The Nordic Isles

 Herewith a recap post of my trip to the Nordic Isles. 

A settlement from 5,000 years ago in the Orkneys

I traveled with a group of good friends where I was sort of the outsider. These people have known each other well since the 1970s (where a core group of the men worked together) and they live in the same town and see each other all the time and have taken several vacations together. I know two of the people very well, also since the 1970s when we were roommates. As a result, even though I left town forty years ago, I've met all these people before, and even taken a couple of trips with some of them. Counting me, there were twelve of us.

A standing stone circle in the Orkneys

We were on a small 125-passenger ship. Much of the time this was a great advantage over being on a more typical several-thousand passenger cruise ship. We got to know most of the people and the staff. The ship went places that don't have the infrastructure to support the bigger cruise ships, and also had the flexibility to change the itinerary on the fly. For example, we spent a couple of hours one afternoon with the ship basically drifting with a pod of humpback whales, allowing us our fill of ogling these incredible creatures.

A stone broch in the Shetlands, inhabited about 3,000 years ago.
The walls are thick and there are rooms all the way up.

We did climb on buses a few times, and then it pretty much felt like any cruise I'd been on before, with 30-40 of us climbing on and off to gawk for a few minutes at something. (Though we were still in fairly remote places where few cruise ships come, and finding 3-4 buses for us exhausted the local supply.) I make a point about the experience because this whole trip was insanely expensive, and I had to continually justify the expense in my own mind. (Legacy of being raised by frugal people.)

Sheep were everywhere in the Faroes. Mostly, in the countryside,
they roam free and so houses have fenced yards to keep them out

But it was truly awesome, in the literal sense of the world! On these remote islands stuck in a harsh climate, we saw ruins of dwellings that were the age of the pyramids. We saw a wild landscape that is under threat, from climate change and development and tectonic action. In incredibly harsh conditions, we saw abundant and charming wildlife and people. I'm so glad I went!

Drizzle in the Faroes

 

We woke up every morning to an announcement with the plan for the day, and the weather, always the same: "It's a balmy 10 degrees out, and it's likely to rain!". Every day, in the fifties and with a threat of rain. You will find in my pictures, however, a number of blue   skies. It didn't rain non-stop, and there were always "bright intervals". 

Boat trip to see rocks and birds from the sea
Faroe Islands

 

A bright interval on the south coast of Iceland

The cruise was supplied with a staff of naturalists and cultural specialists, and so we didn't just see the sights, we learned about the life cycle of puffins, and how the landscape was formed. I was fascinated by the geology of Iceland, which is being literally torn in half (at the rate of about an inch a year) by the North Atlantic ridge separating the North American and European continental plates. We saw volcanoes and lava fields and cinder cones and hot springs and geysers and waterfalls.

Volcanic beach day, Iceland south coast

Once we got out of the ship, some of our group stayed in Reykjavik for a few days. With seven of us, we couldn't rent a car (and nobody wanted to drive a van) so we took a couple of small group tours out of town to see the sights. We did the "golden circle tour" and went into a lava cave. Reykjavik itself is a great little town, and we enjoyed some of its museums. Pretty much the food in Reykjavik is fish and lamb, but one of our party didn't care for those. To our pleasure, most restaurants had a vegan option that could satisfy our contrarian. 

Humpback whale, taken with iphone from ship

Charismatic puffins on the island of Grimsey

Frisbee golf at the edge of the world
(in Grimsey)

Volcanic cinder cone we hiked up,
amid a torrent of midges (see one on my face)
Near Lake Myvatn

Volcanic landscape near Lake Myvatn

Hot springs near Myvatn

One of many waterfalls

Yeah, sheep. Flatey Island

Me and my former housemate,
after a five-mile hike up the valley
Near Isafjordur

Even the cabin had views

A volcanic eruption in 1973 took out a significant part of the houses
in this town. This is the edge where the lava stopped.
These houses are backed right up to it and survived.
Heimany Island

A geysir, right by "The Geysir" that gave them all their name.
Golden Circle tour

A short hike in the national park outside Reykjavik

Entering the lava tube. Apparently, rocks around the tube harden
quickly, underground channels form, and the lava actually drains out
rather than harden in place, leaving caves like this.
Southwest coast