Iceland is the first of many reminders that even though we are leaving a country, there are still hundreds of Iceland sites left unseen, thousands of trails and mountains left unhiked – known limitations of our trip. A full two weeks wouldn’t have been enough either.
Here are a few final thoughts on the Icelandic leg of our epic trip:
1.) We never used any of the local currency, Icelandic króna – ISK. I tried to pull out some currency when we first arrived and it failed. Luckily, we had read beforehand that currency isn’t really necessary in Iceland, and it’s true. All of the shops and diners had mobile credit card machines that made transactions fast and easy.
2.) RBF (resting bitch face) is real, it just doesn’t really mean much. Check out the picture I posted with this entry. It’s a street mural capturing a group of Icelandic locals as they hang in the street? Anyway, only two of them are smiling. The guy in the middle has a smile, but everyone else seems to creeped out by him. He also looks American. The second person smiling is the lady in the lower-left, and her smile is pretty fucking terrifying.
3.) Reykjavík is easy to navigate. Much of everything worth seeing is within walking distance and the bus system was pretty hassle free if you’re not in the mood for renting a car or hiring a taxi. We might rent a car the next time we come out, for flexibility and exploration purposes – the roads are in decent shape and traffic was more like a Lansing than it was like a Chicago.
4.) There are a shit ton of tourists in Iceland. We read an article that said the tourists outnumber the natives 7-1 in the summer months. October was a good month for us to pick, ratio might have only been 2-1.
5.) Many bars stay open til 0400 and almost all have live entertainment. The performers were Icelandic, as far as we could tell, but sang only English tunes.
6.) Free Wi-Fi is everywhere in Reykjavik: bars, hotels, coffee shops, tour buses, super markets, and hot dog stands. Everywhere.