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We may have forgotten to mention a few funny things and maybe want to remind you of some. :) ~ In Reykjavik, when we were leaving the car garage, Cody pushed a button that he thought would open the door. However, it turns out that it was to start an alarm. There was no attendant to notify, so we tried to look like nothing was happening as we left the building. Dan and I decided that we would absolutely throw Cody under the bus if questioned.  ~ In the National Museum, there was a bridal bench from the 17th century.  The couple getting married sits there during the ceremony. On the bench, the following words are carved: Guð miskunna pú mér… (God have mercy upon me…) ~ We have a lot of black bears around us in North Carolina. They get pretty big… not grizzly big but big. Here are their man parts.  ~ Speaking of penises… This T-shirt was not an approved purchase.  A restaurant near the Penis Museum ~ Speaking of penises, part deux, this popped up on IG this morning....

Well, Dan slept through the entire battle that waged in the streets and in the air last night. Amazing.  We woke up and packed up and set off to the Geldingadalir Volcano, which last erupted in 2021 😳. It was pitch black as we drove up to the parking spot at 9:30 AM and started hiking up. Dan decided to turn back after walking quite a ways on the lava rocks, and Cody and I made it 1.2 miles and some number of feet up before we decided that we had run out of time. We had been hoping to get to a viewing point of the caldera. But we saw this instead.  This was taken at 10:30 AM.  After leaving the volcano, we drove through miles and miles and miles of what had been lava fields, we made it to the Bridge Between Continents (Brú Milli Heimsálfa), which connects the Eurasian and North American tectonic plates.  Dan’s shot of the sun from the bridge gorge I regret that I never took geology. Maybe I will audit it at UNCA when I’m old enough. ;)  (Dan - I took a semester...

What a day! Vicki has already written about it, but I have pics, so bear with me. On our way to the Secret Lagoon, we saw this moon.     It remained in the sky all day. The thermal bath was wonderful. That dash from the inside showers to the outdoor water was hell, but it was worth it. I found where the hottest water was coming into the pool and rotated in front of it, like a rotisserie chicken. I have no pictures, but Cody and our friends from England took a few.     After bathing and lunch, we got to Gullfoss. Magnificent waterfall, but I was walking like a penguin to keep from falling on the ice.        Also, in the shop here, I found an Icelandic sweater (actually, Vicki saw it first.). I'll be sporting that all winter in Weaverville. I felt a brief moment of guilt, buying a sweater that I consider expensive, but Vicki pointed out 1. guilt is a wasted emotion, and 2. it was cheaper than most of our meals here. So I am fine.   On to geyser...

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Golden_Circle_(Iceland) We decided (well, Cody and Dan decided, and I’m going along) to do one of the hot spring baths here in Iceland. There are a couple of things that were holding me back. 1) I don’t have a bathing suit that fits. 2) One has to shower - naked and in a communal shower - before (and I suppose after) going into the bath.  Now, look. I know that no one is paying attention to my almost-65-year-old body except me, but I consider me somewhat important to me. I have not showered in a communal shower since, well, ever. The closest would have been the disgusting and embarrassing experiences of PE in middle school. And that was enough to put me off of showering with other people until the end of my days.  Despite my nerves, the drive gets pretty as the sun comes up at 9:45 AM: Real-time update: It was great! There were not many people when we got there, so the undressing part wasn’t *too* traumatic. We were at Secret Lagoon, Iceland’s old...