To Amsterdam / Cheese Tasting / Canal Dinner Cruise
[Photos taken 25 April 2024. Posted online 26 August 2024. Volcano is still going, and it’s the first day of elementary school. The weather is finally nice enough to stain wood!]
Finnur’s parents had both turned 80 years old in the past year, so the siblings decided to replicate previous big-birthdays, and go abroad with them for a long weekend.
Miraculously, they managed to agree on a location and dates, although Icelandair did its very best to throw them off. Both of the flights that we had booked ended up getting cancelled (probably didn’t sell enough seats), and we were instead re-booked on same-day flights, but with less optimal departure times.
We got up at the crack of dawn (which is quite early in late April), fetched Finnur’s parents and drove to the airport. This was a child-free trip, and I was one of two spouses.
Thursday 25 April 2024
Sweden / Paradox & Vasa Museums / To Iceland
[Photos taken 29 – 30 March 2024, posted online 18 August 2024. Last night was decidedly chilly, fall is approaching.]
Black Friday is a public holiday in Sweden so everybody was available for a trip into Stockholm. We found a fun museum to visit, and once that was done, I dragged the kids and my brother to the Vasa museum, just because it’s cool.
The following day, we cleared out of our AirBnb, drove to the airport, and flew back to Iceland.
Friday 29 March 2024
Sweden / Technology Museum / Viewing-Farm
[Photos taken 27 – 28 March 2024, posted online 17 August 2024. It’s my father-in-law’s birthday, which means the weather will be good!]
One of the staples of our city-trips, is visiting technology museums. We’d visited the same museum eight years before, but it had changed a whole lot in the intervening years. There was really just one area that I recognized!
The following day we explored a bit around where we were staying, which included visiting a “viewing-farm”.
Wednesday 27 March 2024
Sweden / Mini-Golf / Uppsala / Electric Go-Kart
[Photos taken 25 – 26 March 2024, posted online 16 August 2024. Seems like we’re in for a lovely day after heaps of rain. School starts next week.]
Our first day in Sweden was a quiet one. I hadn’t really given myself time to formally organize the trip much before we arrived, much to the consternation of some of my “we like a schedule” offspring.
Looking around, it became apparent that the Swedes are fairly “mall-oriented”. Weird entertainment things lurk in the basements of malls, so on our first day we went shopping and mini-golfing! My brother and his wife were both working while we were there, so we mostly met them in the afternoons/evenings.
Monday 25 March 2024
Grandma Turns 90 / Moving Assistance / To Sweden
[Photos taken 19 – 24 March 2024, posted online 15 August 2024. The start of this entry was written in toasty Munich, Germany, but finished in fresh-but-wet-aired Iceland.]
Life returned to normal for a short moment after returning from Brussels. The primary event that week was my grandmother turning 90 years old. It’s hard to fathom all the changes she’s seen in her long life, and even weirder to think that she’s essentially lived for double the time I’ve been alive!?!
Then it was mental and physical preparations for our upcoming Easter trip to Sweden, to visit my brother and family that moved there in 2023. Along the way, we helped another brother move into his new apartment, and I resigned from my job.
Tuesday 19 March 2024
Accidental Brussels Grand Place / To Iceland
[Photos taken 16 – 17 March 2024, posted online 02 August 2024. It’s a new month!]
The day after the concert I decided to hunt down a clothing store that I often get lucky in, and accidentally stumbled upon a whole shopping district, and the Grand Place (Grand Square)!
Dinner was quite French, and the following day I took the bus & train to the airport. The flight back to Iceland was uneventful, and the weather welcomed me home with wind and rain…
Saturday 16 March 2024
Brussels / Natural Sciences Museum / The Smile
[Photos taken 15 March 2024, posted online 30 July 2024. The rain continues… at least the plants are happy?]
It was the day of The Smile concert, but I still needed to pass the time somehow, and hanging out on the computer all day wouldn’t do. After some perusing of options, I decided to walk to the Natural Sciences Museum, to check out some impressive dinosaur-fossils.
I got to the concert venue a bit later than I’d planned to, but got a decent spot on the floor (probably about optimal sound quality wise, but I find I’ve been spoiled by the lovely acoustics of our local Harpa venue), and thoroughly enjoyed the concert.
(However, one lesson learnt: Perhaps next time that I plan on standing for a concert, don’t go on a 3 hour walking tour beforehand…)
Friday 15 March 2024
To Brussels / Royal Quarter Walkabout
[Photos taken 14 March 2024, posted online 29 July 2024. Finnur’s fifty years old today!!]
Back in Covid-times a “small English indie band” (as per Nick Cave) named Radiohead released a bunch of live concert recordings to entertain the bored masses. I’d never been much of a fan, but a few of the concerts grabbed my brain, and to this day I have about four of them “on call” depending on the type of project and energy I need at work.
Also in Covid-times, out of boredom it seems, two Radiohead members (Messieurs T. Yorke and J. Greenwood) got together with a jazzy drummer (Mr. T. Skinner) and formed The Smile.
In late 2023 they announced a tour, and on Black Friday, I decided to take advantage of low airfares and hotel discounts, and booked myself a solo-trip to Brussels to go see The Smile!
Being a “sensible person” I’d planned to fly out on a Friday morning, go see the concert that evening, before flying back early Sunday, but Icelandair had other ideas! They cancelled the Friday flight, and moved me to the Thursday flight instead, which in retrospect, was a lot more sensible!
Thursday 14 March 2024
Dublin Weekend / Volcanic Eruption / Tree Decoration
[Photos taken 15 – 22 December 2023, posted online 19 June 2024. Pouring rain outside, but did manage to build a “lid” for another veggie-box, so now two are covered.]
Finnur had spent the week in Dublin, Ireland, for work. I decided to use some of that sweet disposable income to join him for the weekend, as I’d never spent any time in Dublin, just flown in and then driven north (also for work).
A day after we returned, the ground split open an a volcanic eruption began. It would be the first of many.
As Christmas got closer, we put up and decorated a tree, as well as did other bits a bobs to prepare. Happily, snow came and covered the ground, meaning the days felt a little brighter.
Friday 15 December 2023
Trip to Finland: Day 6-7 (Shopping/Going Home)
[Photos taken 12 – 13 August 2023, posted online 31 May 2024. Eruption is still ongoing, but has quieted down a lot from the explosive start, it’s bubbling, as opposed to squirting.]
With Finnur mostly stuck in bed with his very bruised foot (warning, photo below), we decided this would be the day of shopping.
All the offspring needed clothes for winter, so I took them shopping. We began by eating breakfast at our favorite cafe, before sorting the younger two out with some clothes. Then I sent them back to the apartment with their haul, while Anna and myself kept going, having a lot more stamina for the horror that is clothes shopping.
Saturday 12 May 2023
