Palm

I got an odd email the other day, one requesting info on palm trees in Iceland. Here, I'll just go ahead and let you read it yourself:

Hi Maria,
I have been a fan of your blog since last January when I was doing some research for my trip to Iceland. Now I visit your blog and am longing to go back.
I've recently been researching the existence (or possibility) of palm trees growing in Iceland. I saw your photo of people enjoying the outside patio at Sirkus and found it odd that there is a mural on the wall of palm trees.
Do you know of any palm trees in Iceland? I'm having trouble finding some images.

Thank you,
Michelle

I was intending to give Michelle some outdated bla bla about how Iceland is the northernmost banana grower in the world (here's an interesting article comparing Iceland's banana days to Iran's running out of gas) but then I remembered that banana plants are more bushes than trees. I was also going to mention the huge plastic palm at Perlan, but then, on my way home today an amazing thing happened.

Right there, at the end of the Great Wall of China Asian restaurant on Vesturgata, stood a small but stately palm! And I can promise you it hadn't been there only twenty minutes before when I'd walked the same sidewalk in the other direction! There was Michelle's Icelandic palm tree, and all I had to do was whip out my Olympus to snap the shot she wanted. Of course this tree is also not real, but it's Michelle's image conjured up on the snowy streets of Reykjavik like magic.