Day of Travel
5/28/2013
Laura and I both Super Shuttled our way to the airport
around 3:30am. Yay.
3ish hour flight to Chicago. I mostly spent it sleeping.
2ish hour flight to Boston. We managed to negotiate seat
switching and got to be next to each other this time. I have no memory of this
flight.
The most memorable part was being in the airport for 5
hours, where Clifton and Laura’s brother Kim both came to meet us! Kim brought
an enormous bag of fresh fruit, and we found a restaurant outside of security
to get food and drinks.. and a complimentary priority security lane pass!
5ish hour flight to Reykjavik.
ICELAND! Or Ísland
5/29/2013
We arrive around 6:30am in Reykjavik and make our way
through the incredibly easy passport control and customs process (which
consisted of just walking through a hallway?). We go to an ATM to take out
money, and I am very excited about my First Republic account because they
reimburse all ATM fees, but somehow I forgot to confirm that I actually knew my
PIN before leaving San Francisco. Turns out I don’t actually know it. Woops. No
big problem though, I just use my Bank of America account instead, and will
just have to pay an extra $5 fee or so for my stupidity. Things to look up when
we get internet: First Republic PIN.
We had some pretty elaborate instructions on which buses to
take and how much to pay and which ones required exact change in order to get
to Selfoss, a settlement of 6000ish people in Southern Iceland. In order to
break our large ATM bills, we head to a coffee shop for the first order of
business: purchasing Icelandic yogurt, Skyr.
As a fun note, the first thing you notice when you exit the
airport is the delicious smell of sulphur. This will prove to be a recurring
theme here.
We finally arrive in Selfoss around 9:30am and walk the
short distance to our hotel/apartment Fosstun, and think we are home free. We
are not. After doing a lap around the building, we discover that there is no
front office. The organizer of the program, Hrafnkell (pronounced something
like Hrabbn-ketchl), told us to text him when we arrived, and maybe this is
why. But our phones don’t work. So it’s time to get creative.
Selfoss seems kind of dead, but we find an open Vodafone
store next door and go in to talk to the workers there. They say that Fosstun
doesn’t open until June 1st. This is slightly concerning. We say we
have a phone number to call, and they kindly let us use one of their phones.
Hrafnkell answers! We are saved.
We go back to Fosstun and meet Sofia, who lets us into our
room. It’s clean, nice, warm, and has some very elaborate washing machines and
dryers. Hrafnkell says he will come by and meet us, but doesn’t give a time, so
we decide to hang out in the apartment for a while. Despite our best efforts,
we fall almost immediately to sleep. We’d made some tea, but we were both
completely out before even starting to drink it. Fail. After 3 hours of
sleeping, we wake up, find no evidence of Hrafnkell, and decide to go for a
run.
The entire circumference of the town is something like 4.5
miles so we figure we can’t get too lost. We end up seeing a frozen yogurt
place (yes!!), horses, some trails, a lot of benches fashioned from logs, and a
soccer field which we go investigate. There is a big hill next to the field,
and both loving hills, we decide to go to the top and check out the view. A few
of the kids follow us up and one boy is brave enough to ask if we are
Icelandic. They ended up being really helpful in pointing us to the university,
since we still don’t know where that is located. Except they don’t know the
word “university” and so we are pointed in the direction of the “school for old
people.”
After finally showering (surprise surprise, the shower
smells like sulphur), we are off to Kronan Supermarket, when we meet another
person from the program, Loudi from the Netherlands! She accompanies us to get
food and we cook dinner together. It turns out she has a working phone, and so
we call Hrafnkell again and he soon shows up at our door. This is when we learn
that we are expecting just one more person to show up.. the program will
consist of 4 students!
We did some post-dinner exploring along the river (because
it was still light out at 10pm.. and continued to be even at 2am, says Laura
who had some trouble sleeping), met a local family and their dog, and discussed
some future adventures.
Then an episode of Alias. Then bed. Successful first day.
Selfoss, Iceland
5/30/13
No internet in the apartment yet, so we haven’t been able to
tell anyone we are alive, but we are supposed to be at the Earthquake
Engineering Research Centre at 10am, and they have internet, so we are pretty
happy about that.
We are also pretty happy that we are getting a ride to
class. Christian, a masters student who is here form Virginia Tech, takes us to
the EERC. Turns out he will essentially be our TA for this class. We also meet
Camille from France, the fourth student. Not only are there just 4 of us, but
it is all girls! I’d like to think that says something cool about the adventurous
spirit of the engineering-minded lady.
Class is pretty good and we are introduced to many people at
EERC, some with very challenging names, and some that are easier, like our
instructor Benedikt. We find out the general schedule and requirements, and
that we’ll be heading to Northern Iceland early on Tuesday and not coming back
until Sunday. On the way up (6ish hour drive), we’ll be going through a
National Park, which marks part of the plate boundary between the North
American and Eurasian plates. Then we’ll stay in Husavik, where Benedikt and
Christian will be presenting some research at the International Workshop on
Earthquakes in Northern Iceland. This is also the location of the largest
transform fault in Iceland. But it won’t be all work.. we are already scheduled
for a whale watching tour and have plans to go hot-tubbing in a cheese tub. I
will let you ponder that one.
After whale watching Saturday morning, we don’t have any
plans, and the rental car isn’t due back until Sunday night, so we’re planning
on taking the long way back and stopping anywhere that looks interesting. We
are not entirely clear on if there are roads traversing Iceland, or if it’s
just a ring road, so we’re not sure where to look for interesting things, but
with all the volcanoes and geysers and glaciers in all directions, it doesn’t
seem like it will be a problem.
We are given badges to the other engineering building, we
check out the local pool (apparently Iceland is the only place where every
municipality has a heated outdoor pool!), head back to Kronan for more food,
and that brings us to now.
Oh, and I’ve discovered that they have British biscuits here
(aka cookies), including my favorite: bourbon chocolate. Omg.
