Bloom

My daughterss like a bloom (an ice cream eating bloom) amongst the foliage at the Eden greenhouse and gift store in Hveragerði, a half an hour's drive east of Reykjavik. Stopping by there is definitely a must for travellers, both foreign and local alike. They even have a banana tree or two!

By the way, I have reposted this photo in the size I want it to be in and was going to delete my last post to avoid duplication, until I realized that I would be deleting a small bunch of very nice comments at the same time. My solution? I've copied and pasted the comments into this post so they will be saved for posterity. Thanks you all for the lovely words!

Jen said...
I really love your photos. I had no idea what to expect when thinking of what Iceland would look like. Its really very beautiful.


Lovewine said...
Hi Maria
I'm also wondering about the blogger beta thing and you mention having trouble. I think I'll hold out as long as possible. When I left a comment on your last post I thought it was lost when it didn't show up but it appears to be there now.
Yay winter!


Anonymous said...
Just glad you're back posting. I have been a reader for a couple of months and find your blog very insightful, informative and entertaining. BTW, my niece is named Valentina and I thought, until recently, that was a name unique to our family :-)


Luis said...
Glad you're back posting. I always enjoy the photos and descriptions on your blog.

There is something so unique and appealling about Iceland and I feel you capture it very well.

Hope to read further posts soon.


Barb said...
I was just going to take a quick peek at your blog after searching for one from Iceland and now an hour later, I've had to force myself to stop reading and head off to bed. I thoroughly enjoyed every post and your photographs are stunning. I'll be back!


Faye Pekas said...
Your daughter is very pretty and it looks as if she is enjoying her ice cream :)

I've had the beta blogger since the beginning and just started using flickr. I don't have any problem posting from flickr with it. I do love the beta now that the bugs are ironed out.

(Thankfully, all is finally well with beta here, too!)

Pyramid

Valentina's uncle Snorri Ásmundsson, a very humorously controversial artist, sharpens his thoughts in a plexiglass rendition of the Great Pyramid of Cheops at the intersection of Laugavegur and Skólavörðurstigur. I'm sure a dose of Pyramid Power has given this ecclectic Icelander a serious brain boost, and us Saturday strollers a good giggle.

Concert

Here's just a tiny slice of this weekend's Iceland Airwaves life: a gig by a local act (could it have been Jakobínarína?) at the alternative music boutique, 12 Tónar.

It's been lovely, as usual, having lots and lots of visitors here on the Lava Rock, especially ones who are here for music, music and more music. The festival's really for the tourists, anyway. Get's way too crowded at our local venues, making it hardly worth stepping out at night. But like I said before, it's nice to see new faces on our downtown sidewalks, and always a little sad when they're gone.

Sport

I knew as soon as posted my last entry that the weather would change.

As a matter of fact I actually knew while I was writing that I was jinxing the whole Indian Summer affair, at least in my own universe. But I went ahead anyway, accepting that we were long overdue for a cold snap. It was time to whip out the mittens and get on with it.

Fall is actually my favorite time of year, probably because I'm a late September baby. When I came across these footballers practicing on a recent chilly evening, I got nostalgic; many a teenage hour was spent by me out on the Cupertino High football field rehearsing drill team routines. Over and over again we'd whip out our moves, dancing about to the music of Mr. Gomez's two hundred-strong marching band, our breath hot and white under the field lights and our brows sticky with quick-cooled sweat. Though waiting with frozen fingers for the woodwinds or drumline to grasp those certain tricky measures was never fun at the time, watching these boys run about in the cold made me want to be back there again.

So say goodbye to summer and hello to a new and decidedly snappy autumn season, full of its own uniquely falltime pleasures...

Evening

It's a little cheap tossing skyline shots from our balcony onto a site dedicated to life in Reykjavik, but yesterday's sunset was a wonder.

We are slipping gently into winter here on the island: most days this last month have tipped to the better side of 10°C. To you readers in southern latitudes that may seem hyper-chilly (that's only 50°F!) but those in northern climes will know that a windless, sunny double-digit day, even the lowest double digit, is cause for joy.

I've been lax about noting celebrity visits to our lava rock, so let it suffice to know that Yoko Ono was here the other day, as well as director Atom Egoyan, Brendan Fraser and Dilana from Rockstar: Supernova performing with our very own Magni. I know I'm forgetting some slebs, but that's going to have to do for now.

A blogger named Antoine sent me a link to his site detailing his trip to Iceland, so check it out. Also, a certain Osman is starting up a kind of blog directory, Whole Blogs, so check that out as well (there are some interesting international sites linked on his site.)

More later...Have a groovy weekend!

Reykjavík

Been ages since I've added a new post but that's a good thing...I've been happily busy, you see.

This pic is shot from the top of the Hallgrímskirkja tower on a lovely day last year. Amazingly, the link I added above is for a Wikipedia article on this, our famously oversized church. But maybe not so odd after all when one of the first and very prolific writers for that prodigious online encyclopedia is an Icelander living in a small trailer somewhere New Mexico-ish, happily typing away and filing entry after entry on his native country.

Of course there is the ubiquitous exterior shot of the tower on the Wikipedia link, as well as one very similar to this one, taken in winter. I have to say, though, that I like mine better! ;-)

Traveller

This charming, dreamy young man is the brother of two sweet sisters enrolled at the International School of Iceland where I teach (more on that later). Our 18 students and four teachers went tree-planting with the kids from Sjálandsskóli, (our school is housed there) and he came along for the ride. Though we're sure not all of the few hundered birch we planted will survive the winter, any and all foliage that does is very welcome and brings us a step closer to re-foresting our nearly-barren little island.