Tour of Iceland - Part I

I joined an OAT tour to Iceland with Tom, Janice, and Janet from Oct 5 - 15. The tour focused on the East, north, and south coast, starting from Reykjavik.  "vik" means Bay.  Later we went to Davik in the north where we did whale watching.  We did lodging in four cities:

Reykjavik, Stykkisholmur (on the Snaefellsnes peninsula), Akurevri (the second largest region) in the north, Selfoss in the south, and finally returned to Reykjavik.

The day we arrived Reykjavik was windy and rainy.  But Tom, Janet and I followed our tour guide John Spencer to take a bus tour toward downtown in the rain.  A few picture I took showed rain drops covering the view.
The new performing art center at the water front: Harpa concert house:

 Waterfront:

 Old settlement house:

 Square in front of the city hall where the "pot and pans" revolution took place:

 City Hall:

The second day we drove along the coast north bound to the Snaefellsnes peninsula, and pass the agricultural land of the country:

 The first time I heard "Texas marshmallow" used to describe the hay stacks in the field:

A wonderful rainbow accompanied our bus for a while!

The first fall we stopped by to see is the Lava Fall:

They say if you want to understand Icelanders, we first have to learn their Sagas.  Iceland is famous for its Sagas.   Snorri Sturluson, born in 1179 and died in 1240 was an Icelandic historian, poet, and politician. He was elected twice as law speaker at the Icelandic parliament.  He was believed to be the author of the Egil Saga.  We visited where Snorri used to live and the (thermo) pool he used to sit by and ponder:

A museum of Snorri.  A statue of Snorri is shown on the right.



A Hobbit house and two lambs are also seen on the ground:

All day long, we saw broad sky and wide land, fields and farms, Texas marshmallows, horses, sheep, lonely, lonely ranches.....but hardly any people!

Egil, a main saga character is deeply entrenched inside the psyche of Icelandic men - A murderer and a poet, strong on the outside but fragile on the inside.

We had a picnic outside the little museum.  Tom and Janet took a walk of the little town, while I went to take a picture of the above sculpture overlooking the bay where supposedly Egil and his nanny jumped into to escape.

We were able to see some more scenery of the peninsula, and paid a visit to a shark processing farm in Bjarnarhofn,  before checking in our hotel in Stykkisholmur.

Shark meat being cured.

Fresh sharp meat is poisonous with high urea and ammonia, and had to be buried in ice for a period of time.  The cured shark meat is consumed with vodka or rye bread.  It is more tolerable to me when consumed with rye bread.

Our hotel in Stykkisholmur sits on a hill facing an interesting church and the bay:

~~~~To be continued~~~

Mt. Rainier in My Face!

KC and I have discussed to hike in Dolomite this year, but did not proceed with the plan.  I invited her to hike with me in Mt. Rainier instead.  Ed graciously agreed to play host for us.  So I flew directly from Calgary to Seattle, where KC met up with me in the airport.  Ed and Karen picked us up, and started a very nice 7 days tour of Yakima and Mt. Rainier NP.  Ed cooked a very nice dinner for us:

We head out the first thing next morning to hike in the Bear Creek Trail: One can see a lot of lupines and Indian paint brush:

 

Andrea invited us to her house for dinner.  She served sparkling wine, cool cantaloupe soup, fresh corn, salad with beef strips, and ice cream topped with frozen fresh blueberries.  We sat on the porch looking at her lovely garden.  Very charming evening!

Ethan happen to be visiting Ed.  I have not seen him for so long.  He has grown up to such as tall big guy.  How time flies:

 The second hike was to the south side of Mt. Rainier.  A few Cascadians joined us.

 Monica standing on the bridge above the Christine Falls:

 Ed climbed up to pick some Salmon berries

 They are a bit tart.  But we also found some small purple huckleberries, which were very sweet.

We also saw these interesting woody mushrooms:

 Fern crossing the bridge on our way to the Comet Falls.

 The Comet Fall:

 

We then passed Vam Tramp Camp and reached the Mildred Point to have lunch.  The trail to Mildred Point climbs at a moderate grade through the forest, sprinkled with beargrass long past bloom. Also one can see the petite bistorts dotted along the way.

We reached the Mildred to break for lunch.  Mt. Rainier is right at our face.  This is the south side view of Mt. Rainier. A dried up glacier can be seen below too.

We took it easy the following day and did museum visiting and wine tasting:

 KC enjoyed the wine tasting very much.

 Pretty view outside the Windy Point winery:

 And we tasted the sparkling wines too:

The third hike was to the Nachess Peak:
We crossed the bridge acrss the highway:

 Lupines were glorious:

 It is just so beautiful!!

The fourth hike we did was to the third Burrough, starting from the Sunrise Visitor Center.

The trail we were on:

 The Frozen Lake behind:

 Ed was teaching us how to walk on snow path:

 Heading toward the Third Burrough:

 Having lunch on the Third Burrough:

 The Mt. Rainier from the north side view

 A nice butterfly joined us during lunch:

 KC on the snow path:

 On the way back to the Sunrise Visitor Center for the back side:

While in Yakima, we really enjoyed the sun rise and moon rise from Ed's deck:

ABTU Canadian Rocky Reunion

David and Sandra are the host for a total of 11, including the host, members reunion.  We toured Calgary, Banff, Jasper, and Lake Lousie for a wonderful 10 days period.  There was only one day of Bridge and Marjon playing due to the rain.  I thought of Sylvia a lot on this trip as she was with some of my Chin friends on this same route last time.  The following picture of me overlooking Lake Peyton is especially in memory of Sylvia.

I organized some pictures for the group, and it is shown in the following link:

https://drive.google.com/open?id=0BzEdiAkHJnp9Qkd1a2hxRmVwQWM