Iceland Album - Part 4

(Continued from Iceland Album - Part 3...)  It was such a beautiful day when we left Cabin Agnes and drove to Thingvellir National Park where we planned to spend the whole day hiking.  I bought the most beautiful little book at the visitor center.  I’d been hoping to find an Iceland souvenir that wasn’t the usual, and this was it. 

Thingvellir: A Walk Along Memory Lane, by Hildur Petersen and Anna Bjarnadottir, is a beautiful story of two little girls who grew up together in the park (Anna's father was Iceland's Prime Minister during the 1960's.)   The park's history and points of interest are woven together with personal memories and illustrated with sketches & photo-collages by Swiss artist, Karin Kurzmeyer. It reminded me a little bit of my flying adventure book,  and turned out to be the perfect guidebook for our day.  It was so much more interesting than just reading random facts.  I wish EVERYwhere had an accompanying guidebook as artful and special as this one!

So we started down the trail in Almannagja (All Men's Rift), and as I was looking at one of the sketches in the book I realized we were standing in the exact same place!

Thingvellir is a UNESCO World Heritage Site.  It was home to the world's first parliament waaay back in 930AD.  The park is also famous for its geology as it sits on the divide between the North American and Eurasion tectonic plates. Usually these continental seams are under the ocean, but at Thingvellir you can literally see the effect of continents moving apart.  And there we were walking right down the middle when we hiked Almannagja.  So cool.  Live Science has a great article about it HERE.

We hiked the canyon trail to the very end, then returned along the lake path, which was dotted with picturesque little summer cottages hidden in the trees. 

This one had so much glass it looked like part of the lake.

After a picnic, we hiked in the other direction back toward the visitor center, where we ended the day with ice cream (of course!)

On our last day, we had two things planned that I was sooo looking forward to:  a horseback ride, and a visit to the Blue Lagoon.  I used to ride and now I miss it, so any opportunity to get on a horse makes me happy.  The guides were amazed at the sunny weather… usually you get outfitted with galoshes and raincoats.  Not today!  The Icelandic horse has two gaits that other horses don’t: the tolt and the flying pace.  I’d been on an Icelandic horse before and there's no forgetting that tolt.  It's heaven. It feels like riding on a cloud.

Blue Lagoon's geothermal spa was the perfect treat for my sore legs after that ride!  Yes it’s kind of expensive and yes the waiting line is long, but it’s worth it just to say you’ve been.  The water is the same color as the inside of glaciers — that milky ice-blue — and there are warm spots and hot spots, and mud masks for your skin. Blue Lagoon is one of National Geographic's 25 Wonders of the World, which I thought was pretty cool.  By the time we got out we were sooo tired.

The landscape around the lagoon was surreal.  We found a giant hole to leave the kids in.  “There’s candy down there…!”

We spent our last night at a guest house in the little fishing village of Gardur.  It had a view of the sea, but I thought the view of the laundry in the wind was just as pretty.

The next morning we had a hard time getting going...

… but the reward for getting up early was being bumped up to Business Class —  sweet!  As we waved goodbye to this beautiful country, we all agreed that we definitely want to come back. Thank you, Iceland!

For those who've known me since I was twelve, yes, that's my Snuffle Bear!

If you haven't seen them yet, here are my other Iceland posts: PART 1 .   PART 2 .  PART 3

Hello, Cleveland!

It’s been awhile since that last Starfighter adventure to Port Clinton and Put-In-Bay (read the post HERE).  But the planets recently aligned for another perfect day.  “Name three places you’d like to fly today,” John said when we woke up.  Hmm... a picnic at Highland County?  Kelley’s Island camping?  Cleveland...?  Cleveland.  I'd never spent any real time in Cleveland.  The forecast showed some weather coming in from the south later in the day, but it all looked good in the north.  

I don’t know why I hadn’t thought of Cleveland before — I don’t think I realized that Burke Field — the executive airport — was so close to the city, never mind pretty much IN the city, and right on the lake.  While John took care of flight planning, I figured out what we could do when we got there.  There were the usual suspects: the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame, the Great Lakes Science Center, the aquarium.  But I don’t know, I guess I didn’t want to spend the entire day indoors.  I remembered a blog post written by Kaylah Doolan of The Dainty Squid.  A Clevelander, she wrote a “faves” post about the city which I bookmarked.  Maybe there were a few spots we could get to easily enough without a car.

We folded up the scooters, fueled up the plane, and off we went.

The lake was sooo blue, and I loved seeing the city from the air.  What a view!

The base-to-final approach was so stinkin' cool.

We fueled up, checked in at the FBO, and unfolded our transportation (the Razor A5... HIGHLY recommended for portable travel as they fold up small and speed along much faster than the scooters with smaller wheels.) Ready...set...go!

Well, sort of.  We didn’t get very far because the International Women’s Air and Space Museum was right on the field.  Had to check that out.  The exhibits were great. Could I please have this jacket?

I didn’t know this, but in 1911, Harriet Quimby became the first woman to earn a pilot’s license.  Also the first woman to fly the English Channel and also, sadly, the first woman to perish in a flying accident.

The museum had a couple early flight simulators! Can someone pleeease make a real plane that looks just like this little blue guy??!!  How cute is that!?  (It even comes with outdoor seating!)  

The history of these things is so interesting.  Their inventor, Edwin Link, was learning to fly but found training to be somewhat cost-prohibitive.  So he did what anyone else would do, obviously: he made his own simulator which operated off an organ bellows (as in, church organ) from his family's factory. In 1934 the Army Air Corps ordered a bunch of them to aid in instrument training and pretty soon, Link trainers were everywhere.  The one in my photo is the later GAT-1 model.

The IWASM is making efforts to grow and establish itself, so I highly recommend a visit!  As a fly-in destination, it's perfect, and they’ve got a lineup of great events in the works.  I was so bummed that I was going to miss the “Dress up Like Amelia” wine night, but I hope to get involved up there.

It was definitely time for lunch, so we scooted over to Townhall, near the Cleveland Clinic.  What a fabulous spot!  Everything from smoothies to sandwiches to creative entrees.  We shared a rice bowl, wanting to leave room for ice cream at Mitchell’s down the street, but when we saw the dessert menu -- holy cow! -- I rarely want EVERYthing on a dessert menu, but Townhall’s was sooo tempting!

Mitchell’s did not disappoint.  We’ve got Graeter’s and Jeni’s in Columbus, but Mitchell’s seemed like something in between.  Creamy gourmet flavors but also down-home standards.  I’m usually a straight vanilla with sprinkles kind of girl, but I tried a sample of the lavender honey and was blown away.  What a great building too: skylights and huge curved beams.  And a birds-eye view of the magical-ice-cream-making down below!

We thought we’d try a different route back to the lake, and while trying to figure out how to get to the bridge we needed, we came across this mural.  Cleveland seems to have a lot of great stuff painted on walls in places you don’t expect.

Finally found the bridge, but it was tucked down underneath all these other bridges. And where did all these hills come from?! Cleveland looks so flat from the air.  It’s a ruse.  

While scooting back along the lake, we passed the Steamship William G. Mather (everyone seems to call it the Cleveland Cliffs boat) that’s always in the harbor.  Turns out it’s part of the science museum.  It looked so tiny from the sky but giant up close!  We decided to take the tour.  I don’t know why these huge freighters fascinate me so much.  I think it’s because they’re SO big.  The ship was built in 1925 and was the "flagship of the Cleveland-Cliffs Steamship Company fleet until 1952."  The Mather mostly carried iron ore from Lake Superior down to the steel mills of the lower lakes.

Walking through the crew and guest quarters was like stepping back in time.  I felt like a ghost from the future.  We were the only ones aboard by the end of the day too.

It was still hot at 5pm.  By the time we left the ship (basically a giant solar oven) I was wilting.  It was time to get back to the airport anyway.  (... via a short stop on the lawn of the R&R Hall of Fame.)

I SO enjoyed my first real visit to Cleveland, although I felt like we hadn’t explored much of the city.  True, it hadn’t been the plan to wind up in two museums, but I'm so glad we did, and there will be plenty of next times.  Cheers, Cleveland!  See you again soon!

* Read more Flying Adventure posts HERE  * Find out more about the International Women's Air and Space Museum HERE

Iceland Album - Part 3

(Continued from Iceland Album - Part 2) From the Solheimajökull glacier we drove back towards Reykjavik, but turned north just after Selfoss.  I’d found a perfect little cabin via Airbnb across from Lake Apavatn that would give us a cozy, quiet place to call home for two nights, with easy drives to the landscapes along the Golden Circle, and close proximity to an end-of-the-day treat:  the Fontana baths at Laugarvatn.

The little cabin was even cuter than in the online photos.  Agnes, our host, had cut fresh lupines for the table and left fruit and other goodies for us.  I think she also arranged for the sunniest days in Iceland ever.

We’d stopped for some provisions on the way… I’ve never been so happy to cook spaghetti and sauce from a jar! Easy, inexpensive comfort food - yay!  And yeah, the kids fought over who was going to sleep in the loft (because of course they wouldn’t share it), but nothing was going to ruin my happy place.  John went for his morning runs along the horse trails and I spent time on the porch with tea and my journal.  Next time we will rent the cabin for our entire stay - it was HEAVEN!

We started our Golden Circle drive with a visit to the Gullfoss waterfall (along with every other tourist).  I am not a fan of crowds, but how could we be this close to an Icelandic icon and not go?  I suppose it’s like some of our own more popular national parks: there is no such thing as solitude at Half Dome in the summer!

From Gulfoss we backtracked to the geysers.  Geysir, the one that gave us the word “geyser” — I did not know this! —  no longer erupts regularly, but Strokkur, the one next to it, does.  I kept trying to make a photograph without every other person on the planet in it, but was always foiled.  Then, however, as I was muttering and cursing, Strokkur erupted out of the blue and I got totally soaked.  Serves me right :-\ 

I did, however, manage to get a couple photos I liked of John and the kids disappearing in the steam...

I love sundials.  This one, partway up the hill overlooking the geysers, was so beautiful...

While I did not bring my camera to the Fontana baths, trust me, they were a perfect end to a day full of walking and people:  quiet, and right on the shore of Laugarvatn Lake.  While I wish we'd had the time to find some secret hot springs in the middle of the wilderness somewhere, this would do nicely!

And then, ahhh, a home to come back to.  We love you, Cabin Agnes!

If you missed it, click to read PART 1 and PART 2