The northernmost capital city

I'm in Iceland, and I could not possibly be more mixed up in terms of time right now. I'm starting this blog around 9:15pm and the sun won't set until 10:30pm or so - which means it's going to be light until almost midnight. The sun rises around 4:00am, though of course it will be lighter earlier. Crazy, right? As of now, it looks like it's about 6:30pm. I'm additionally all mixed up because we took a three hour nap in the middle of the afternoon to recover from sleeping in an airport last night and flying this morning. Maybe by the time we leave we'll have it figured out.

Even with all that napping and confusion, we went out and saw the city of Reykjavik today! It's a bit other-worldly. I've never been somewhere like this before!

A preview photo.

We drove in from the airport over old lava fields all the while able to see the mountains with snow, the glaciers, and a great sound of water. The town of Reykjavik itself isn't too big. It's only about 120,000 (of the 300,000 people who live in Iceland), and there aren't a whole lot of areas to explore. We managed to see most of the city this afternoon.

The city really has the feel of a fishing town. The buildings are small and simple and the city is fairly quiet. You'd never guess it's also the seat of government. There are tourists here, but not too many at the moment, so it doesn't have the same touristy feel as many other European capitals. It's basically just an enormous fishing town. It's also not that old. While it was settled by the Vikings several thousand years ago, the urban area didn't start growing and expanding until the early 18th century - another difference from most European capitals.

It was a nice place to walk around though, and we ate lunch in a cool cafe on one of the main streets.

The old harbor with new whale watching boats, small boats, and old whaling ships. The mountains were really an incredible sight in the background. We also got really, really lucky with weather today! The pictures look great because the sky was so blue!

The old jailhouse building, now the main seat of government. Yes, that tiny little building is one of the main buildings used by the federal government of Iceland. Small country.

Some of the parks and the streets. The buildings aren't super brightly colored, but many of them are nicely painted and help make the city cheerful. They're all very simple though, with small and tasteful embellishments. The city is also extremely, extremely clean.

A pretty white church that we walked by in the central part of town. 

Katie and me next to the "pond" a body of water int eh center of town. The main sound would be to the left of this picture - and then everywhere you look there are mountains! It's a very amazing setting for a city. Also, look how cold it is! I got sunburned two weeks ago - and now we're bundling up in scarves! It wasn't too cold (upper 40s) but the wind was brutal.

The coolest sights of Reykjavik are the mountains and the water, which you can see from almost any street. Every corner we turned when we were up on the slightly hilly part of the city had a view of the sound and the mountains.

Looking down one of the streets at the view in the distance. Most streets have views like this.

Said view - but closer up.

This is just a really pretty church we saw down by the pond. I loved the colors and the style and it looked so beautiful against the blue of the sky this afternoon.

The last thing we did today was visit the big church that is at the top of the hill in Reykjavik, Hallgrimskirkja. (The Icelandic language is crazy - luckily everyone speaks English very well.) The church is a crazy modern structure that dominates the top of the hill and on the inside almost gives the impression that you're in a building made of ice and snow (it's white and simple and clean). You can also take an elevator to the top to see views of Iceland - and those views are amazing. I'm so glad we went up today when the weather was so nice. The views were really incredible, both of the city and of the nature that surrounds the city.

Hallgrimskirkja. Very funky building.

Some different shots of the exterior. Definitely the most unique church I've seen in Europe!

The interior. Out the back windows (behind the altar) you can see the mountains, which are beautiful.

And of course, the views from the top were spectacular:

A good view of the buildings and their colorful rooftops.

In the distance, though it's difficult to tell, you can see just dark plains. Those are the lava fields. We're going on a tour later this week and I hope to learn more about those then.

It was a successful day, and we saw pretty much all of Reykjavik! We have a private room in a guesthouse (which is always nice after a hostel) so we've just been hanging out here for the evening. We booked tickets for other excursions this week as well: tomorrow we're going to the famous Blue Lagoon, a massive hot spring, for the afternoon and on Thursday we're doing a big tour that takes us to some major sights (waterfalls, craters, glaciers, etc.) We're going to get to see a lot of Iceland, so that's exciting! And we're looking forward to just kind of hanging out in the Blue Lagoon tomorrow. I think all three of us are pretty tired from traveling. Karen's been traveling a week longer than I have and Katie's been traveling as I - we're all pretty beat and ready to come home in a few days! But for now, we're going to enjoy Iceland!