May 19 & 20

We left Orlando Sanford airport on Saturday at 7:30pm on Icelandair and arrived at Keflavik Airport at 6:30am on Sunday.  The flight was smooth and the food tasty.  Iceland time is 4 hours ahead of Eastern Daylight time.  It was clear and sunny with the sun high in the sky, and the cold air was refreshing.  The Flybus ride to Reykjavik, Island’s capitol, took about 40 minutes and we transferred to a minibus to the Hotel Fron in the city center.  We had breakfast and waited about an hour for our room to be ready.  After resting up awhile we went out to wander.  Light jackets were sufficient to keep us warm and many locals were comfortable in just shorts & tee shirts. 

We first walked along the waterfront, enjoying the views of snow capped mountains across the large bay.  We stopped at a roadside hot dog stand for one of the famous hot dogs with everything, “everything” being mayonnaise, mustard, ketchup, bbq type sauce and chopped bacon.  They were delicious.  We walked to the end of town along the waterfront and walked back and forth along the city streets.  There is an abundance of restaurants covering almost any ethnic type of foods from around the world, but the majority of them advertise Islandic delicacies which are heavy on the seafood and lamb.  All restaurants seemed to offer creamy fish (or seafood) soup which is a meal in itself.  We’ve had the soup on a previous visit and will have it again during our 3 ½ day visit here.  After about 5 hours of wandering we returned to the hotel to rest and wash up before dinner.

We started the evening with a glass of wine in the hotel bar and got a lot of information about Reykjavik from the bar tender.  We walked a few blocks to a restaurant next to a park that we had scoped out in the afternoon.  Pat had local lobster and I had surf & turf which was lobster and lamb roast.  Both meals were excellent.  The local lobster is a small langoustine lobster, the tails being about 3 inches long, that is delicate, sweet & very tasty.  Several tails are served as a meal it was some of the best lobster we’ve ever had.  The lamb was tender and had a great flavor.  We got back to the hotel around 10:00pm and the sun was still in the sky.  It’s not midnight sun yet but it doesn’t get fully dark at night.