A short family vacation in Iceland was planned long before the volcano started messing up European air space, and our tickets were booked at a time when planes tended to leave on schedule.
Our tickets were for Friday afternoon, but early in the morning I received a text message saying the flight was cancelled. To make a long story short, we were rescheduled the next day. Arriving at the gate we were informed that we did not have confirmed seats, but luckily this meant an upgrade to business class, meaning that we arrived in style and comfort.
The best way to transfer from the airport to Reykjavik is to stop for an hour or two at the Blue Lagoon, swimming in the leftover water from a geothermal power station. The air was chilly, but the water warm and comforting.
Our hotel room was waiting, with about 60 square meters for a family of four we were very comfortable. One word of advice, though. If you want undisturbed sleep, you should consider accommodation outside the city centre at weekends. The party scene is very lively, and they don’t go to bed until very late!
We were hungry, and my research led us to an upmarket fish and chips shop. The cod and plaice were perfectly cooked to order and the onion rings were crisp. The oven baked potatoes had been in the oven a bit too long, but it was a nice meal without any fuzz when we were all tired. No beer today, that would have to wait.
Is the sign really in English? That is sad.
Sad or just exploiting an international customer base?
When a Norwegian travels to Iceland, I bet the common language of discourse between he and the natives is English.
Face it, English is the Lingua Franca in the 21st century.
I’m afraid you’re right. If I want to speak to anyone under sixty, English is the common language. They used to learn Danish in school, but nowadays English is the first foreign language.
On the other hand, Icalanders who come to Norway seem to pick up tha language in a month or so. More tricky the other way around with the grammar more sophisticated and far fewer words loaned from other languages.
That makes sense since Norwegian is basically just a very progressive modern dialect of Old Norse, whilst Icelandic is a very very conservative dialect.
more time in Iceland and I would have introduced you to grilled whale
Alan, the capital area only houses around 180.000 people, majority of restaurant customers are tourists, regardless to the time of the year
I’ll come back to what I ate there. Whale is actually available here in Norway as well!