view of Reykjavik from our hotel

We asked for a room with a view of the old city center. We had to lean a little at the window, but we could wake up every morning and see the town, most notably Hallgrimskirkja church at the far right. And of course the clouds over the mountains. Always the clouds. It is Iceland, after all! In front of the church, right across the street from us, we could see the National Museum of Iceland. We thought that'd be a great place to start our very first day in Iceland!

The building was recently redone and is beautiful. And the exhibition, detailing Iceland's history from early settlements through modern independence, was excellent.

Did you know that, despite having Europe's oldest parliament (established in 930 AD), Iceland didn't become an independent republic until 1944? It seems that the Viking clans and chieftains, couldn't quite manage to keep the peace among themselves, so they became a part of the Norwegian, and then the Danish, kingdom. After Hitler took control of Denmark in the Second World War (and Britain moved into Iceland to keep it away from Hitler), Iceland declared itself independent. The Danish king sent them a note of congratulations.

One of the coolest things in the exhibit was a traditional one-room turf-covered house that was filled with all the things of typical country life well into this century. Like wool. One tiny room, and there's spinning wheels everywhere as well as a basket of carding near the back. If there's one thing the Icelanders did have on their tiny island, it was sheep. (Oddly, the wood for the houses was one thing they didn't have much of. Most of it was either driftwood or was imported.) So, there was wool, wool, everywhere, but the well-known Lopi sweater - the one that every tourist buys - wasn't actually introduced until the 40's.

want to learn how to say Lopi sweater in Icelandic? It's lopapeysa!

But the best part of the exhibit was the "hands-on" room, with historical costumes for dressing up like Icelanders of days gone by.

This dress looked to be about my size, so I gave it a try. It weighed a TON. That was some seriously heavy fabric, let me tell you. Once I got it on, it kinda looked great on me, which was a little depressing. To think that I was made to wear drab 17th century Icelandic peasant garb! While I was trying on this pretty little number, hubby slipped into some Viking warrior gear.

much too smiley for a Viking - that's probably a good thing

After learning about Iceland, we thought it was time we went out and saw it. We took a stroll through Reykjavik, which is a charming, little town. And cozy too....

a knitted lamppost cozy!

Our walk into town took us first past Reykjavik's lovely little lake Tjorn. Reykjavik's one landmark, the Hallgrimskirkja church, is on the far right, situated up on a hill overlooking the city. We wandered up the main street on our way there.

At the foot of the main street lies this simple, little building: the offices of the prime minister. A few days later we accidentally stumbled upon the Parliament building. I only noticed it because of a parking sign! Iceland, home to a mere 300,000 people, obviously has a small government. And Reykjavik wasn't even the seat of government until the 19th century, when they moved the parliament from a valley about 45 min west, where it was founded over 1,000 years ago. There were some problems with the original location (but more on that in a few days...).

Reykjavik, itself, was founded by Iceland's first settler, around 900 AD.

As he approached the coast after his journey over from Norway, Ingolfur threw the pillars of a special chair overboard. Tradition held that where the pillars washed ashore was the spot the gods chose for you to settle. The pillars were found a few years later at Reykjavik - literally, smoky bay (the smoke was from the steam of various hot springs). Unfortunately for Reykjavik, much better, more fertile land had been found by others elsewhere, so it wasn't really a popular destination. In fact, Ingolfur's slaves escaped rather than go there to live. (They were found, of course, and taken care of, the viking way.)

Here's Ingolfur Arnarson on a sad little hill across the street from the government house, overlooking an as yet rather unattractive construction project on the harbor. Remember that all of Iceland is only the size of Kentucky, so when I say harbor, I mean a city square sized inlet with a couple of ships, all about four blocks away.

A much better view than Ingolfur's can be found from Hallgrimskirkja. We went all the way up to the top, which is to say, the 8th floor. (After taking the elevator up to the Top of the Rock in NYC just a few weeks ago, this elevator trip was a leeetle bit anticlimactic.) But it was still plenty high to see all of the old city with its vibrant colored buildings and tiny harbor. Is cute, no? We likey-ed.

Stay tuned all this next week for more posts about our trip to Iceland!