This final saga is all the little bits and pieces I either missed during the past week or so, or didn’t fit into any of the other sagas.
To start with in answer to a question I was asked - yes Iceland had angels, here is one from the pulpit of the Church at the Presidents residency.
A building missed from the Buildings Saga one that you might recognise. It is called Höfði in 1986 its picture was transmitted to television sets around the world as the place where Ronald Reagan and Mikhail Gorbachev met in secret to discuss SALT - not the condiment.
One of the ways that Iceland uses their abundance of free hot water is for heating this includes in certain areas, under-pavement heating. While walking down by the docks one day we discovered this area of pavement under construction.
I know Hubby managed to get that last picture a little out of focus, but he is totally forgiven for this next picture is also one of his, and must be one of the best pictures he has ever taken.
Solfar is a sculpture of a Viking ship which sits on the waterfront in the bay, we had taken a gentle walk up to have a look at it, stopping off for a hotdog on the way on a cold but not unpleasant morning, then as we turned to go back we saw that storm clouds had suddenly blown in and now hung threateningly over the city, the picture actually shows the edge of the storm. Needless to say we ended up being caught in the snow storm on the way back.
Of course the local wild-life have to deal with the weather day in and day out, and this goose had decided if the water beneath it had frozen this was the best way to keep warm.
This picture for me sums up the beauty of Iceland on a cold winters day. Although it is obviously cold in the picture it somehow exudes warmth and welcome, maybe because it has a Christmassy look about it.
And finally - this picture has to be shown, not for its content this was the driver of the super jeep which took us up onto the glacier putting some air back in the tyres, but because Hubby told me I had to post it, he is looking for sympathy. It was sheet ice underfoot, you couldn’t stand still even when you tried you found yourself slowly gliding along on top of the ice, well I did, Hubby on the other hand found himself lying on the ice with his feet in the air and a sore elbow!
Just one last saga to tell, that of the plane on the way home. There we were sitting ready the preamble telling us the stewards names and welcoming us on board had began when suddenly there was dark and silence. The lights had all gone out, the announcements had stopped even the engines were silent. Hubby isn’t too keen on air travel so I turned to him and said ‘At least it happened while we were still on the ground.’ Honest I was trying to be helpful; although I am not convinced he felt that way about it. Next came a series of what I can best describe as false starts, while we didn’t hear a key turning in an ignition with the accompanying straining engine sound, the lights flickered as if in time to such a scenario, then nothing again for a while. I looked out of the window and saw a truck draw up beside the plane with a generator on board. Yes we were getting a jump start! Soon the lights came on and stayed on, the engines started up again and eventually we were on our way, saying au revoir not good bye to Iceland.
