Akureyri, Icelands 2nd city - city, and also referred to as such by my brother, but Pip objected to that, so Phil fired back with municipality ?? - by population (but to then get really, really picky Wiki says that as a municipality Akureyri is only the 4th largest in Iceland ???) .
We didnt travel far at all today, just one brief out of town trip, but still filled a good day (though unfortunately the main museum we wanted to spend time at, Into The Arctic, seemed to have permanently closed).
We treated ourselves to breakfast today at TripAdvisors No 1 - waffles for Pip, porridge / raisins / cinnamon sugar for Paul. Delicious.
This morning we did manage to get into the church. Consecrated in 1940 is was designed by architect Grudjon Samuelsson who also designed that church in Reykjavk. Fairly plain, Lutheran, but with some lovely, old English stained glass plus Icelandic glass too.
If we had visited and blogged 6 or 7 years ago we would be telling you how the English glass was originally in Coventry Cathedral but removed
for safe keeping before the war, and then somehow found for sale in London by an Icelander and bought for this church. Because that is how the story went.
However, fresh research in 2014 found that the Coventry Cathedral part of that story was a fallacy and that the glass probably originated from some London church. What is proven is that it was made in Exeter.
The area around the port had many information boards explaining a lot about the history of Old Akureyri and info about many of the old houses - around 100 to 150 years old - which are still standing. Akureyri was first mentioned in 1602, and later in the day we saw a very early map which showed 2 noticeable buildings, a couple of small dwellings and a sheep pen. This first settlement, 1778, was when Danish merchants were first allowed winter residence. Major development was around 1900. The buildings from that time are now all protected.
About a mile beyond that area we had seen a landmark on the map - Giant Viking Beer Can. We were up for it, it added distance to Pips walking target. The disappointment on arrival
was to find that whilst large it was not giant to the factory silos it was near to - why had they not just painted one of those? And it was only half a can anyway.
Into the car for a quick trip to The Christmas House. On arrival Pip declared this to be the best part of the holiday but pretty certain this was a fib. Some nice hand made things but the prices were awful even by Iceland standards. The separate gift shop was weird. It was full of mostly imported goods including Staffordshire jams and preserves, Cornish blue ware pottery, flavoured coffees from Darlington, hand bags from St Ives, Cornwall, Wilkin & Son preserves.....
We walked out from town to the Akureyri Museum unsure as to whether it was open or not. There was conflicting info about this on the boards nearby. But, turned out it was.
And a large room about the music scene in Akureyri which seemed totally misplaced, especially as it seemed to focus on the 1950s.
The Toy Museum - but it wasnt until we were leaving and asked that the reception lady told us that had closed for the winter.
And an homestead /farm museum 20 miles north of Akureyri (wrong side of fjord/wrong direction for us) that at this time of year wasnt open until 1pm Saturday.
Today and tomorrow are designed to take small chunks at a time on the journey on Monday to the far reaches of the Westfjords.
Rather than the direct route west we headed to the furthest reaches northwards, with some geocaching on the way.
First stop at Hjalteyri where we watched a rickety, old, wooden, former fishing vessel whale watching trip depart. We have chosen not to fit one in on this trip as we are a) not convinced that
its the best viewing season, b) not liking the thought of the current weather out there, and c) any trip was almost inevitably going to pale against our Hawaii whale trip.
