First 24 Hours in Iceland

Since arriving in Iceland, we met up with Debbie & Saevar, rented our car for the week and took off to head to Akranes, a fishing village about 30 min. outside of Reykjavik and Saevar's hometown. On our way, we stopped in Reykjavik as we were insanely hungry and stopped at the Bæjarins Betzu ("The Town's Best") hot dog stand for a hot dog. These famous dogs are made with Icelandic lamb and are reputable for being insanely good....and they certainly were. The meat was so delicious and the dogs were snappy. I've never had a hot dog like this---I have a feeling we'll be eating a lot of these while we are here.

We then made our way to Akranes, met up with Saevar's uncle's family for a quick 'hello' and then continued over to his cousin's apartment where we'll be staying for the next few days for some much needed rest after 2 red-eye flights in a row. After passing out for about 5 hours, we woke up, changed and headed over for a delicious meal at the Perlan Restaurant, this round dome atop a hill with a beautiful view of Reykjavik.

The food was delicious: salmon, prawn soup and lamb. When political or royal dignitaries visit Iceland, they are often greeted with a reception at this restaurant.

After dinner, we headed over to a large park where Björk was giving a free concert. We got a great spot near the front and I got some awesome photos:

Note that the majority of these photos were taken between 10pm and 11pm----that's how bright the light is here. Technically, the sun set somewhere between midnight and 1am...and even then, there was still a decent glow in the sky...bright enough that you would barely need to have your headlights on while driving. It is now 4am as I type this and the sun rose about an hour ago -- it's bright and sunny again. This is the most daylight I've ever experienced. Here's a photo of us stopping for some snacks at a gas station taken around 1:30am to give you a sense of what "nighttime" looks like during the summer

Anyway, I need to attempt to sleep now....