Minnesota Girl Encounters a Viking

Iceland is one of my favorite countries. Far less icy than its name implies, this island nation is vast and open and exquisite. I especially love the light in Iceland, which has a magical quality that is soft and eerie by day and then, on Aurora nights, dazzling beyond description.

On a recent trip, I joined a small ship that circumnavigated the entire country. We snowmobiled across glaciers, were gobsmacked by pulsing Aurora Borealis and made it to the peak of an inactive volcano.

Our group traveled to isolated fishing villages splashed in primary colors, and met the equally colorful folks who wintered over in them. A part of me envied their courage and community spirit. The kids had roaring confidence that came from living off the leash in a wild place.

Trips like this tend to draw more intrepid travelers and, on this voyage, we were blessed with a ship full of certifiables who took full advantage of the open bar. The most dangerous among us held nightly, vicious games of Scrabble. 

One of us was rather good.

On the afternoon that our ship reached the apex of Iceland, we were loaded into zodiacs and whisked away to a small island inside the Arctic Circle.  Not to be deterred, we brought along the Scrabble game. I have a treasured picture of four of us, sitting on a blanket under a sky that never set, warming ourselves with spiked hot chocolate as we played our last polar game.

One of us was rather good.

Our voyage ended in the capital city of Reykjavik where a group of us headed to the famous geothermal site, The Blue Lagoon. We slid into the 102-degree Fahrenheit pool, slathered ourselves with white silica mud masks and floated like a family of Kabuki dolls.

Fortunately, I brought my cell phone along, tucked inside a ziplock bag. I heard a giggle and then looked up to see the happy Viking in the picture above. When I raised my phone to take her picture she howled and then rocked this pose. Her grin says everything about our splendid adventure to the land of fire and ice.