Rekyavik 20 July 2018

Rekyavik 20 July 2018

Next day we are woken by jack hammers, dust and rain.   We meet Stefan who assures us that he knew nothing about it but the noise would stop, shortly.  We go walking through the town.  Lovely little streets run parallel to the harbour.   Lots of bars, and restaurants.  We can’t believe how expensive everything is.  A cute tea cosy shaped like a viking helmet (I know why would I be interested?) $45!

We visit the church. An incredible structure.   So plain but grand inside.  Yay! Choral works but not while we are here.  The bain of every traveller’s life!

We walk down to the harbour bracing ourselves against the cold and rain.  still our ship is nowhere to be seen.  We pass small café’s selling fisk soup and adventure tours.  We ask at one of the little stalls if they have seen the ship the Panorama.  And then we see it.  A white sailing ship.  Sailing ship?   How did we miss that?   We booked a sailing ship in Iceland!  Really? 

People are just disembarking.  They look glum.   The crew though are smiling and friendly.  I ask them if we can drop our luggage early the next morning.  No problems they say… Bag problem solved.

Locals build temporary sculptures along the "beach" great fun for kids and everyone.

At the Harpa  Ari Þór Vilhjálmsson  and Nina Margret Grimsdottir put on a superb performance.    The small audience is scattered at the front of the imposing red and black hall.  The woman’s heels clatter across the stage emphasising the emptiness of the huge stage.  

We start with Beethoven and finish with a composition by Sveinbjörn Sveinbjörnsson,  an Icelandic composer - I know I had never heard of him either .  He composed the Icelandic National Anthem.   By the way do you know the anthem voted the best... very funny on Google.  I wonder what you would choose.   I know they are all awful, but I do like this one.

As we walk through Reykjavik we see some incredible sculptures and street art.

But back at our apartment, the noise is shattering and all of our things are coated in dust.  We try to contact Stefan.   He doesn’t answer his phone.  It is raining and cold. We try the restaurant they call him, and he says he will be back in 15 minutes… we wait.   We can’t stay in the apartment.  But we spend the whole day calling  him… no reply.  We book into another hotel.   As we are leaving – I go to the restaurant and he is there.   He is the chef.  I demand to see him.

Finally, he agrees to repay the money but is totally smug and unrepentant! 'You are NOT my priority' he smirks.

Off in a cab to a new hotel apartment which is is lovely.  It’s still raining.