Leif Erikson contemplates a Voyage of Discovery…
There is no real evidence that Eiriksson discovered America but his statue faces to the west as though in expectation of belated recognition for his achievement. Today he looked out over Viking skies full of Nordic drama with mountainous clouds as big and as grey as a medieval cathedral.
Posted in Cathedrals, Europe, History, Norway, Travel, World Heritage
Tagged Culture, Leif Ericson, Leif Erikson Day, Life, Photography, postaday, Reykjavik, Travel, Vikings
Leif Ericson, Reykjavik
Outside the cathedral in Reykjavik is a statue of Leifur Eiriksson who was an Icelander born about 970 and who explored the oceans and the lands west of Iceland, establishing colonies in Greenland and Newfoundland and who according to legend reached America long before Christopher Columbus or Amerigo Vespucchi. The statue was a gift from the American Government in 1930 to mark Iceland’s one thousandth anniversary and October 9th is commemorated as Leif Ericson day in the United States. The date is not associated with any particular event in Leif Erikson’s life, it was chosen because the ship Restauration sailing from Stavanger in Norway, arrived in New York Harbour on October 9th 1825 at the start of the first organized immigration from Norway to the United States.
Posted in History, Iceland, Travel, USA, Vikings, World Heritage
Tagged Culture, Leif Ericson, Life, Photography, postaday, Reykjavik
Now we began to appreciate fully the landscape and as the sun began to appear through broken clouds we stopped for a while to enjoy the spaciousness of the countryside. First we found some Icelandic ponies that are unique to this country and then stopped for magnificent views of the River Sog with the sun hugging the horizon and shooting shafts of brightness through the heavy clouds.
Posted in Europe, Iceland, Natural Environment
Tagged Geysir, Golden Circle, Jules Verne, Life, Photography, Reykjavik, Travel
Sólfar Suncraft, Reykjavik
It was only a short walk to the seafront and we found our way to the promenade and walked along to the Sólfar Suncraft, which is a stainless steel 1986 sculpture of a Viking long boat that occupies an impressive spot overlooking the bay and Mount Esja on the other side. Iceland is proud of its Viking heritage because the country was first colonised by Norwegians in the ninth century and the first permanent settler was a man called Ingólfur Arnarson who landed here in 871 and named the location Reykjavik, which means smoky bay, on account of the plumes of the steam that were coming from the nearby hot springs.
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Posted in Europe, History, Iceland, Natural Environment
Tagged Leif Eiriksson, Life, Photography, Reykjavik, Sólfar Suncraft, Travel
The trip to Iceland was eighteen months ago when the country appeared to be riding the crest of a wave, top of the United Nations index on human development and according to a study at Leicester University the fourth happiest place to live in the world. Iceland had one of the richest economies in Europe, but it had a problem because its three main private sector banks had become so large that their assets amounted to more than ten times the gross domestic product of the country and things have gone spectacularly wrong.
Today the economy is in unbelievably horrible shape and the three banks, Kaupthing, Landsbanki, and Glitnir are in receivership. The stock market has lost 90% of its value, the central bank is technically insolvent and a mountain of liabilities dwarfs its modest pile of assets. The krona has lost more than half its value. GDP is expected to drop by 10% in 2009, and unemployment will probably hit a 40-year high. The Government of the country is in meltdown and in January the Prime Minister resigned and called a general election.
Following negotiations underway with the IMF since October 2008, a package of $4.6bn was agreed on 19th November, with the IMF loaning $2.1bn and another $2.5bn of loans and currency swaps from Norway, Sweden, Finland and Denmark. In addition, Poland has offered to lend $200M and the Faroe Islands have offered 300M Danish kroner. Poland is the biggest net beneficiary of the European Union cash handout so it could probably afford to give a bit back but for the Faroe Islands it is the equivilent of the United Kingdom lending 300 billion danish kronas or 35 billion pounds! How generous is that.
Iceland retained its top spot in the index on human development in 2008 but it is doubtful it will still be there at the end of 2009 and I’m not sure just how happy they are now either. In the New Economic Foundation’s 2009 Happy Planet Index Iceland came ninety-fourth. The Icelandic króna has declined more than fifty percent against the euro. Inflation of prices in the economy is almost out of control and interest rates had been raised to eighteen percent to deal with it. The króna’s decline is reportedly only beaten by that of the Zimbabwean dollar.
The assets of Icelandic pension funds are expected to shrink by up to twenty-five percent and the Icelandic Pension Funds Association has announced that benefits will in all likelihood have to be cut in 2009. Iceland’s GDP is expected by economists to shrink by as much as 10 percent as a result of the crisis, placing Iceland in an economic depression. Inflation may climb as high as seventy-five percent by the end of the year. Unemployment has more than tripled with over seven thousand registered jobseekers (about 4% of the workforce) compared to just over two thousand at the end of August.
Iceland, which has previously always resisted membership, has also formally applied to join the European Union. The bid must now be approved by the EU, after which Iceland’s people will be asked to vote on it in a referendum. Iceland, with its tiny population of just 320,000, has traditionally been sceptical about joining because some fear that quotas could hurt Iceland’s fishing industry but many people there have warmed to the idea of membership following the devastating economic meltdown, which saw the top Icelandic banks collapse in a matter of days.
With things this bad and Iceland crying out for customers this could be a good time to take advantage and visit again. In the United States it is in the top five of bargain destinations because of the fall in the value of the Krona and as long as that keeps ahead of the prices in the shops and the restaurants that should make it nicely affordable. I hope we would still be welcome there because it does have to be said that Iceland does partly blame the United Kingdom for its economic woes because we turned down requests for assistance and then invoked anti-terrorist legislation to seize Icelandic assets.
The Iceland national tourist web site is reassuring however and says:
‘While Iceland and most other countries are currently dealing with a serious financial crisis, business in Iceland is being conducted as usual. All services – including banking services – are functioning as on any other day. Hotels, restaurants, airlines, car rentals, currency exchange facilities, offices, shops, etc. are all open for normal business.”
Visitors can be assured that they will be treated with same friendly hospitality that Icelanders have become known for throughout the travel world. There is no reason to fear that a visit to Iceland will be anything other than an enjoyable experience’.
I think I would be prepared to risk it and so are lots of others because visitor numbers from the United Kingdom have increased by 20% since September 2008 . We British know a bargain when we see one!
The signs to the attraction were a bit confusing but as we approached we could see the plumes of steam rising into the atmosphere and finally it was impossible to miss the huge structure of the power station looking like a set from a James Bond movie and we turned off the road and into the car park, which today, probably on account of the wretched weather was virtually empty.
Posted in Europe, Iceland, Travel
Tagged Blue Lagoon, Geothermal Energy, Iceland, Reykjavik
No luck with the weather and we woke to more overcast grey skies and a rather damp scene. After breakfast we walked into the city to see the parts we had missed on the first day. We had liked the Sólfar Suncraft so much the first time that we made for the seafront again and made a second visit before we walked further along the promenade towards the docks until finding our progress barred by road works we abandoned this route and turned instead towards the city centre.
Posted in Europe, Iceland, Travel
Tagged Blue Lagoon, British Airways, Iceland, Reykjavik, Vikings
The landscape was more mountainous now with deep black fissures and verdant green moss and litchen, which was a sure sign that the air was clean and free of industrial pollutants. The black granite mountains were capped with generous amounts of snow and below the frost line the ice was dripping down the side like gloss paint dribbling messily down the side of a pot.
Posted in Europe, Iceland, Travel
Tagged Þingvellir, Golden Circle, Gullfoss, Iceland, Reykjavik
The weather was a bit of a surprise because we had interpreted ‘Ice land’ rather more literally than we should have and were expecting sub zero temperatures, mountainous snow and lots of ice. What we hadn’t taken fully into consideration was the effect of the gulf stream that delivers warm water from the Caribbean directly to the south of Iceland and thereby keeps the temperature unexpectedly mild
Posted in Europe, Iceland, Travel
Tagged Geysir, Golden Circle, Iceland, Iceland Pony, Jules Verne, Reykjavik
We had been allocated a nice silver car with hobnail tyres that made a strange crunching noise that made me think at first that I had got a flat but a quick check revealed that everything was in order and the journey to the city was straightforward and uneventful. In fact the tyres were studded with aluminium rivets designed for ice and snow and we hoped that this meant that someone at the hire desk knew that the sort of weather we were hoping for was on the way.
Posted in Europe, History, Iceland, Travel
Tagged Iceland, Leifur Eiriksson, Reykjavik, Sólfar Suncraft, Vikings
