[Photos taken 10 – 15 June 2023, posted online 14 March 2024, from a cafe in Brussels that has a smoke detector that is almost out of battery. Peep!!]
Upon returning home from California, the grass had grown to time-to-mow-length, there was a birthday, more work to do in the garden, bread-baking, insensibly fed ducks, purchased kayaks, and e-biking along the rocky coast.
Saturday 10 June 2023
Time to cut some grass!
Post cutting, pre-bagging. That area next to the house has bugged me forever, we never seem to get a handle on what and how it should “be”, so it mostly just stays in limbo.
Flower-planting time!
Such a hard life!
Later that afternoon we headed to a birthday party in the west end of town.
Yum!
Getting so big!!
Standing!
Proud planter and waterer of grass-seeds! The apartment was about to be sold, and a little bit of grass beats no grass!
Meanwhile on the other side of the fence…
The results of Anna’s hard work.
Sunday 11 June 2023
Lazy-lunch at a cafe.
At home, Anna was making “Sarah-bread”.
We got a visitor! In retrospect, it was probably not due to anything good, as a lot of nature was being excavated further up the hill to make way for houses, in all likelihood destroying many nesting sites.
We were worried there was something wrong with the bird, so we tried giving it some water.
Breads coming along nicely.
The duck disappeared, only to reappear with its mate!?!
Before we really thought it through, we put some food-stuffs out… not realizing they were probably scouting the area for a nesting place…?
The birds finally went away, and Anna handed me a buttered piece of freshly baked bread, as I was outside weeding.
I do try to keep this public-facing portion semi-weed-free, but often fail.
Ugh. Too much!
We all cheered the fresh breads, which got cut into slices and frozen for future toasted goodness.
Monday 12 June 2023
Bjarki’s summer “job school” started.
Monday gym! That’s 90 kg I think.
Making sweaty faces at the camera, in part to document the lush “old masters paintings” ad campaign the gym had going to celebrate it’s 25th anniversary.
The ducks came back, but we’d decided we wouldn’t add to the food.
That evening I spotted this kayak at Costco… hmmm…tempting!
Tuesday 13 June 2023
It was a gorgeous Tuesday, and I even spotted a guy out on a balcony sunbathing!
I met up with my e-bike group.
We were biking not very far away from the eruption area on Reykjanesskagi.
The Strava recording on the right, the Blue Lagoon and the then-not-deserted-but-is-now town of Grindavík on the left.
We stopped on a ledge overlooking a …
Big rock!
It was a big rock with a door?
Yup, a door!
Quite lean-y…
… also in the overhanging sense.
With the rock thoroughly examined, we kept going.
Mounts (i.e. volcanic ridges) in the distance.
A tire needed changing so we hung out by the vista spot for quite some time, and stared west.
I was there!
Moon-scape-y.
Looking east, where we were headed.
After a bit of a grassy and slightly muddy ride, we came to a lighthouse.
Mud-proof!
Refreshments.
Aforementioned mud.
We kept going…
… but then had to wait a bit as another bike broke down.
Navigating tricky terrain.
The grassy bits are the nicest bits, when the grass is dry.
Looking back from where we came.
Sheep-sorting fences.
Sheep are navigated into a central area, there people look at sheep ears, and then drag the sheep to the correct fence according to their ear-mark.
Leaving the sorting place.
About to bike on asphalt.
We biked straight back towards the cars.
We parked next to this cute little church.
On the drive back, I stopped to check out the Krýsuvík geothermal area.
Lots of steam, lots of colors.
Looking up the hillside.
Looking down the hillside, the setting sun on a hill in the distance.
This area has had shakes-series that could be magma moving, but so far, it’s not been nearly as active as the Svartsengi/Blue Lagoon area.
It was chilly outside, and I didn’t have a warm jacket, so that was all the geothermal stuff I looked at that evening.
Thursday 15 June 2023
We did indeed end up buying a couple of kayaks, so we also had to buy some water-shoes….
