Nothing New But a View

Borgin milli tveggja flóa. (The town between two bays.)

Today, having been thwarted in an attempt to file yet more paperwork with the Powers that Be, I decided to take advantage of a rare rainless day and explore some parts of Reykjavík that I hadn’t seen much of before. I didn’t bring my camera, but I’ll throw in some pictures from other trips to make scrolling down worth the while.

It’s difficult to get lost in Reykjavík—it’s pretty much a peninsula between two bays; if you see water with big mountains on the other side, you’re in the north part of town, if you see water with little mountains on the other side, you’re in the south part. Rarely are you far enough from the water that you could actually lose your way, at least in Vesturbær and Miðbær (the western and mid-sections of town). Today, I walked south until I hit the water, then walked along it westward until the trail ended, then crossed the peninsula (which is only a half-mile at most), hit the water to the north, then kept going west.

I didn’t mean to walk as far as I did, but when I saw the signs for Seltjarnarnes (the headland west of Reykjavík proper), I thought, “Oh, just a little further.” And when I saw this hook of land up ahead, I thought, “Oh, I’ll just get to that hook so I can see what’s beyond it.” I did stop there and turn around, but from that point I could see the lighthouse and was really tempted to walk to it too, but it was probably another mile and a half along and I knew I’d be too tired to walk back. It was quite a view, though, of the mountains on the other side of the bay with the clouds tufted on their tops like wool caught on the lava rocks that are everywhere here. The sea was just at low tide, and for once there was no wind, so the water was almost as smooth as glass, and as silent as a lake in winter. I couldn’t take my eyes off it for a long time.

Eventually I turned around and headed home, but then I saw this road leading uphill, and then a grassy hillock and then nothing but sky beyond it, and I thought, “Well, I’ll just see what’s up there.” I’m glad I did. I got to the top of the grassy mound, and it was the highest point on that stretch of the peninsula. I stood there with a bay on each side of me (or two arms of the same bay) and Seltjarnarness Church down the hill below me and felt like Ingólfur Arnarson must have felt when he landed there as the first settler more than a thousand years ago. The place is just a wonderful little improbable gem in the middle of the North Atlantic. Of course, I’m sure Ingólfur felt (and I will feel) quite differently when the winter sets in and the sun disappears, but the land itself is just breathtaking.

From there I headed home in earnest, and naturally managed to get myself stranded on the one spit of land that defies the “water north and south” rule—the arm of the harbor that extends out into the bay. I got to the end of it and realized that, unless I wanted to swim, I had to backtrack and take another road back to the middle of town. No matter, I found my way just fine, but I do have a blister on the back of my heel to show for it.

Tomorrow my class is planning a trip to Reykholt, the setting of one of the sagas, so if all goes according to plan I’ll have pictures and a tale to tell next time I get the chance!