Eastern Iceland and a Resplendence of Reindeer

Housing for Icelandic Elves in someone's backyard

v. comfy, not quite finished lodge

Wednesday night Ila and I stayed at a lodge, so new that its owners seemed inexperienced to checking in guests, though they were as ever, Icelandic nice. We had the usual spotlessly clean room and the spot-on breakfast that came with it.


Although the dining room has all the charm of a double wide trailer, the breakfast was ready for prime time: 5 kinds of fresh grain laden breads, Icelandic butter and cream cheese, sardines (I know!), sliced red peppers, tomatoes & cukes, cheeses, smoked salmon and plenty of thick Icelandic yogurts, the ever present muesli, egg souffle, streaky bacon, a half dozen kinds of fruit and yes... good coffee. V. healthy and no rampant sugar as normally found American continental breakfasts.  I wanted to just sit and eat breakfast for the remainder of the day. I wish I could manage such spreads at home.

Quite an Icelandic breakfast feast

Alas - Ila wanted to accomplish something aside from watching me bloat. Leaving the little lodge, we drove down the short driveway and onto the main road. The main road is plainly visible in the photo below. The 'main highway' runs along the fence line at the bottom of the gravely driveway. OK, what I'm sayin' here is, in California we'd have filled that entire valley with strip malls and gated housing.

The fence line runs parallel to the Ring Road, running left to right

Almannaskarð tunnel dead ahead!

This was some tunnel - took so long to drive through, it was a little scary. Were we driving through a tunnel to another dimension? At almost a mile long the tunnel exit put us by a mountain road. That road led to an overlook we'd been told was a must see.

On the hill at Almannaskarð

Ila viewing the distant hill panorama

Saw a lot of wildlife & birds today. There was some nice signage on the topic too.

Cool Icelandic signage, all about the birds

Pretty Black-headed Gulls bathing in ice water. I know!

On the gravely shore, a fat grey seal sunned itself. One look at us and it dove into the river. [UPDATE: didn't recognize the seal was a new species for me, a Bearded Seal. How did I miss that?] 

 Tubby Bearded Seal

 Saw many reindeer (caribou?) thoughout the day. This is the only one that totally freaked at the sight of us.

Snow glazed hills

Not an Elf house, a full sized shed/croft

Today we had many 'side' adventures as we progressed along hwy 96. The days' goal was Egilsstaðir, which is in Northeastern Iceland. The town as well as the Icelandair Hotel we stayed are fairly upscale - I mean, the hotel even had an elevator.

Someone else's photo of Egilsstaðir's Icelandair Hotel 

My favorite thing about this hotel and its friendly staff was this fellow that greets visitors at the entryway.

His smile was a bit wooden, but he seemed friendly enough

Our room was average for Icelandic accommodations, i.e., clean & decorated in clean cut Scandinavian style.

The view out the window was - for me - tops.  The view (below) seems just your average parking lot overview but note the suggestion of white spots in the distance... if you can.

For a birder, only binoculars were required to appreciate the view of the white spots, aka swans and company.

Whooper Swans and Greylag Geese enjoying
their own version of  'hotel accommodations'

We shopped across the road at a genuine 'oh-my-gods-how-I-love-foreign-groceries' store. We got
breakfast foods for tomorrow morning including a packet of unidentified red berries that may be a type of currant. They aren't the least bit sweet.

[UPDATE: the 'mystery berries' are Schizandra Berries, whose flavor is described as 'sweet, sour, salty, bitter and pungent' All in one berry!]

Once breakfast for tomorrow was secure, we took off for dinner at a nearby restaurant.

We decided to give the Nielsen Café a go. Soon we were seated in the second story dining room. The bottom floor was all about chocolates and pastries for sale.

The Nielsen Café

Smallish & pretty dining room

Rack of Lamb ala Icelandic

The Nielsen Café wasn't the place for such authentically Icelandic fare as svid (head o' sheep). It did have Roast Reindeer, but at 75 krona a pop I instead enjoyed the 47 króna 'rack o' lamb' with all the fixin's. It was pretty darned tasty.



Here are some of today's goo-gobers worth of reindeer with a little music. OK, OK, the music is meant for a moose, but I work with what I have.