#reykjavik
Moody & beautiful Hallgrimskirkja Cathedral. #Iceland #reykjavik #cathedral #church #architecture #lutheran #lutheranchurch #capital #travel #blackandwhite #monochrome #hill #history #viking #vikings (at Hallgrimskirkja Cathedral Church)
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The tourist attractions in Iceland start and end with Reykjavik. The largest city inIceland hosts 2/3 of the country’s entire population. Culturally unique to any place in the world; parties last for hours into the night, the people and surroundings make it feel cozy and quaint, great museums and arts district, and an opportunity to sample whale and to indulge in some disgusting sea creatures.
See more at wanderingtrader.com
#europe #iceland #reykjavik #culture #museum #art #greatplace
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Reykjavík is so beautiful, I have 5 more nights here and I’m going to make the most of it! #reykjavik #iceland #travel #wander #wanderlust #travelphotography #travelholic #icelandtravel #architecture #statue #history #wanderer (at Reykjavík, Iceland)
https://www.instagram.com/p/BozfQ_fiYYT/?utm_source=ig_tumblr_share&igshid=olk9cy5cpkfi
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more Iceland background practice! This one’s the view of Reykjavik from the top of Hallgrimskirkja church
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Late but still… 2019 was an incredible year full of adventures, concerts and love. Can’t wait to see what this year will bring ❤️ @the_buffy__
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#travel #love #newyear #happy #uk #iceland #reykjavik #disney #disneyland #disneylandparis #vukovi #rockforpeople #bigweekend #holiday
https://www.instagram.com/p/B60TMA8n0jh/?igshid=ea5jz9dl3jlr
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In between employment, I decided to take an impromptu trip to another country, which is something I’ve never really done before. I’ve taken on-the-whim day trips to places, sure, but never a week-long international journey.
I always wanted to go to Iceland, and after my brother went a couple of times, one for a medical school rotation, I saw his pictures and was in love. Iceland is incredibly accessible to people in the United States, especially with the addition of WOW Air, which serves a handful of cities in the U.S. with insanely cheap flights. I flew out of Newark Liberty International (which I do not recommend… I hate that airport with a passion). Getting to Iceland is easy. Getting around Iceland can be tricky. And paying for everything in Iceland is going to cost you. We’ll dive into all that later, but until then, here are a few pictures I snapped in and around Reykjavik, Iceland’s capital city. The pictures include Hallgrimskirkja, the Lutheran church.
Some of the other pictures are from the central part of town, including the colorful rainbow building, which is Kiki’s Queer Bar, the country’s only gay bar. Iceland is extremely welcoming to people of all backgrounds, and they are one of the most gay-friendly countries in the world. While there’s only one gay bar, you can go to any bar and feel comfortable.
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Thanks for following along on my journey through Iceland! I’ll leave you with some of my favorite pictures I haven’t posted yet :)
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Day 6
So, after getting my ass out of that creepy AirBnB in Hella, I decided that since my plans to meet up with people in Reykjavik for lunch were postponed until later that evening, I might as well extend my drive to the capital city and take a mini detour to Iceland’s Golden Circle. For those who may not know, the Golden Circle is essentially a 300 km loop that connects to Reykjavik. It’s a super popular course for tourists to take, since it’s jam-packed with a lot to see, including waterfalls, geysers, and gorgeous views of the country. It’s especially popular for those who have a day or two layover in Iceland before continuing on to either Europe or North America via Reykjavik.
Initially, as I was planning my trip, I wanted to avoid the Golden Circle because it’s crawling with so many tourists. But, I decided to brave the crowds anyway, and it actually exceeded my low expectations. First stop was Gullfoss, a large waterfall that is fed by the country’s second largest glacier, Langjökull. Gullfoss, unlike the other waterfalls I had been to, is much more broad and expansive. And there’s a great story behind conservation of this waterfall, where people sought to build infrastructure around the area to harness its power for energy. But thanks to the hard work and dedication of Sigriður Tómasdóttir and her family, Gullfoss was eventually protected and designated a nature preserve sometime later.
After enjoying the waterfall from a few different viewpoints, I drove a very short distance to Geysir, which by the name you could guess is a geyser, like “Old Faithful” in the United States. Apparently, the English term “geyser” comes from Iceland’s “Geysir,” with accounts of Iceland’s famed attraction dating back to the late 13th Century.
About every 2-4 minutes, hot water shoots into the air. Some eruptions are more powerful than others, with many topping out at about 30 meters in the air. It was really fun to watch, and despite being crowded, it was quite enjoyable being surprised every time it erupted. After about a half hour, I hopped back in my car and made my way to Reykjavik to my AirBnB, an Eco-Hostel in Reykjavik that was only a two minute walk to the Magnusson’s with which I stayed with earlier in the week. I was planning on meeting my brother’s friend in town, Lenika. She went to school with my brother at Stanford University in California, and she and her friends just happened to be traveling through Iceland the same time that I was. So, we decided to meet at Bæjarins Beztu Pylsur, Reykjavik’s (and perhaps the world’s most famous) hot dog stand. Lenika was joined by her three friends, Emily, Sheela, and Kristen, who are all from Chicago. The four of them are traveling Iceland together, and three of the four are continuing to Europe, as a celebratory trip after they recently graduated from Northwestern’s graduate school in genetic counseling and English.
Back to the hotdogs. What makes them so special? The meet is a combination of lamb, beef, and pork. They put crispy onions on the bottom, fresh onions on top of that, then the hotdog itself, a teeny bit of ketchup, a relish mayo, and their secret hotdog sauce, which is a little browner than Dijon mustard.
They were really good! The best? Maybe not, but pretty darn good. We ate the hot dogs, walked around town, talked a lot, and then went back to their AirBnB, where we had some Icelandic beers and chit-chatted with some people from Croatia who were also traveling the country.
We talked for hours, and it was a lot of fun getting to know them all. We talked about everything, including celebrities we’ve met, boys and dating, and Lenika’s career as a professional gymnast. She competed for Spain in the 2008 Beijing Summer Olympic Games. How cool is that?
I ended up leaving at midnight to get some rest at my hostel before my big day heading up to the Snæfellsnes Peninsula in the morning.
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Day 1
March 27, 2018
After my flight was delayed for about 3 hours from Newark to Keflavik because of bad weather in Iceland, I hopped on board the WOW Air flight to begin my journey to Iceland! The plane was incredibly hot and uncomfortable, but it was only about a 6 hour flight, so I sucked it up and dealt with it. I purposely chose the window seat on the left side of the plane in hopes that I’d see the Northern Lights. After about 3-4 hours into the flight, I peaked out of my window, and saw a very faint but visible green glow moving across the sky. It was too faint to get a decent shot with my camera phone, but it was pretty exciting! Sadly, that would be the only time I would see the Aurora the entire trip :(
After arriving at the airport and stepping out of the airplane, I was blasted with wind and rain. It’s not like I didn’t expect the weather to be terrible, but it was insanely windy, at least 40-50 mph in 30-something degree temperatures and rain showers.
After I picked up my rental car from Avis/Budget, I made my way to Reykjavik. My brother put me in touch with the Magnusson family. He was friends with their son who went to Stanford, and they were gracious enough to offer me housing for a night.
So off I went to their home. And once I arrived, Kristin had a nice breakfast spread waiting for me, which consisted of a large block of swedish cheese, colorful breads, tomatoes and cucumber, cereal, and a liquidy yogurt that was tasty AF.
I talked with the husband, Sveinn, and he told me about the line of work that he does. He’s the Director General of the Ministry of Health, which is maybe loosely equivalent to the second in charge of the Department of Health in the United States. He’s well connected with the Icelandic government, and when he heard that my line of work deals with meteorology and emergency management, he called a few people up and arranged a meeting with me and several people that run Iceland’s emergency services and operations center…!
Here’s a quick (and hopefully accurate) crash course in Emergency Management in Iceland
Sveinn and his friends showed me around the 1-1-2 and emergency operations center in Iceland today. (1-1-2 is the equivalent of 9-1-1 in the United States.) They have a call center that takes emergency calls for fire, police, and Coast Guard (all three different call centers in the same building). They also have a Emergency Operations Center that functions like one would in the U.S. People with different responsibilities will come in and put on a vest and contribute however they can to assist in a disaster. This includes sectors like resources and management with representatives from health, media, police, and other areas that would all stage in that room during disaster.
Something else I learned was quite intriguing. The search and rescue operations in Iceland are primarily volunteer-based. People throughout the country volunteer to help and may be called upon to assist in rescue and recovery at a moment’s notice. Everything is coordinated from Reykjavik, and they have GPS trackers on all emergency vehicles and even can tap into locations of utility company vehicles and DOT vehicles, as they may function as emergency responders.
People get emergency management training here a lot more than they do in the United States. And if they choose, they may receive specialized training for diving, helicopter rescue, ice rescue, and other technical skill areas. Iceland has no standing military, national guard, or large law enforcement agency, so the work of volunteers is essential to everything that they do.
Their 1-1-2 call center in Reykjavik receives roughly 300,000 calls a year. About half of those calls requires an emergency response (fire, EMS, etc).
Their Coast Guard has detectors on all boats and crafts that are 6 meters or more in length. They have transponders that can be tracked by the Coast Guard at all times. If a transponder isn’t beaming back a signal, Coast Guard can call on other ships to see if a boat is in distress if it doesn’t show up on radar. Other boats and ships account for 80% of rescues of other ships.
There’s also a cool program where travelers in Iceland who are traveling alone can set up their positions and check in to let law enforcement know where they’re located. If they fail to check in, then emergency crews may go out to that area to see if they need help. Form more info on this, you can visit safetravel.is
Funding can also be an issue for something that is so dependent on volunteers. Firefighters and EMs make money by selling fireworks and figurines (Christmas collectibles/etc.) to people throughout the country. It’s become a tradition for people in Iceland to buy this stuff to support their emergency services!
After a nice tour, I returned to the Magnusson home to take a nap. I had slept maybe an hour in the last 36 hours, so I was quite sleep-deprived and jet-lagged.
After my nap, I walked around Reykjavik for about a couple of hours, taking in the sights and sounds before returning home.
I had dinner with the Magnusson’s and a Ph.D. student named Adam, who is studying anthropology and the beginnings of the Icelandic Healthcare system. We all ate dinner, which was so delicious. Kristin made salmon with olives and other vegetables. We actually started out with half of an avocado with boiled shrimp (cold) and feta/mozarella cheese in oil as a spread. It was really delicious, especially with a squeeze of lemon. We also had baked potato slices, salad with red bell pepper, onions, and other sauce. And chocolate cake and fresh whipped cream for dessert along with a giant hollow Easter egg. We talked for 5 hours that night, and finally I hit the hay and passed out hard.
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Submission Saturday!
Traditional dress on Icelandic National Day in Reykjavik, Iceland by Hannah Goodman
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Done @blackkrosstattoo
Thanks again @einarknudsen for this great spot!
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#handpoke #rose #tattoo #iceland #reykjavik #stickandpoke #handpoketattoo #stickandpoketattoo #machinefreetattoo #handpoketattoo #tattoos #inkstinctsubmission #blackworkersubmission #blackworkers #rosetattoo #facetattoo #blackwork #simple #minimal #flower #flora #punctuur #antwerptattoo #taot #tttism #tattrx #equilattera #blxckink
https://www.instagram.com/p/Bpw7JfOHJ4F/?utm_source=ig_tumblr_share&igshid=zmw5t7huyj2o
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Done @blackkrosstattoo .
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#iceland #reykjavik
#handpoked #moon #tattoo #handpoketattoo #stickandpoketattoo #handpushed #blxckink #punctuur #handpoke #stickandpoke #ttim #xoymtaty #handmade #machinefree #nomachine #nomachine #nonelectric #blackwork #blackworkerssubmission #inkstinctsubmission #blacktattooart #black #ink #tatted #tattoos #tattrx #inked #taot #equilattera
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