Reykjavik is a small city, where the people are friendly and everything is easy. Three days was plenty of time to see what we wanted to and I didn't find it as expensive as I'd thought it would be - for most things, it was pretty on par with what you'd pay in London. Our flight there was on a Wednesday evening but we just went straight to our hotel from the airport as it was a fairly late flight. Plus the beers we had at Wetherspoons in Heathrow combined with Julia Roberts in Eat Pray Love on the flight made us a bit sleepy. We booked to stay at Hotel Cabin, which lived up to it's name as the rooms were like what I imagine rooms on a cruise ship to be like - very small and compact - I am pretty sure they used the services of some kind of expert in how to get the most out of a 2m by 3m space to design the rooms - everything you needed, but no room for anything else.
We began our first day in Reykjavik with a buffet breakfast (is there a better start to the day?) and wandered into town. It was cold but the sky was blue and the sun was shining - a welcome change from London. We spent the morning wandering around the main shopping area, drinking coffee and checking out a few sights like the partly frozen Tjornin lake, the giant 3D map of Iceland in the town hall (not as exciting as it sounds), the National Gallery (containing some random art - a pile of clothes being one of them) and the Hallgrímskirkja, a church where you could get a lift to the top for some spectacular views. After that, we decided to sample some traditional food, and made our way to Bæjarins bestu where the likes of Bill Clinton and Metallica's James Hetfield have enjoyed a hot dog with everything (mustard, ketchup, friend onion, raw onion and remolaði, a mayonnaise-based sauce with sweet relish). It was also voted by The Guardian in 2006 as the second best fast food stand in Europe. They were pretty good - and cheap - so we had two each. For some reason, Reyjavik seems to be the home of a lot of 'the best' places - the cafe we visited that morning came second place in the World Barista competition and we also came across the best t-shirt store in the world as well.
After hot dog heaven, we found a pub where we enjoyed a pitcher of beer and then headed for the nearby hot pools which had....wait for it....a waterslide. And not just any water slide - one with black out sections and glowing stars. Ok, so I know I am probably too old for waterslides and A took a bit of convincing but I still think they are some of the best fun you can have sober. Come to think ot it, they might be even better when you're not sober. After working up an appetite on the slides, we headed back into town for dinner at Icelandic Bar to experience some even more traditional Icelandic food - and we were not disappointed. We shared an amazing entree of smoked arctic charr, smoked eel and lumpfish roe - to die for. We then shared a reindeer burger, which tasted just like a beef burger, and a delicious traditional fish stew, plokkfiskur, made with cod, potato, onion and curry powder and served (in a jar) with rye bread. Then it was off to 'chase the goose' as the tour guide put it, and seek the elusive Northern Lights. We were picked up from the hotel, herded on to a bus and driven out to a nearby lake in the middle of nowhere to wait in the cold for the lights. Our enthusiasm and excitement soon faded - despite it being apparently perfect conditions, they didn't show and after a couple of hours, we went back to the hotel and to bed. We knew it wasn't guaranteed, but needless to say we were a bit disappointed.
After a sleep in the next day, we walked to the Perlan (The Pearl) for some panoramic views, to get windblown and have a stranger change the settings on my camera that I now can't change back. We went to Icelandic Fish and Chips for lunch for, yup, you guessed it - fresh fish and chips, served with some yummy dips, then back into town to wander around the shops looking at woolly hats, lava jewelerry and t-shirts that said 'ég tala ekki íslensku' - I'll leave you to google that one! We also tried a kleiner - a pretty average Icelandic donut. Are you seeing the food theme here yet? If it's a speciality, I'll eat it.
Back at the hotel we had a few vodkas before heading out again for another attempt at the Northern lights - purely in the name of keeping our body temperature at an elevated level of course. We went to a couple of spots this time and after waiting for a little while, it paid off - surreal green swirls of light that changed and moved, got brighter and then faded with every second. A truly amazing experience, especially as the trip I planned to Alaska in 2009 to see them, fell through. I got some blurry pictures, but I was there to see them, not to photograph them, and that was enough for me. We returned to the hotel, happy but too tired to head out to the bars and party it up, Reykjavik style, as we'd planned. Which is probably just as well as we decided to have a drink in the hotel bar before bed, costing us about £10 per drink.
Our return flight was booked for late afternoon the next day, so we headed for the Blue Lagoon for the morning on the way to the airport. It was surprisngly uncrowded and we whiled away our last few hours in Iceland lazily swimming around the pale blue, geothermal water, getting massaged in a waterfall, slopping mineral mud on our faces and relaxing in the steam baths - a perfect way to end the trip. And we thought we'd better have another hot dog before we left too - skál!
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