Engjabær-Descendants Meet Up

2016-08-13Hrefna's family, Us Standard

[Photos from 13 August 2016, posted online 07 October 2016. This post took two coffee house visits!]

Earlier this year, after a funeral of a member of my mother’s extended family, the idea was floated to have the descendants of my maternal-great-grandparents meet up outside of the funeral context for a change.

My great-grandparents, who lived in Engjabær, which was located where the farm animal/family park in Reykjavik is now, had 12 children (sort of standard for the time), all of which made it to adulthood, but only five of which had children of their own.

One cousin offered up a fishing hut/camping site that he runs at Minnivallalækur. Since the five of us still don’t have the equipment we need to camp overnight, we instead drove there on Saturday morning, spent the day (fake-camped our small tent), and then drove back in the late evening.

A good time was had by all! Also, the whole photoset can be seen here. (32 images below)

Group photo of (most of) the attendees. Click on the image to see a larger version.

The plan for the day.

The result of our fake-camping.

Ríkey, the queen of planning, and master organizer, giving directions for the games ahead. My grandmother, Hrefna, in the black vest and white sleeves, was the only one of the 12 siblings present. Only three of them are still alive.

It was a good group of people, many of whom I'd never met before.

It was a good group of people, many of whom I’d never really met before.

Ríkey keeping a watchful eye on the various groups as they solve various tasks in the grassy field behind the campsite!

One of the tasks.

Lots of huddles as the teams race to finish their assignments.

Anna wearing two tasks!

Next up: Running with eggs on spoons!

Dutifully turning in four circles on the other side.

There was also precision boot-throwing!

Measuring distance from the chair/target.

Emma was hungry, and insisted on eating one of the eggs from the competition. Yes, they’d been previously boiled!

Next we all drove to a nearby farm, to look at the largest man-made cave in Iceland, dating back some thousand years ago, give or take some.

Next we all drove to a nearby farm, Hellar (literally means Caves) to look at the largest man-made cave in Iceland, dating back some thousand years ago, give or take.

The entrance to the entrance of the big cave.

Getting a small lecture before actually entering the cave.

Inside the cave. It was far too dark to photograph effectively. The cave was surprisingly big. There was a “first part”, and then a tightening, and then a second large space.