Reykjavik geocaching and sightseeing combo

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After two busy days touring punctuated by a very late night northern lights hunt I reward myself with a massive lie in! Well that's the plan but I find myself woken up early by a little ginger cat walking around my head! He's found his way into our dorm room via an open window - no wonder I'd been cold - open windows with minus temperatures outside - are you insane! He spends the next 10 minutes checking out everyone's luggage, playing with me and jumping up on all the beds. No-one else wakes up and I even get a couple of photos of him before he decides to head off outside again and try to find some food elsewhere. So back to sleep and my promised lie in. I let everyone else get up and head off on their various activities for the day then have a leisurely shower and breakfast at the hostel before setting off myself.

Solfur or Sun Voyager sculpture

Today I'm on a mooching about Reykjavik day with a spot of geocaching thrown in for good measure. I had planned to have a look at the Maritime Museum and the Settlement Exhibition, but find that Good Friday has closed down most places today. Bloody religion! Fortunately I still find lots to do and set off along the harbour area towards the Solfur, or Sun Voyager, sculpture down by the water's edge. This sculpture, created by Jon Gunnar Arnason in 1985 after winning a competition to commemorate the 200th anniversary of the city, is supposed to be the depiction of the bows of a boat in skeleton form but to me looks to have a bit of whale skeleton thrown in too. It's a really striking piece and looks great set against the snowy mountains across the bay. I find my geocache near to the sculpture in between other tourist's visits and photo taking sessions.

Hallsgrimkirkja

I now head back into central Reykjavik keeping the iconic Hallsgrimkirkja in sight. This is my next planned stop and I arrive to a perfect dappled sun and pretty clouds backdrop for my photo of this spectacular church. This imposing concrete building was designed by state architect Guojon Samuelsson in 1937 to represent the volcanic basalt columns seen around Iceland. It's named after Icelandic poet and clergyman Hallgrimur Petursson. Inside they are setting up for a children's concert later in the day and a guy is practicing the organ. With over 5000 pipes he's got his work cut out! After sitting a while in the main church which seems to have sets of seats that face both ways to face either the organ and stage area or the alter at the other end, I decide to pay to go up to the top of the 73m high tower. Luckily there's a lift so I don't have to climb up hundreds of stairs to get to the amazing views all across Reykjavik. Again the sun is shining so I get some fantastic photos of the colourful houses below and the snowy mountains in the distance. I can see the Perlan building shimmering off in the distance (I plan to go here later in my trip as there are few geocaches nearby).

Einar Jonsson Museum Sculpture Park

Right next to Hallsgrimkirkja is a sculpture park, part of the Einar Jonsson Museum which houses works by one Iceland's famed sculptors. Have to say I've never heard of him, but that's because I'm an uneducated pleb! And yes it's closed because of Good Friday but luckily there are quite a few freebies in the grounds of the museum so I take a look around. There's a lot of religious symbolism and one word titles for the sculptures which seem rather pretentious BUT I enjoy walking through the snowy park looking at these creations nonetheless. My favourite is a rather grim looking skeletal guy doing a bit of a tadaa along with other writhing naked skinnies - why ARE they always naked in sculptures? Not exactly realistic considering this is Iceland and temperatures are pretty low most of the year!

University of Iceland

Next I head off on a long walk following the gps towards the University of Iceland, not on most tourists' radars I don't suppose, but us geoachers like to get a little off the beaten track. I pass a gaggle of geese determined to take over the footpath near a main road - silly creatures, you have a massive country full of wilderness areas and you choose a busy road in a city! Having negotiated said busy road I'm beginning to think the gps has it all wrong as this looks more like an industrial area, but I keep walking and eventually another interestingly designed building comes into view. This is the University of Iceland's Askja building and in front of it is an area of marshland/lakes with board-walks which must be really lovely to walk around in the summer. There are interpretation panels with information about the flora and fauna you can find here at different times of the year. The geocache is pretty funny as there's a VERY obvious 'geocache trail' of footprints in the snow leading up to a rock with an inscription on. I get odd looks from someone inside the building as I take a self timer photo of my head sticking up above the rock. Geocachers also like to take silly photos - it's kinda fun going to places to find boxes that most people don't know are there and take silly photos to show you do know. There's another geocache to find placed in the wall of a grand sweeping lawned area (under the snow!) with raised walkways and staircase leading up to the main university building. As there are some handy benches near the cache and a great view looking towards the city, including Hallsgrimkirkja that I visited earlier in the day, I decide to have my picnic here. It's pretty cold but I have my flask of horlicks to warm me up.

National Library and National Museum

My next geocache hunt takes me to the National Library of Iceland - well to the wall outside. I sneakily log my find and then head back to the National Museum of Iceland that I'd passed on the way and hooray, finally something is open so I divest myself of my many layers and my rucksack in the lockers provided and enjoy a couple of hours looking around this fascinating museum. It's pretty dark inside the museum, presumably to protect the exhibits, but it makes it hard to read some of the information. I wonder what the glowing dotted line on the floor is until I finally reach an explanation that this is the outline of a boat in real size to give an impression of how large they really were. I learn loads about the settlement of Iceland and see many artifacts found from that time. The large brooches are really intricate and I love the wooden, whale bone and horn carvings. This was a time of warring between the chieftains usually over property or matters of the heart and there are swords and daggers on display too. Fighting only took place at close quarters, hand to hand, and never on horseback. Women were not allowed to bear arms! When they weren't fighting they was lots of cooperation going on in the way of trading and bartering of goods. Those who lived by the sea traded dried fish for items such as tallow, butter or wool. On display are looms, lace making bobbins and stones with holes in - the weights from wool spinners - the wooden shafts no longer remaining. There are ancient books showing old Icelandic that was used rather than Latin - in Iceland there were sufficient wealthy chieftains and merchants who were able to buy books but who didn't know Latin so the Icelandic language was kept for the written word rather than in other parts of Europe where only Latin was used in books. There are old boats and an entire house giving a really great impression of what life would have been like for the settlers. The museum moved towards later periods including the conversion to Christianity and there was a section of religious artifacts with chant music playing so I had a harmonised singalong as I looked at the exhibits. I find it fascinating looking at items that show everyday life and the things people invented to try and make things easier. Sometimes these look to be so complicated as to defeat that entire purpose and make me smile. For example there is a really complicated wheel and cog effort with carved figures and words that was to help tell the date! Overall an excellent museum, but as usual 'do not touch'! I really wish museums would find a way of allowing you to pick things up to have a real good look at them and have items actually working so you can get a real idea of how people used to do things. What's the use of a a cabinet with items and information that talks about bog iron and smelting if you have absolutely no idea how this works? It seems obvious to me that you need to either have a video of someone actually doing it or someone there to explain and let you pick things up and have a proper look at them so you can work out what goes where. 'Using and doing' is far better than having to read a massive load of words that still don't always make sense of the objects in front of you, so lost in time are the skills and uses for objects.

And so I head back to my hostel after a lovely day exploring Reykjavik, even if most of it was closed!

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