for me to be impressed.
In order to truly make this a great story it needs more. Thankfully more amazingness was added about an hour later thus
taking this tale from story status to legend. The game continued to progress like the first half of it did. Dad’s lead increased and Mom’s incredulity over my father’s seemingly endless amount of trivial facts increased to the point where Mom was near explosion. The home stretch had begun for my father, he had entered that horrible path in Trivial Pursuit where your key to winning the game involves getting into the middle circle with the perfect role of the dice and the answer to one last question. My mother picks up a card and begins to laugh maniacally, think Dracula before the kill. Mom can’t help herself and says, “There is NO WAY you’ll get this one…
NO WAY!” Mom waits for a momentary pause as if she’s thinking deeply then says the fateful phrase that elevated this tale from story to legend, “I’m so sure you won’t get this that I’ll bet you $50…no, $100 that you’ll get it wrong.” Dad pauses before answering, a moment to think about the bet, but I think it was merely a moment to add to the pressure before answering, “Sure, $100.” The question, “What is the only city in the world to
be powered by hot springs?” The answer, once again with little or no pause, “Reykjavik, Iceland.” And thus, history was made. The moral of this story: Don’t bet unless it’s a sure thing. To this day I have thought of this moment before putting money down on anything.
Over the years this story has grown, the dollar amount may have changed, the year may not be right, but overall the story is pretty close to the truth. The unintentional outcome of the story, Reykjavik attained near mythical status in our minds. I’m sure that most American households wouldn’t even know where Reykjavik was let alone that it was powered by hot springs. When it came time to chose where to go next from Norway, my bid was on Iceland and Kel agreed that it would be fun and different. Later, when we told Mom and Dad we were coming here the excitement from the senior Turners was almost overwhelming.
Enough Background, Here’s The Reality. Iceland is a land that is closer to the world’s volcanic history than almost any other. As recent as 300 years ago eruptions of Iceland’s volcanoes devastated the meager population of this
(then) Dutch colony. Due to the recent volcanic activity, Iceland’s landscape is stunning with its cratered moon like plains and tall black and green mountains. There isn’t much historically to make Iceland famous with a few rare exceptions: Pingvellir was the site of the worlds first parliament in 1000 AD and Leif Erikson, the Viking attributed with discovering America, spent some of his life here.
We arrived in Reykjavik about mid-day on Wednesday and spent the latter half of the day wandering around the city to get acquainted. Reykjavik isn’t much of a city compared with some of the places we’ve been in the world. There are few buildings that are architecturally unique and not much of historical significance. What sets Reykjavik apart is its people and the fact that nearly everything is made of corrugated metal.
Corrugated metal, which is deemed a shabby and sub par building material back home in Virginia, is the mainstay of architecture here. Everything from houses, super markets and even churches are built out of this brightly painted metal. My supposition is that its variegated metal surface keeps pockets of air pressed against buildings as a sort of secondary insulation. While it’s
Sexy Beauty Commercial Pose
They do this pose on every TV commercial... not the most attractive façade in the world, I am certain that there is a reason why corrugated metal is so popular. If anyone out there has any ideas, please feel free to write a comment and keep all of us informed.
The only other main thing you notice about Iceland is its people. The people themselves are no different than any other similar culture around Europe, what sets them apart, similar to local buildings, is their façade. Clothing here is strange and different. I jokingly stated to Kel that Iceland was where fashion went to die, but that isn’t quite true. Fashion here is not dead, it’s just different - very, very different. People wear a lot of black here, women are big into black leggings with similarly black, chunky almost hiking shoes. Stripes and patterns get mixed all the time. Think Bjork and you will get a better picture of the craziness that I am attempting to speak of. Bjork is one of Iceland’s biggest exports musically and her strange music and even stranger fashion is very indicative of what you will see in Reykjavik. We continually felt underdressed and strangely out of place fashion wise. We
were just way too plain!
The Blue Lagoon Our main activity for Thursday, our first full day in Iceland, was to visit the Blue Lagoon. This huge ice blue pool of geothermally heated water is situated right next to one of Reykjavik’s five geothermal power stations. As the steam is vented for the power plant it is also diverted into the Blue Lagoon to create one of the world’s largest natural hot tubs.
In conjunction with the large hot tub, Blue Lagoon is famous for its silica mud. The substance that clouds the blue water and coats the bottom of the pools with inches of slimy feeling white/gray mud is supposed to be great for your skin. People throughout the pools take the mud and rub it on their faces, or even in some cases their whole bodies. Check out the pictures, we had some fun clowning around with the silica mud.
The only problem with the Blue Lagoon is that the water is seawater and chock full of minerals which dry your skin out and make your hair feel like straw. To combat this there are huge containers of conditioner in the bathroom
but poor Kel has had dry, brittle hair for the last three days thanks to the mineral seawater. I’m sure that she will be fine after a few more sessions with the bottle of conditioner.
The one challenge of the Blue Lagoon experience is the changing room. Guys, the world over, are at least somewhat modest in locker room situations. While we all get naked to shower on the way out, everyone keeps very much to themselves and quickly gets dressed to move on. It turns out that women from Scandinavian countries are not so modest. Kel, who was willing to strip down and shower with these crazy naked ladies, was shocked at the fact that women would spend considerable time naked in the dressing room. Naked women drying their hair, naked women showering, naked women just plain standing around. It seems that women in this part of the world are completely unfazed by their uncovered bodies and have not an ounce of our puritanical feelings about keeping clothed as much as possible. Strange!
Well enough from Iceland, hope you are all well back home!!
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garron
non-member comment
Whew!
This is a great entry! And I''m so glad most of the others have been recovered. Dying for the BRU dish...