Monday September 15, Flying Home
And just like that, our phenomenal vacation in Iceland was nearly over. Our flight was not until 1700, so we had a free morning and early afternoon to catch some last minute sights in Reykjavík, or not.
The sky was largely still dark when I awoke in Reykjavík at 0530. There was no chance that I would go back to sleep. My mind was already running the checklist of things to do today: shower, pack, find coffee, buy sandwiches for the plane, take our suitcases to the car in the parking garage, return to the apartment to finish packing our carry-on bags, check out, take our carry-ons to the car, wander around until our lunch reservation, eat a leisurely final meal in Iceland, retrieve our car from the garage, drive to Keflavík, fill up the gas tank, return the rental car, shuttle to the airport, clear security, and locate our gate.
After our bad experience with coffee yesterday, we vowed to do something different and having time to kill before heading to the airport, we wanted to have a sit-down breakfast. I had already read about and seen Sandholt just a block or so from our apartment, so I suggested it. The sky was gray, but not raining, for our 3-minute walk to the family-run bakery on Laugavegur.
Immediately inside the door, we were intrigued by incredible looking pastries and breads as we waited to be seated. At our table in the comfortable space, we sat back to relax while waiting for our food and coffees to arrive.
 |
| Impressive Pastry Counter at Sandholt |
 |
| Delicious Cinnamon Roll |
 |
| Lamb Tinga Sandwich: OK Lamb, Dynamite Bread Closer to Barbacoa Than Tinga |
As we were eating, a young woman came in and requested a corner table. Ann and I watched slack-jawed as this apparent "influencer" reset the table to her liking so that she could take photographs. The nerve of some people. After we settled our breakfast bill, we went to the takeout counter and got two sandwiches to eat on the plane. They proved inexpensive and delicious.
After Sandholt, we walked around the block the opposite way going back to the apartment, There, I gathered our two bags and took them to the car a few blocks away, rolling them right down the middle of the pedestrian-only Laugavegur, keeping a sharp eye out for the delivery trucks servicing the businesses along this busy street.
 |
| Love the Iris We Spotted Headed Back to the Apartment |
In less than 10 minutes, I was back at the apartment where we relaxed until check out time at 1100. We schlepped our carry-ons to the car on the way to see a few last-minute sights before our 1130 lunch reservation. From the garage, we walked down to the waterfront to see the Sun Voyager sculpture and then towards the port past the Harpa Concert Hall to the restaurant.
 |
| Sun Voyager Sculpture Evoking Viking Ship |
 |
| Harpa Concert Hall and Conference Center |
I booked an 1130 table at Messinn thinking that we would have a long and leisurely lunch before hitting the road for the 45-minute drive to the airport in Keflavík. It was a difficult assignment to locate a sit-down restaurant near the parking garage that is open on Monday for lunch. Seafood restaurant Messinn seemed to fit the bill and had decent enough reviews.
Our experience started going south from the beginning as the server told us that of the eight fish species on the menu, they only had two: cod and char. Given that restriction, our order will be no surprise. We started with an appetizer of smoked char which we enjoyed. But we found the sweet brown rye bread (rúgbrauð) on which it was served to be too sweet compared to other versions we have eaten in the past three weeks.
 |
| Smoked Arctic Char on Rúgbrauð |
For entrées, Ann ordered plokkfiskur, a mix of cod, mashed potatoes, and béchamel. It was fairly light as plokkfiskur goes and tasty enough but not the filet of cod that Ann had wanted. I ordered the char. The menu did not specify that the char was charred but that is how it came, fried into submission, dry and unappetizing, a sad end for a beautiful fish. All the other char on plates near us was similarly butchered. We left disenchanted long before we had planned, our last meal in Iceland not worth the money and detracting from our overall experience.
 |
| OK Plokkfiskur |
 |
| Charred Char, Dried Out and Terrible |
From the restaurant near the harbor, we walked the few blocks up the hill to the parking garage to get our car out of hock and start for the airport. Paying the fee was a non-event. Once we exited, the license plate reader did its job and our ticket was closed out and paid automatically via the Parka app. The trip to the airport was uneventful, but I was surprised to see so many vehicles driving at 120+ kph. I suppose it is no different to the road to any American airport, but in a country where most people kept within 5-10kph of the speed limit, it was a bit of a surprise.
After getting gas near the rental car center, we went to drop off the car. The instructions I got about returning the car were "behind the building, you'll see it." So, driving behind the building past the garage bays, we did see a sign that indicated returns to the right. After turning right, there was no apparent or signed return area, so I pulled to the sidewalk and left it there for them to figure out where to put it, no employees in evidence. We retrieved our bags and headed for the office, leaving the keys in the car as is common practice in the U.S.
In the office, the young guy behind the counter said, "keys?" when we told him we were returning. I got the biggest eye-roll and attitude, like I am the dumbest human alive, when I told him they were in the car. Apparently he had more attitude with Ann while I took my time in retrieving the keys. Anyway, what do I care what some barely-old-enough-to-shave kid from Croatia or Slovenia or wherever thinks of me? His problem, not mine. After handing him the keys, he said, "That's it." so we walked outside to wait for the next shuttle to the terminal. The shuttle driver was a really charming guy from Firenze and the direct opposite of the kid at the counter.
We left the rental car center at 1400 and we were through security at 1430. Meanwhile, I received an alert that our flight was delayed 30 minutes, from 1700 to 1730. Because we were so early to the airport, our gate was not posted, so after going through outbound Passport Control, we looked for a place to sit out the wait. Oddly, KEF does not have seating at each gate, rather it has a few waiting areas scattered throughout the terminal. Those waiting areas do not have enough seating for the number of passengers, nothing close to sufficient.
Boarding at KEF is a damned chaotic circus. Each gate has a line and the order in which you are in line is the order in which you board. There are no boarding groups or other means of filling the plane in an orderly fashion. So, it is a rush to get on line long before the flight so that space for carry-on luggage will still be available on boarding. Worse, after scanning boarding passes, passengers merely move from a line in the terminal hallway to a sardine can-sized preboarding area that is too small to hold all the passengers on a modern jet. We stood on line for an hour and then another 15 minutes before they let us climb the stairs and enter the jetway to board, an infuriating process.
The plane, a brand new A321, pushed back 40 minutes late, but arrived in Seattle only 10 minutes late thanks to a decent tailwind. We cleared Passport Control, Customs, and TSA to arrive at our gate 30 minutes before boarding for Bend. The TSA lines were vacant thanks to our 1800 arrival. The trip home was uneventful and our shuttle dropped us off at the front door at 2200, 0500 by our body clocks used to being on GMT. It would take me a week to get back on PDT, the jetlag worse coming back than going.
And that, save a final wrap-up post, is the saga of our once-in-a-lifetime trip to Iceland.
No comments:
Post a Comment