Husb and I were given free tickets to the cinema this evening, ‘The Secret Life Of Walter Mitty’, with Ben Stiller. I’m not a big fan of Stiller and hated the original ‘Walter Mitty’ film with Danny Kaye but this turned out to be a really good movie. I thoroughly enjoyed it, especially as aContinue reading “Queueing For A Viewing”
Tag Archives: Iceland
The Hidden People
This is definitely my last blog about my recent trip to Iceland, probably. Our most excellent guide, Olafur, told us about the hidden people, the Huldufólk, supernatural beings who live in rock formations and only rarely show themselves to humans. Many Icelanders believe in their existence. One day, we went off road in giant jeepsContinue reading “The Hidden People”
Hot And Steamy
Another dawn on the road, another glimpse of the morning star. On our last day we went to the Blue Lagoon, a mineral-rich outdoor pool filled with hot volcanic waters. We had to run from the nice warm building out into the freezing cold and then plunge into the lagoon. Lovely. The skies were spectacularContinue reading “Hot And Steamy”
The (Late) Morning Star
It was a bit weird getting used to the very short days up near the Arctic Circle and waking up, breakfasted and out into our tour bus for a comfortable 9am start meant that we were stumbling around in pitch darkness. But it gave us a chance to see the sunrise every morning over theContinue reading “The (Late) Morning Star”
Hot And Cold In Iceland
Iceland is full of geological wonders. In the freezing weather of late November, we welcomed a stop to explore geysirs and hot springs. The original Geysir, the origin of the name for all similar phenomenon, no longer blows, but a few yards away Strokkur blasts away every few minutes. The landscape is ethereally mistyContinue reading “Hot And Cold In Iceland”
East Meets West In The North
Iceland is a lump of lava up by the North Pole. The reason it’s there is because volcanoes keep erupting in the area because the North American tectonic plate and the Eurasian tectonic plate are pulling apart from each other. And this keeps setting off volcanoes. As the plates rip apart from each other, aContinue reading “East Meets West In The North”
Floyd On Ice
Travelling across Iceland with Olafur The Guide, Otto The Driver and a gaggle of, mostly, babyboomers, we went off-road in some giant jeeps up to the Gigjokull glacier. We’d had three days of deep snow, which was spectacular but unfortunately it meant that we weren’t able to see any Aurorae because of the heavy cloudContinue reading “Floyd On Ice”
Scribbling On A Glacier
ICELANDIC JOKE (courtesy of Olafur The Guide) Q. “What do you do if you’re lost in an Icelandic forest?” A. “Stand up.” I guess you had to be there. There are lots of forests in Iceland made up of the Arctic Birch, Betula pubescens tortuosa, but because of the climate the trees are generally veryContinue reading “Scribbling On A Glacier”
Stacks And Giants
We spent a while on a wonderful beach of black sand covered with shiny dark, coin-shaped pebbles, fringed with towering silvery basalt columns, like the ones at the Giant’s Causeway in Northern Ireland. I couldn’t resist scribbling and despite the snow, sketched some of the basalt with one of the Reynisdrangur sea stacks in theContinue reading “Stacks And Giants”
Freezing Mitts And Yellow Grass
As we travelled around Iceland, Husb and I noticed that the grass that thinly covers the black lava landscape is an unusual yellowy-orange colour. I think it might be Leymus Arenarius (Lyme grass) but I’m not sure. Before I went, I prepared different drawing media, including a 20cm square sketchbook of handmade Khadi paper. IContinue reading “Freezing Mitts And Yellow Grass”
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