I arrived in Reykjavik at 9 am Ísland time (1 am Vancouver time) after leaving my home at 10 am the previous day. The trip from Vancouver through Seattle and Minneapolis to Reykjavik was, happily, unremarkable, but the airline foolishly left Sue’s luggage in Seattle.

As soon as Sue and I settled in our hotel, we headed for the main shopping area a few blocks away. Reykjavik is quaint and artsy and relaxed and friendly making visiting a treat. Lots of pedestrians – probably mostly tourists – walked willy nilly from one side of the street to the other. The few motorists didn’t seem to mind so I too am now a confirmed willy nillier.

The day was cool and blustery with occasional short sprinkles of blowing rain. First up was to find a jacket for Sue which we eventually did. The upside of the missing luggage is that we soon learned our way around old Reykjavik as we trekked from store to store. After a yummy lunch of asparagus soup and bread with Ísland butter, we retired to our rooms for well-earned snoozes.

One of Reykjavik’s landmarks is the Hallgrímskirkja, built in 1986. The church’s website states: “She is a church of ministry about Hallgrímur Pétursson and a pilgrimage to tourists” which certrainly sounds like somewhere I was meant to go.

The statue in front of the Hallgrímskirkja is of Leifur Eiríksson, the first European to arrive in America. It was a gift from the United States to commemorate the 1000th anniversary of Alþingi, Iceland’s parliament. Here’s a better look at Leifur.

I took the elevator to the top of the church tower for a panoramic view of Reykjavik. Imagine the view on a clear sunny day!

The interior of the church is open and airy and huge. A very modern organ has an impressive array of pipes through which to sound. Even the baby organ has some pretty nice pipes of its own.

A side sanctuary provides one of the only stained glass windows in the church. I did not find this church particularly spiritual. Its walls are bare and the lack of stained glass windows makes the light feel harsh. It is nevertheless an impressive bit of architecture.

As an interesting sidenote, Ísland was settled by Nordic peoples in the 9th century most of whom worshipped “pagan” Norse gods. However there was also a community of Christians; some were Nordic Christians and others were Irish Catholics who had travelled to ´Island in search of solitude and a life a prayer. The rift between the two religions became so drastic that there was talk of splitting the island into two countries – one pagan and one Catholic. In the year 1000, a pagan magnate who was the Law Speaker in the parliament feared the country would come to arms. To prevent this from happening he ruled that all Íslanders be baptised into the Christian faith and thus Ísland became a Catholic country.

I will close with a word about duty free shopping. I use a Clinique face cream which is starting to running low. I decided to price the product in the Vancouver and Minneapolis duty free shops, but first checked the Canadian price on my local drugstore’s website.

• Local drugstore’s website price = $78 CAD
• Vancouver Airport duty free shop price = $77 CAD
• Minneapolis Airport duty free shop price = $69 US @ $1.33 CAD/$1 US = $91.77 CAD

I decided a bottle of red wine was a better deal. Certainly a happier deal but one that perhaps won’t last as long.  🙂