Field Notes: October 7, 2022

Yes. I was in Iceland. Yes, I saw melting glaciers, spouting geysers, smoking earth, and moss-covered lumps hiding centuries of secrets. No Blue Lagoon, but steaming outdoor baths, black sand, sheep, petite ponies and more waterfalls than I knew could exist in a tiny place. I came away wondering, why does everyone seem to offer a tomato soup when all they have are pretty but not great hot house ones?

Best meal out of Reykjavik? Glacier View Guesthouse. After a quick stop at the black sand beach, we had a far too good for the café, “happy marriage cake” (kind of a rhubarb buckle) and called ahead and said, yes, please, we’d love you to make us dinner. En route we rode past that bumpy green carpet that turned out to be the Eldraun lava field. This was one of the remaining testaments to the devasting eight-month eruption from Laki that started in 1783 and created toxic plumes that killed thousands in Europe. Nature.

At our dinner, the other travelers joining were two from Brooklyn, two from Portugal and a solo traveler from Holland—politically incorrect Belgium jokes flowed. Latecomers were two Russians who were incredibly uncomfortable and even more uncomfortable when they found out someone at the table spoke Russian. I can’t imagine what it must be like for them traveling, or perhaps they were escaping to Iceland, avoiding the forthcoming draft? Even in the rurality of it all, the world bears down.