August 11 -- Wrapping up Iceland

Today was a quiet day in what has, at times, been kind of an aerobic tour. We drove south to the Blue Lagoon. This was accidentally formed by the output of a geothermal heating plant and the original lagoon was replaced by a planned one to make it more usable. It is a very popular tourist attraction in Iceland. We got there before 9:30 and waltzed in. When we left at 11:30, there was a long line.

Although its called the Blue Lagoon, it was actually more of a milky color with a slightly bluish overcast. The water has lots of silicates in it, and is supposed to be very good for the skin, particularly psoriasis. The heat ranges from maybe the high 90s to over 105, so you can find a spot with the right temperature just for you. It is only about 3-4 feet deep in most places, so it is easy to wander around. They also have vats of the silicates and encourage you to put them on your face and rinse them off in the pool. There was also a steam room (I tried it -- hard to breath in all that steam!) and a waterfall was position to provide shoulder massage.

Even the technology is pretty cool. When you arrive, you are issued a wristband with a chip in it. There are private lockers, and several are centered around a chip reader. When you close your locker, you tag the chip, it locks your locker and verifies the number. When you return, you tag the chip again and it tells you what locker your belongings are in. There is no limit to the number of times you can open and close the locker.

When we got back to the hotel, we headed to a nearby mall for lunch and to try to find a turtleneck tee to wear under the Icelandic wool sweater I bought. I realize that we are at the end of the summer season and there would be lots of summer clothes on sale (amazing to see so many camisoles and tank tops in a place where a really warm day gets to 72...) but I thought there would be decent choices with the fall season arriving. I was wrong. Nobody carried any simple turtlenecks like the kind we have by the thousands in the US. I found one, finally, at a department store on sale, a bit heavier than ideal, but for $13 (vs the $70 we were seeing elsewhere for less ideal garments) I was sold. We also found our cheapest Magnum Bars, so how could we say no? I had hoped to leave a few pounds behind here in Iceland, but I don't think its working.

After shopping, we walked back to the Botanical Garden we explored the first day to take photos of the former boiling springs used as a laundry, and also to see more of the garden. Either blue and lavender flowers grow better here than other colors, or the gardeners are very partial to those colors, as they predominated.

Boiling water filled these areas. The photo below shows how they were used -- both for safety and positioning clothing to cool.

Once we got back, all that was left to do was re-organize our packing -- we can only take 22 lbs each to Greenland -- and to go to our 'Farewell Dinner', which is sort of premature, since everyone in the group is going on to Greenland, including our tour leader. This is kind of unusual, especially for the tour leader to go along, but apparently the Greenland work crew is not sufficiently large or experienced enough to fill this role. Since we have really enjoyed Snorri, this is fine with us, but strange to have the farewell with 5 days left on the trip!