Monday, July 22, 2025
We woke up super early (before 5am) to get ready and pack the last few items. The flight left at 8am; we got to the airport well before. Erik bought the kids and himself McDonald’s for breakfast. I wasn’t hungry, so I didn’t have any. The flight was 2 hours and 45 minutes to Calgary, Canada. Unfortunately, there weren’t any screens on the plane, so I mostly drew in my sketchbook to pass the time. Once we got to Calgary, we picked up our rental car—another Chrysler vehicle. We had 7 hours to kill. Our first stop was Cactus Club Cafe restaurant, which claimed to have both Canadian and American food. Elisa and I split the peppercorn ribeye steak plate. Gabe and Ian both ordered a bacon cheeseburger. Erik ordered butternut squash ravioli with prawns. My steak was good, but Erik’s ravioli was definitely the best.
After eating, we drove to the nearby mall and walked around for a bit. We found a Bath and Body Works, but they couldn’t take my free item coupon since Canada’s stores haven’t yet implemented the rewards system. After the mall, we went to Walmart for some snacks—mostly chocolate.
We drove around downtown for a bit to kill some more time. I may or not have drifted off to sleep during the drive. By now our layover was just about over, so we headed back to the airport to return our rental car and board the plane to Iceland. Unfortunately, the plane was delayed an hour, so we walked around the airport for a bit. I had to buy some expensive sparkling water since I was so thirsty, and we sat around until it was time to board. We were the very last people to board the airplane, which I like. Elisa made a friend just before we boarded, and I got to brush my teeth. Unfortunately, the airplane didn’t have screens, but the flight was a lot shorter than I initially thought. It was 6 hours 11 mins; I thought the flight would be 9 hours. For most of the flight, I read my book and sampled the chocolate.
Tuesday, July 23, 2025
Somewhere after dinner was served, Monday turned into Tuesday. They served dinner which was salad, a roll, a choice of pasta or honey mustard chicken (I chose the chicken) and a Madeline cookie/cake for dessert. Ian and Elisa refused their meals. I tried to sleep, but I was too uncomfortable. I might have slept for maybe 20 minutes. Most of the time I just sat there. Ian, thankfully, slept most of the flight. Finally, we arrived in Keflavik which is almost an hour away from Reykjavik, Iceland, about 9:00am Iceland time. After a bathroom break and picking up our luggage, we got our rental car. Thankfully, we didn’t have to wait too long for any of that. Not that it mattered much; we couldn’t check into our Airbnb home until 3pm. Our first stop was the Hallgrímskirkja Lutheran church in Reykjavik. It was pretty chilly getting out of the car, especially for Ian who didn't have a jacket (it was packed in his suitcase). The church looked almost like a cathedral from the outside, but the inside was plain as could be—not a single picture and no stained-glass windows. The most interesting part was the organ. There was a whole lineup of organ concerts at the church, but, unfortunately, we wouldn’t be in Reykjavik during any of them.
After browsing through the church, we walked down the street at looked in a few shops. Things sure were expensive in the shops. We stopped at a food hall for lunch. Gabe and I tried a famous Icelandic hot dog. Ian and Elisa had pizza. Erik tried some fish. Then we parked in a different area called Laugavegur and walked around and browsed some more expensive shops but didn’t buy anything. Our last stop before arriving at our Airbnb house was the local supermarket, Bonus. We bought some breakfast items and snacks for the next day. It was fun looking at all the different food items. Everything was written in Icelandic, so it took me a bit longer to figure out what things were.
Finally, just before 3pm Icelandic time, we arrived at our new Airbnb home. It was a decent sized apartment, but it felt like we were snooping in someone else’s house since they left behind their clothes, jewelry, and some stuff in the fridge and freezer. They even left all their pictures on the wall. We all went right to sleep. We napped for a few hours. We woke up the kids around 7pm so they could shower and not be awake at 5am. We also ate a little bit of the food we bought and played some rounds of a Head’s Up on Erik’s phone. Then, we finally got ourselves to bed.
Interesting church sure does resemble the basalt columns similar to those we saw in Ireland. I'd like to try the North Atlantic cod because it's probably better than the cod we get here.
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