Part Two - Iceland

After our transAtlantic flight and 45min cab ride from the airport to the city centre, we were able to check into our hotel early (for a fee). We rested for a couple of hours then headed out on foot to explore. 

Skip and I had visited Iceland 9 years ago. Our bus tour included a circle tour of Reykjavik, Thingvellir, Selfoss and Geysir. Our bus then drove up the middle of the country on a lava rock road to Akureyri on the north coast. We then sailed for 3 days back to Reykjavik via Isafjordur and Stykkishomur. My account of the trip is here.

On this return trip, I had a pretty good idea where to head. Our first stop was at Hallgrimskirkja, a Lutheran Church on a high point of the downtown are and the largest church in Iceland. Out front is a statue to Leif Erikson, the son of Eric the Red. It was given as a gift to the Icelandic people from the US in 1930 to commemorate the 1,000th anniversary of the Althing - the country's parliament (more about that later).

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The interior of the church is stark white and free of much ornamentation. The organ has 4 keyboards and pedals, 72 voices and 5275 pipes. It's 15m high with the longest pipes 10m long. The organ weighs 25 tons.

Someone was practicing on it during our visit.

After lunch at a quaint bistro, we found our way downhill to the waterfront and the Harpa concert hall and conference centre. It features a 'coloured glass facade inspired by the basalt landscape of Iceland'. It's the home of the Iceland Symphony Orchestra and Iceland Opera. Other events such as international chess tournaments, award shows, and art festivals are held there.

The next morning, we checked out of our hotel and walked the block and a half to City Hall and our pick up point for our 3-day circle and south coast tour. 

One of the events on the tour was a glacier hike. We were given hard hats, crampons, and ice axes for the hike up a glacier. Also on the tour was a walk through an ice cave.

About halfway up the glacier Poppy and I both were gasping for air. The climb was very steep and we had to switch back and forth to climb. I could see Poppy was struggling and I no longer wanted to be so uncomfortable so we told our guide we were going to head back down. He told us the bus to pick up the group that was ahead of us would come by in an hour or so and could take us back to base camp. He also told us we could sit in the pickup truck if we wanted to while we waited.

So we made our way back down and enjoyed just sitting and resting. We did sit in the pickup truck and reclined the seats for a wee nap for a few minutes. Then Sasha (from Latvia) arrived with the bus to pick up the group that was just coming off the glacier and he agreed to take us back to base camp.

Back at base camp we turned in our equipment. The sun came out and we basked in it until the rest of the group returned an hour later. The organizers were concerned for us and wanted to know why we bailed. We simply told him we were too out of shape and too old. They offered us tea and anything they could do to make us comfortable. Poppy and I just enjoyed sitting out in the sun - we hadn't seen much of it thus far on our circle tour so it was very enjoyable.

Another point of the three-day excursion was a visit to Jokulsarlon glacial lake where icebergs that had calved from the glacier were floating around. There was some bird life and I spotted a European Greenfinch and a snow bunting. 

The glacier lake emptied into the ocean at a black sand beach  It was quite a hike to get there and we were warned to stay well back from the waves. I chose to admire it from a distance.

The next day we visited Skogafoss waterfall - a 60m drop. Some folks climbed the staircase to the shelf at the top of the waterfall.

We also visited Thingvellir, the site of the first parliament - meeting of all the tribes - in 930AD. It is also where the two tectonic plates, North American and Eurasian, meet. 

The landscape of Iceland is very barren - lava mostly covered with lichen. There is a joke amonf Icelanders:

Q: What do you do if you get lost in Iceland?

A: Stand up.

Trees do not grow there - there is very little, if any topsoil.

We briefly visited a horse farm. Icelandic horses are are very special breed. They are small in stature and have a couple of gaits no other horse breeds do. This day I wore the sweater I knit for Skip after we visited Iceland in 2016.

Poppy wore the lopapeysa she knit tin only a month to take on the cruise. She did an amazing job.

We also visited Geysir that reliably erupts every 4 - 9 minutes. I just need to figure out how to upload the video file.

For two nights we stayed at the Adventure Hotel near Kirkjubaejarklauster (say that 5 times fast - LOL). A very comfortable establishment made of prefab buildings. 

One of our days on the tour it poured rain. I was very glad I had several layers under my fleece-lined raincoat with a hood. It was also fortuitous the glacier hike wasn't on the rainy day. That would have made for a miserable experience for the hikers. 

The bus took our group back to Reykjavik where we checked into our hotel again for our last night. We had supper at (of all places) a Mexican restaurant Tres Locos  The portion sizes were very small and my frozen mango margarita was very weak but the food was yummy and interestingly served on slate slabs.

The restaurant was only a couple of blocks from the hotel.

The next day we ordered a cab for 4:45am to take us back to Keflavik for our 7:50am flight to Oslo then on to Bergen where we were going to meet up with Heather and Jeff who flew in from Toronto that day via Amsterdam.

to be continued...

Procraftinating

I have an errand to run but am dawdling the day away. 

I did find a laceweight yarn in my stash that I can ply with the Leonora silk blend. It is from a gradient set I bought years ago at Rhinebeck from The Unique Sheep. I have no idea what I thought I would knit with it.

Anyway, I thought it was a good companion yarn as one of the colours in the gradient is a very close match to the silk blend. It is the horizontal strand over the Permin yarn. 

Each ball of yarn is 25g. Plied together will yield 50g - more than enough for a VEVO. Later today I'll haul out the spinning wheel again and ply the two together. 

I also found a bunch of remnant sock yarns mistakenly put in my remnant laceweight bin. I may have to begin another 'Excavation' blanket - this time a much bigger one. Here are a couple I've previously knit.

I used random acrylic worsted weight yarns for this wonky one. I keep it in the car for wintery rides.

I watched 'Adolescence' on Netflix yesterday. It gives a good insight as to what kids have to deal with on social media and the harm that can come of cyber bullying. It certainly explains why many boys/young men are reluctant to ask girls/young women out with the risk of cruel ridicule always looming. So sad.

I also listened to a very interesting and somewhat disturbing true crime podcast yesterday called 'Blink'. The young person it is about actually narrated it. Another episode will be released tomorrow. It's free.

I think I need to find some more uplifting things to listen to and watch. 

Yet Another Interruption

After completing Poppy's Dandelion mittens on the cruise,

I knit another VEVO with the Rowan Felted Tweed I had purchased on the cruise (not sure which yarn shop or which town).

I blocked it and it's dry now. The points don't pull out as well with DK yarn as they do with fingering. Also I used a suggested eyelet border (Larissa's) which is included in the pattern, after the cast on but forgot to do it again before binding off. Oh well. It is nice and snuggley.

I borrowed Poppy's 4mm knitting needles for this, and cast on the smaller size as I was using larger yarn. 

As I've probably mentioned before, this is an excellent project for that one,random, lovely ball of fingering weight or DK weight yarn. 

As a review, here are the others I've knit with either fingering weight, or two strands of laceweight plied together.

2 plies of Yarns Lang Merino 400 lace:

2 plies of Anzula Wash My Lace:

Toft's Lace Weight British Baby Alpaca Yarn:

Sometimes you just need something to keep the back of your neck warm. VEVO is perfect for this. The finished item is soft and light and easily jammed into a coat pocket without taking up too much room.

I'm off to drop off my taxes. Coincidentally there is a yarn shop in the same town that I haven't visited in eons. 

Interrupting My Travelogue - Searching for yarn - STASH Acquired on the Trip

Poppy, Jen1, and I attempted to find yarn shops at each locale. Using Ravelry (a free knitting/crocheting/weaving website), we clicked on the 'yarns' tab. Under 'Popular New Yarns' is the 'Local Yarn Shop Directory'. Simply enter the town or city and a listing of yarn shops comes up. Yarn shops come and go so it is a good idea to attempt to find the active websites before heading out. We found this tool very useful in planning outings at the various ports on our cruise.

In Bergen, we found 4 yarn shops within walking distance (within 20 minutes) from our hotel. At the first yarn shop we were told about a Knitter's Market at the cultural centre (Kulturhuset) only a few blocks away so we headed over there. 

This was the only place on the trip that cash was the only option. Jen1 loaned me a 50 (Femti) Kroner note - $6.47CAD. It had a puffin in the corner! (Must check if I paid her back).

While we waited in line to go in, we noted a yarn shop right across the street! 

Once in the Knitter's Market we perused the wares: hand-dyed yarns, patterns, finished models, etc. etc.

All I bought was a kit for a zipper bag. There was limited selection. It included the canvas, needle, lining fabric, neutral and coloured threads, back fabric, zipper, and cord for the zipper pull. The pattern suggests just picking random colours for the semi-circles of colour. No attempts to try and coordinate. 

I think I would just go for contrasts between the two halves.

We then met Heather, Jeff, and Norbert at the Floibanen Funicular station for our ascent up Floyen.

We were so lucky to have a nice sunny day for a panoramic view of Bergen down below.

It was somewhat bittersweet remembering the last time I was up there with Skip 💕on our epic Scandinavian holiday in the fall of 2017.

While we were up there, Norbert told us he found two more yarn shops on his walk from the hotel. It was a couple of blocks in from the waterfront street (Bryggen). After our delightful mountaintop sojourn, we headed out to find the shops for ourselves.

First we found Faer. There were lovely yarns of all types. I stood to the side and Jen1 kept zooming out to get me in the picture - LOL.

A couple of blocks down the street was Bergens Broderi Service. Its website doesn't have this address listed but we found it anyway.

It, too, was a lovely shop. We revisited again two weeks later (when the above two photos were taken) upon our return to Bergen after our cruise. I bought a bunch of KnitPro cords for interchangeable needles that swivel. A new thing for me. They are compatible with all the KnitPicks needle tips I have. I also purchased a pair of carbon fibre KnitPro 3.5mm needle tips. The carbon fibre needles are my faves because they have just enough grip so yarn doesn't easily slide off and the tips are nice and pointy. I exceeded my 315Kr ($45.05 CAD) minimum to get a tax refund so they made out the paperwork and gave it to me to hand in at the airport when I left Norway. (a surprisingly easy task)

This shop also carried some Permin cross stitch kits, many with Nordic patterns or themes. Nothing I needed or wanted. However this cross-stitch wall hanging was stunning and easily measured 3' x 4' and was done on what might have been 28ct canvas.

We happily walked the rest of the way back to our hotel to meet up with our peeps and go for dinner.

After all that shopping, we met up in Poppy's and my room and put our feet up. Our 'piggies' were tired! We perused the three beautiful Nordic knitting pattern books Poppy had purchased and admired our respective hauls.

Over the entire trip I acquired the following:

a solitary ball of Rowan Felted Tweed in the Scree colourway. I wanted to knit myself another VEVO neck warmer.

I never see Rauma yarn back home so had to buy a couple of balls of 2-ply to knit another pair of Nordic mittens.

Fjaere (feathers) is sock yarn with some nylon content. 

With another neck warmer in mind, I picked up a 25g ball of laceweight. I started knitting with it and decided it was too thin so I'm going to ply it on itself. Hopefully there will be enough for another VEVO. If not, I'll ply it with another laceweight from my stash.

I think I bought this ball of Mille Colori sock yarn at one of the ports up the coast. It has some 'bling'. It reminded me of Northern Lights.

In Europe, ball bands are in many languages. In this case, German, English, French, Italian, Spanish, Portuguese, Dutch, Swedish, Norwegian, Polish, Serbian or Ukrainian, and Korean.

I also got a couple of balls of gold Sandnes Garn Alpakka DK that was on sale for 60% off. 

I was inspired by these mittens I saw for sale that Poppy swooned over. They were selling for 599NOK or $76.99CAD! (Gasp).

As yellow is one of Poppy's favourite colours, I bought a single ball of white superwash DK wool to pair with the yellow alpaca yarn to knit her a pair of mittens. With her approval, I chose this pattern from the Drops Design website:

Over the next week or so I cranked out the mittens.

Rather than a striped, ribbed cuff, I substituted another iconic Nordic pattern for the cuff and embraced it with Latvian braid, mirroring the chevron direction on the other mitten. Once again I cleverly knit about a third of a second left mitten before I realized my mistake. I only had to rip down to the top of the cuff to start the hand again. This time with the thumb gusset on the other side of the palm for a right hand mitten..

They were lots of fun to knit and are very cozy.

Also on the cruise I knit the VEVO with the Rowan Felted Tweed on 4mm needles I borrowed from Poppy. It is blocked and drying as I type this. Basically I knit until I had almost used up the entire ball. The pattern is very flexible that way. I did my preferred stretchy bindoff: K2, *pass the first stitch over the second, yarn over, pass the knitted stitch over the yarn over. K1, repeat from *.

We were also getting excited to board our ship. Boarding started at about 3pm and we set sail at 8:30.

(to be continued...)

Our Excellent Arctic Adventure - Part One

About a year ago, Jen1's friends Heather and Jeff invited them to go on a special Hurtigruten cruise up and down the western coast of Norway. Later on, Jen1 invited me to join them and I invited Poppy to be my roomie for the trip.

Hurtigruten (literally 'The Fast Route') has a fleet of ships that leaves Bergen every day heading north to Kirkenes, stopping at many ports to deliver passengers and goods. Some port stops are only 15 to 30 minutes long and happen at all hours of the day and night.

I suggested that since we were flying that way anyway, that we stop over in Iceland for a few days. Jen1 and Norbert investigated the available tours. Poppy and I were game so we booked that, too.

The 'red eye' flight to Reykjavík is only about 5.5h but I treated myself to IcelandAir's Saga Class, their equivalent of business class. This entitled me to hang out in the lounge at YYZ before the flight where there were comfortable leather chairs, lots of places to charge our devices, and complimentary food and drinks. There were even showers for those who wanted to freshen up before or between flights. (We didn't need to use them). Poppy and I pulled out our knitting to pass the time.

Once aboard, I was handed a glass of Prosecco.

At each seat was a 500mL bottle of Icelandic glacier water,

a pillow and blanket,

and an amenity kit which contained lip balm, hand cream, ear plugs, two designer post cards, an eye mask, and a pair of socks. The pouch is made of high quality kraft paper - reusable and recyclable. 

It is not unusual to see folks knitting on planes in the northern climes.

The snack and beverage cart came around first. Rather than a fizzy or alcoholic drink, I chose a refreshing mango and orange smoothie to enjoy with my salted cashews and gummy bears. There was no limit to the number of snacks we could have: chips, nuts, gummy bears, chocolate bars, etc. My knitting bag is seen hanging behind the tray.

Next we were given drink and dinner menus. IcelandAir boasts a comprehensive 'Gin Library'. 

I selected Lundey Gin as I couldn't resist a product with a puffin logo. It came with a lower calorie tonic water and salty, cheesy, crispy crackers.

The gin turns pink when the tonic water is added.  I bought a bottle of this stuff at the Reykjavik duty free on the way home last week.

There were two choices for the dinner entreé. I chose lamb.

I devoured it before I got a photo but here's what my meal looked like on my return flight to Canada. The tray was served on a linen table cloth. All drinks were served in glass containers. Our metal cutlery was wrapped in a linen napkin with a napkin holder. My meal was piping hot and delicious.

Then it was time to snuggle down for the rest of the flight. Complimentary earphones were handed out but I had brought my own. The seats are not 'lie flat' seats but do recline significantly and there is a foot rest. It was very cozy with my soft pillow and quilt. I watched several promotional videos about Iceland and snoozed a bit.

Once in Reykjavík early the next morning, we sailed through Customs and Immigration, retrieved our luggage and met up with our driver that Norbert had pre-booked. Flybus shuttles folks into the city on a regular basis as Keflavik airport is about 50km west of the city. 

However once in the city we would have to transfer to a taxi to take us directly to the hotel so we decided to just take a cab from the airport directly to the hotel.

To be continued...