Night In Iceland

We landed in Reykjavik in the morning after a pretty easy 7-hour flight from Seattle. I was surprised to find that the airport was about an hour from the city, especially given all of the stopover advertisements. We walked from the bus station to downtown and saw this famous church on the way. The area we were in downtown felt a little deserted, but we found a restaurant serving Scandinavian food (sooooo much dairy) and got our bearings.

Image of Icelandic countryside on the route from the airport to Reykjavik. Rocky and blue skies — Icelandic countryside from the airport bus

Large church in Iceland. Shaped like a rocket and pointing into a blue sky with a cross at the top — Reykjavik church

We then made our way to some neat museums, but I found myself wishing I had a little more context on the history of Iceland. The art museum was cool and much of it reminded me of American folk art. We also went to the Icelandic Culture House, which was quite unique. Different rooms talked about different elements of Icelandic culture (religion, life, death, language, etc.) and the whole museum had mid-century-modern cabin vibes.

Room in the Icelandic Culture House with clean wood floors and a slanted roof. — Icelandic Culture House

Room in the Icelandic Culture House with white tile floors and a big winding staircase. — Icelandic Culture House

Drawing of a duck found in the Icelandic Culture House. The duck says I am Dook — The Culture House also had a lot of fun interactive elements and I found this very funny drawing

After all of this, we spent a while trying to find the bus stop to go to our airbnb (there was construction that diverted the route we’d found on Google Maps). Iceland was definitely the only place I needed warmer clothes; there was a splitting wind and it drizzled on our way out.

We got to our airbnb in the evening and washed our things. We were going to go to sleep, but I ended up staying up all night as the sun set at around 1 and rose just a couple of hours later.

Gray stone building outside of Reykjavik.

Room with a view of the mountains and ocean in Reykjavik.

View of Reykjavik with blue skies, big clouds, houses and trees.

The next morning I counted down the hours until a nearby public pool opened; our airbnb felt like purgatory given a sleepless night of sunlight, strong wind, and jet lag.

We got to the public pool at around 6:30 AM and it was full of elderly Icelandic people. It was quite nice; there were hot tubs with 4-5 different temperatures of water, a small pool with water from a nearby hot spring, a larger swimming pool, and a water slide. There were also things like a sand volleyball court, and I left wondering how often people use outdoor activity equipment given how cold it was even in the summer.

The inside of the facility was reminiscent of a Wes Anderson movie.

Outside of the women's locker room in an Icelandic pool facility. Mid-century modern design.

Cabinets in a pool locker room in Iceland. White doors with brown wooden trim.

We back to the airport the next day, scrambling again to make the city bus (we ended up doing the 40 minute walk to the airport bus station) because of changes to the route. We met a cat near the airport bus station (probably the least friendly cat of the trip).

Gray cat crouching on a gray stoop.

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