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Friday, March 14
Today the Iceland project students made their closest brush with being tourists. We had a tour bus and the same guide as we had Thursday. We saw several neighborhoods and then went to Höfði House, the site of the famous summit between President Reagan and Gorbachev. This site perhaps lacked a little gravity with the students as they were all born after that event, but we took a group portrait on the steps of the house anyway and made a brief stab at explaining the cold war. We went to Perlan, which has a coffee shop and a great view of Reykjavik and surroundings and then saw important government buildings and the striking Hallgrimskirkja church. Our guide dropped us off at the National Museum which has an excellent display of Icelandic artifacts spanning farming, seafaring, and yes, Viking, (which was indeed originally a verb.) After the Museum and it’s gift shop, we walked to a very tiny wonderful seafood restaurant right at the docks. We sang “Happy Birthday” to Morgan in very bad Icelandic with the help of the waitress, had a great meal, and after several explanations of the bus system, set the kids off on their own in downtown Reykjavik. Many stories and purchases later, we gathered back at the Hostel to walk to dinner at another restaurant. After a good dinner we split up, with some students going swimming and others going to a music concert. Saturday we expect a presentation on genealogy at the hostel and then a bus to the famous “Blue Lagoon” for lunch and a relaxing soak in the mineral waters before the trip home. Saturday will indeed be a long day as we will be chasing time zones across the Atlantic before arriving back in Chicago. |
