Not the Cheese Town

After Reims, we had reservations at a chateau in a town called, "Cambremer" which, of course, is a bunch of kilometers (as in a lot of miles times 0.6) from the town of "Camembert".

The drive was long and rainy. When we arrived in "not the cheese town", the town had been attacked by highway/sewer/electrical repairmen with heavy equipment. As far as we could tell, they set up their equipment at all points of the cute little village and started digging at the same time in a "shot-gun start". They then left for a Bank Holiday. The townspeople could have taken black and white photographs of their village and posted them as "Cambremer - 1945."

The address of our chateau was "Route du Cadran", which is kind of like saying you live on Broadway Avenue, but not giving any particulars. We found Route du Cadran in "not the cheese town" and started up. Like many small country villages, it was cute, there were rock walls on both sides and it was only wide enough to accommodate one small car and one very skinny, cautious pedestrian. We twisted around a couple of corners and came to a warning traffic sign "Route Barree" - this did not bode well.

However, we were tired and hungry (and I was a bit thirsty), so we would probably have driven down a large aisle of a grocery store if it was available (with Karen saying, "watch out for the cheese display" and Mrs. Tom Tom saying, "At the meat counter, turn right and then proceed to the second exit"). We pressed on, ignoring the sign and going over a number of bumps and holes and around idle equipment. After we had been on "Route du Cadran" for some time, Mrs. Tom Tom stated with satisfaction that "We had arrived". If that was the case, we were sleeping with cows. It was clear to us that Mrs. Tom Tom was just tired and cranky and wanted the trip to be over, who could blame her?

We drove for awhile further and then started to think, "had we missed it?" "Is it just a small chateau with a little driveway?" We turned back, went down the hill over the bumps and holes and around the idle equipment and determined that we hadn't missed it. So we re-turned back and went back up the hill, over the bumps and holes, etc..., got back to where we thought we had driven too far and drove further. Finally, around a corner, was a sign, indicating that Chateau les Bruyeres was just a little ways further.

We came to it and turned down a lovely tree-lined road that guided us to the chateau, we had really arrived! I could sense Mrs. Tom Tom sulking in the background.

The place was lovely, we had a wonderful dinner with all sorts of apple products. In this area of France, they make apple jams, butters, desserts, ciders, aperitifs, wines, champagnes, brandies, etc... I'm pretty sure they can make anything with apples. I also imagine that the people in this area might view apples like we view zucchini, great at the beginning of the season, but when the hell does the stuff run out? The William Tell story would make a lot of sense in this area, he was just trying to do something different with apples. In any event, I had a sampling of "apple-stuff" and nodded appreciatively. They wanted us to stock up on bottles, boxes and jars, but we declined.

We were there for a couple of nights, so the next day we decided to drive to the town of Bayeux. To get there, we had to drive back through "not the cheese town". The workers had returned from their Bank Holiday and at this point the "Route Barree" meant there was a large piece of equipment which took up the whole road, from the rock wall on one side to the rock wall on the other. We turned around and went off on a side road, figuring we would get into trouble somewhere and Mrs. Tom Tom would figure a way to get us back. It worked, sort of. We wound up and down single lane farm roads, fortunately not meeting any cars, trucks, horses or large birds until we got to wide enough spot. Mrs. Tom Tom eventually came to life and guided us back to civilization.

We finally made it to Bayeux. The town was lovely, with winding cobblestone roads and a beautiful cathedral.

It also had an Irish pub that served Guinness on tap and excellent fish and chips, so all was right with the world!!!!

We toured the Bayeux Tapestry, which was incredible! This was a 230-foot long tapestry which told the story (the Norman version) of how and why William the Conqueror conquered England in 1066. It was while Wild Bill was still alive, so it was 900+ years old. The church in Bayeux would bring it out every year and display it for the townspeople for a couple of weeks, probably the 11th century equivalent of HBO.

We ambled back to Not the Cheese Town, had a lovely dinner and some more apple products and called it a day.

Easter Sunday

Easter Sunday started with clear sky and the sun shining, a wonderful beginning to a great day!

We got up and shuffled around the room, drinking our insta-coffee. The French have wonderful hot water pots that act like thermo-nuclear devices in heating up water in nano-seconds. In the hotel coffee world, however, they are still back with Mrs. Olson and Folgers, only not quite as tasty.

We breakfasted downstairs in the hotel. The buffet was quite good, with a wider and fresher assortment than we found in Smorgasbord-Land. No sardines, though, which was a pity.

From there we walked to Reims’ Notre Dame Cathedral. It was easier to find than the prior day, which was more of a safari, “I think we turn right.” “That doesn’t feel right to me, let’s go left.” “The girl at the desk pointed to here on the map, let’s go this way.” “The girl at the desk couldn’t find the elevator, let’s go this way.” Actually, with the narrow streets and alleys, combined with three story 17th century houses with steep roofs, it is amazing how easily you can miss a 200 foot steeple that is one block away.

The cathedral is nothing short of spectacular. It is one of those typical European edifices, built in 900 AD on a Roman site from 100 BC, burned to the ground, started construction of the current Cathedral in 1201, mostly constructed through 1350 AD, but building still not quite finished, architect arguing about change orders for the vaulted ceilings. It was the site of numerous coronations of French kings, Henry V of England showed up, Joan of Arc was there, the Germans marched through it several times and now the Barnums have arrived, all in historical order.

We celebrated Easter service at the cathedral, which included Gregorian chanting by the choir and beautiful music from the huge church organ. It was a wonderful service.

From there we walked to the “Salle de Rendition” which is a museum in an old brick school house that served as the headquarters for General Eisenhower and his staff in World War II after D-Day through the end of the war and is the site where the German military staff formally surrendered. It is a simple, but very moving, place. You actually get to see the map room, with the table and chairs where the surrender took place, name plates for the participants on the back of the chairs.

We were feeling a bit hungry and thirsty, so we made our way to one of the town squares near our hotel, found a nice table outside and proceed to have a meal of crepes and champagne. Sitting there in the sun, sipping champagne with Karen was pretty much idyllic, even eclipsing my daydream of the peeled grapes and girls in togas (“You’ve had enough grapes, Gary, send the nymphs home.”). We ambled our way back to the hotel and promptly fell asleep, the afternoon nap being one of our vacation treasures.

That evening, we were booked for dinner at L'assiette Champenoise, a Michelin Guide, two star rated restaurant. I was checking the map for the location relative to our hotel and discovered what appeared to be a pretty easy route of about 2.2 kilometers, or a little less than a mile and a half, in “normal distance”. We had already walked a bit, so the choice was a taxi or driving. Karen, not hearing the eerie music in the background (the music you hear in horror movies when the audience is yelling, “stay out of the cellar!”), said “let’s drive”.

Driving in France has been pretty pleasant. We have a GPS device called a “Tom Tom” which Karen is very adept at using. You plug in your destination and follow the directions, all quite nice. Unfortunately, the Tom Tom works off maps loaded in the computer which are not updated (they are in the US and Canada, but not Europe). Reims is a sea of one-way streets, alleyways and dead-ends and it recently installed a city train system which has apparently caused a lot of rerouting, none of it known to Mrs. Tom Tom (since it is a lady’s voice telling us to “take the third exit on the fourth roundabout ahead”).

We started off well enough, though from my limited knowledge of the town, I thought we were supposed to turn right after leaving the hotel. Mrs. Tom Tom said, “left, no right, wait, no, go left.” We should have turned her off, parked the car and hailed a taxi then.

Mrs. Tom Tom guided us through a series of turns and we came up to a bridge crossing the river which she told us to get on, except the bridge was covered in train tracks with trains and clearly marked that cars were not allowed. I executed a quick turn and started to head back the way I thought we should have gone in the first place. What followed was a series of negotiations between Karen and me, “What do you think, left or right, I think left.” “Left will take us back where we were, let’s go right.” Meanwhile, in the background, Mrs. Tom Tom was “recalculating” and trying to send us to our deaths back on the “train bridge”. We dove into a mire of twists and turns and went down a narrow alleyway, coming into a four-way intersection in which all of the other three directions had a sign indicating that you couldn’t go that way. It was like one of those riddles where there is no way out and you have to figure out how it’s done. Straight ahead, a few blocks in the distance, we could see additional traffic which appeared to be moving cross-wise, and there were no cars in that particular road where we weren’t supposed to go, so Karen said, “let’s go that way, but fast.”

The nice thing about Reims is that they have a lot of streets that have been closed to cars and only allow foot traffic, making it very safe and peaceful. We have driven down several of them and they are lovely. Of course, our Renault being the size it is, we thought Karen could have got out and pushed it and people might have thought it was a baby carriage.

From there, we continued to execute a series of twists and turns, backed out of several one-way streets and then came out into a lovely square which looked vaguely familiar. It was, it was where our trip had started. At that moment, even Mrs. Tom Tom got quiet, though my wife said, “F%@!, I think I’m going to cry.” I’m not sure why, but it is at those types of moments, that confidence and clarity come to me, so I cheerily said, “I know where we are now, we can make it!” I drove on.

Now, I had allotted a little less than 30 minutes to get our car and drive the 2.2 kilometers to the restaurant and park the car. Our adventures had eaten away all of that time and Mrs. Tom Tom, who among other things tells you how far you are from your destination, had been going “2.2 * * * 3.8 * * * 1.9 * * * 3.4 kilometers” while Karen was repeating at various points, “We are going to be late.”

Undaunted, I finally came across what appeared to be a straight shot across a bridge that allowed cars over the river. It wasn’t quite that simple, as what was a straight shot became a right turn, though there was a middle section that went straight. I took it, to which Karen yelled, “Those are the train tracks!” so I started to veer to the right, “That is a curb!” When given the choice of train tracks and jumping off a curb, I recommend the curb and that is what we did. It seemed farther in our Renault and we landed with a thump. I did get comfort from those lovely three words which have taken me through all sorts of driving experiences around the world, “It’s a rental.”

We managed to continue straight after a couple of twists and came up to the restaurant. We parked in front and I handed the keys to the valet who wasn’t sure what to do with a car that size. We walked up the stairs and announced ourselves, “We are the Barnums!”

Walking into the tranquility of L'assiette Champenoise was wonderful, particularly after our just-completed trek. We were seated at a lovely table and a girl came by with a champagne cart, a huge rolling ice bucket with a selection of champagne bottles for your amusement. We amused ourselves and calmed down.

We had a plateful of wonderful appetizers, including a sushi-like salmon and a wonderful potato puff. At that point, vey serenely, one of the waiters (there were a lot of them) arrived with the menu. The menu was a sea of French, with references to truffe noire, vin jaune, jus de cuisson, Sainte Jacques, Phillipe Oliverier, pommes and confits. Since there was no English version, we had our waiter translate, the best he could, what the choices were. In the end, as it usually does, it came down to the universal question, “chicken or beef”? We took the beef.

The waiter was followed by the wine steward. I have seen wine lists and wine books, but he brought us a wine encyclopedia. It was a single book, but they could have legitimately brought it out in several volumes. There would have been a volume of just champagne, and with the other wines, the list wouldn’t have been red or white, it would have included entries like – Bourdeaux – Volumes 1 and 2, etc...

L'assiette Champenoise is a “little” on the expensive side, as in “Let’s go have a snack at L'assiette Champenoise and not pay the mortgage this month.” It was wonderful, though.

There was a host of people seeing to our table, the head waiter, the other waiter, and then "yet another waiter", the water boy, the “most of the silverware” girl and the “rest of the silverware girl”, the clean up person, the napkin girl, the other person with the food lid so the waiter and the other person could both reveal each course at the same time, and my favorite, the wine steward. With a wine list which included entries like, “expensive”, “really expensive”, “really-really-really expensive” and “I could buy a car for that”, the wine steward noticed my deathly pallor and steered us to a wonderful and relatively affordable Bourdeaux. He then decanted it and poured for us, keeping the bottle away from the table.

I am not normally a fan of having the bottle of wine “off-stage” as most servers don’t keep pace with me. Our wine steward, however, was lovely. If we drank, sipped, or he detected some evaporation, he was there to refill our glasses. I could take this guy home with us.

Each of the courses was lovely and the pace of the meal wonderful. We had asparagus with truffle, scallops, a lovely sea bass and veal, interspersed with little “snacks”. Then the cheese boy came out with a cart full of cheeses. When he lifted the lid, the cheese smell was close to overpowering in a very good way. We sampled six different kinds of cheese, from stinky blue to mild soft brie.

Then started the dessert, which was less of a course, and more of an onslaught. There were candies, macaroons, freshly made marshmallows, chocolates and demi-tarts, but that was just the introduction to the actual dessert which was a collection of custard, candy-crust, ice cream, caramel and fresh apples. This was followed by an “ice cream mint” which pretty much put us over the top. We bagged up the leftover desserts (I don’t know how often that happens at a Michelin restaurant, but we weren’t leaving those behind) and made our way out, being greeted by the chef as we left.

The drive back was fairly straight-forward and non-eventful. I don’t know if it was the effect of the wine or the Mrs. Tom Tom finally figured out the directions, but we made it back in record time.

It was a lovely Easter!!!

Easter in Reims - Notre Dame Cathedral

"The World's Most Drinkable Address" - W. Churchill

Here we are, at the Avenue de Champagne, Epernay, the place Winston was talking about. Of course, I was also reminded of WC Fields "During one of my treks through Afghanistan, we lost our corkscrew. We were compelled to live on nothing but food and water for several days."

Below the streets of Epernay there are more than 60 miles of tunnels which run all over the place. Each champagne "house" has its own series of tunnels, packed with champagne. We toured a couple of the houses, Moët & Chandon and Mercier.

We went to Moët & Chandon (pronounced, "Mow it and Shadow") first. The house is old and spectacular, the family business dating back to the mid 1700's. The tour started with a short film posing as a documentary which basically assured us that, if we bought Dom Pergnon we might have a chance at dating Scarlett Johansson. I'm not totally clear on why they thought that would be tempting, but that was their main message (or "le message", as they say in France). They also walked us through how champagne is produced. Apparently, there are all of these grapes in the Champagne Region (or "region de Champagne"), which are in the beautiful French countryside on vines. Then, all of sudden, voila!! We have bottles of champagne and Scarlett is squirting champagne bottles all over the place with a big smile and men are wearing tuxedos while women are in lovely gowns. It was "très instructif".

The Mercier Champagne house starts with the mandatory brief silly video ("le video stupide"), extolling the virtues of champagne and why we should buy more to feel a kinship with rich people. They then take you to the ascenseur (or "elevator") which is described by the Epernay Tourism Board as "The panoramic elevator leading to the Mercier vaults is a real attraction all by itself." It's not. It has the silly feel of the Disneyland Animatronic Lincoln without the realism. However, it is the way to get to the cellars, which are fantastic! In Mercier's cellars, you get into an electronic train which takes you on quite a long journey through piles and piles of champagne bottles.

The amount of champagne in these cellars is daunting. Moët & Chandon produces 26 million bottles a year. I didn't count them, but they all seemed to be there. Each tunnel goes forever, turns and then goes forever again. Every thirty or forty feet in the tunnel, there is a side chamber, which is huge in itself and filled to six feet or more, going back twenty to forty feet or more, with bottles of champagne. It brings tears to your eyes and a mild tingling to your liver.

There is one problem you begin to notice as you go on these tours. The combination of moisture and age has brought a great deal of mold to these tunnels. It may be good for cheese, but it is a bit tough on the lungs. You don't notice it at first, but by the end of the day after touring several of these champagne houses, you found yourself coughing quite a bit and your mouth and throat felt like they were a little bit furry and green. I'm not sure how the regular workers take it spending a lot of time down there. Perhaps liberal washings of the throat with champagne will help. We are trying that now.

All and all, we heartily approve of Epernay, its tunnels and all of its bottles!!!

Vive la France!!

We are in France!

The flight was uneventful and smooth (pretty much; Karen has a more detailed report on actual turbulence, wind speed, altitude and weather generally - I usually limit my inquiries to, "may I have a vodka?" - the vodka on this flight was smooth, therefore, no events).

We collected our bags and looked for someone to whom we could present our passport. There were no takers, so we went to the Hertz counter.

After getting our keys, we went to the car, upon which Karen noted, "This is not a Mercedes." I replied, "It is a Renault, it's French - they said we had a class of car within this type, but it might be a different make and model." However, she was correct, it was not a Mercedes. On the plus side, it was small, tinny and made a lot of noise on acceleration, all the things you look for in a French car. On the negative side, it was not a Mercedes. We are plugging along in our "Not-a-Mercedes" car, revving up South of any speed limits which are posted above 100 km/hour more. The car is game for anything, with a lot of spirit, and we have only been passed by all wheeled vehicles and half of the people on foot. Next time, we'll stick with German engineering.

Having just left Iceland, we marvelled at the scenery in France as we drove towards the Champagne region. There was grass, trees, a few flowers, and colors other than gray and brown. We felt like Dorothy, freshly arrived from Kansas to colorized Oz.

We made it to our destination and checked in at the l’Hôtel Jean Moët in Epernay, France.

This place is seriously wonderful!!!

It is central, the bed is amazingly comfortable and they pour champagne like water, only more often!!!

For me, however, the topper was the shower.

For a lot of people who travel, it is the bed, the temperature, the room service, the toilets, the location. For me, it is the shower. I will forgive a host of sins if the shower is acceptable, all other problems wash away. Europe takes "shower issues" to a new level, including small wall-mounted heaters (some of which you need to plug coins), bathtubs with a shower head attachment and bathtubs with nothing like a shower head attachment, sometime with only lukewarm water. All these are possible.

This hotel has a shower that does more than suffice, it is just possibly one of the best showers in my life!!!! The temperature is perfect and can get even hotter than perfect if I want. The water pressure is intense, just short of drowning. The main shower head is huge, which sprays a waterfall over you within which you can barely breathe. On top of that, there are multiple side water jets so that you get water from every direction. Had I not been in the champagne-capital of the world, I might not have ever left the shower! I have taken several.

Leaving Iceland

Before starting down the champagne trail of my journal, though drinking champagne at this moment, I thought I'd get us out of Iceland.

First, before leaving the Hotel Ranga, we had our last breakfast there, a real "smorgasbord" which you may recall means sandwich in Swedish. In Iceland, they call "smorgasbord" a "smorgasbord", but I think they add some consonants to the pronunciation so it sounds like your tongue is crashing on your front teeth, pretty much like all of their words.

It was a nice spread, with waffles you could make on your own (though they were thin in a Rye Krisp kind of way), yogurt (or Skyr, as they call it in Iceland), bread, cheese and meat (so you could make your sandwich) and, my personal favorite, sardines. I think I was the only one there that ate the sardines and I had a lot of them!

They also had various fruit juices, but, as often happens in Europe, they were more a selection of colored flavored liquids. There was something which was close to, but not quite, something like bad orange juice. There was something that looked like, but was definitely not, cranberry juice. There was something which appeared to be grapefruit juice and was a distant member of the citrus family, but apparently not well liked by his cousins. There was also an amber colored drink which pretended to be apple juice, but was only a lame impersonation.

In the middle of the second breakfast, I surrendered and drank the water, which was quite good and readily identifiable.

Our original booking back in Reykjavik had us in a hotel close to the airport. However, on arrival to Iceland a few days before, we had noticed that there was more than one airport and our "Reykjavik" airport was actually in Keflavik, so the hotel was about 40 miles away, a bit more than we wanted to drive at 5 in the morning. Of course, our reservation was prepaid, noncancellable and not subject to change without a penalty fee of the full cost of the reservation, so I started making phone calls to change it. The wonderful thing about being irritating is that oftentimes people will agree to something just to stop talking with you. Our money was refunded and we re-reserved a room near the correct airport.

We had a very nice drive back to Reykjavik. Instead of snowy, frozen, rugged and barren land, it was for the most part dry frozen, rugged and barren land. We drove around Reykjavik. They haven't quite mastered the art of commercializing their harbor, so it was pretty much a working harbor.

Since we didn't have any heavy cargo to pick up or leave off (well, except for our suitcases, but we still needed them), we drove up the hill to a beautiful church, Hallgrímskirkja, which is pronounced, "church".

The inside of Hallgrímskirkja is spectacular, with incredibly high vaults (ceilings, not the jumpy kind). It is decorated in the official color of Iceland, gray. You also can pay several thousand Iceland kroner to take the elevator up to the top of the church tower.

The elevator is small, slow and creaky, not in a good way. I have a recurring nightmare about elevators, which involve small, slow, creaky elevators which do not go the right direction, start to tip, doors open to vast chasms and the floor starts to retreat. It occurred to me that this elevator seemed a lot like the one in the dreams. We made it to the top of the tower without the floor giving way. The tower, which is stone, swayed and creaked. I didn't think stone towers were supposed to do that. Karen and I looked at each other, commented that the view was lovely and wondered if the other had had quite enough. As often happens, we found ourselves in complete agreement.

We had a wonderful meal at the Hamborgarafabrikkan, which is a hamburger and cheese cake place which was started by a couple Icelandic radio personality celebraties (I know, it sounds a little odd) who liked the Cheesecake Factory. Karen had seen a series of television shows on the flight to Iceland about the development and opening of this restaurant, so we thought, "let's go!!" The hamburgers were outstanding and the milkshakes were wonderful! I particularly recommend the coffee milkshake laced with Kahlua.

At the end of the day, we drove to Keflavik, stayed in the Icelandair Hotel which was close to the correct airport and prepared for our journey to France.

All is well with the Barnums!!

Moet & Chandon - Dom Pérignon & Scarlett Johansson

Today we toured Moet & Chandon (Dom Pérignon). Scarlett Johansson is the official spokes-woman for the company, which is now owned by LVMH... Moët Hennessy • Louis Vuitton... (Who knew! Apparently the great-great grandson of Moet et Chandon sold out.) We walked the long cellars that Napoleon had walked. This is the video presentation they showed us on the tour...

La Cave a Champagne - Epernay

Seriously... one of the best meals ever!

I had...

Coeur d/ Artichaut, escargots creme persillee

(Globe artichoke heart, with snails in a parsley cream sauce)...

Escalope de Sauon buerre de Champagne

(Salmon in a champagne butter sauce)...

and... Tarte Fine aux Pomes Acidulees

(French Apple Tart)

Gary had...

Huitres Gratinees er au Champagne

(Oysters au gratin with champagne and gruyere cheese)...

Effiloches de canard aux Raisins er au Verjus

(Duck with a champagne reduction, pureed celeriac, grapes, and potatoes au gratin)...

and... Creme Brulee vanille bourbon

(creme brulee made with bourbon vanilla)

Within walking distance of our hotel, there are so many incredible restaurants. Absolute food heaven!

** Photos with help from Tripadvisor's review of the restaurant as I forgot to bring my camera tonight.

Hella, Hverageröi, Reykjavik, and Keflavik...

First Night in Iceland... Dinner at the Hotel Ranga

We didn't see the Northern Lights tonight, but we had a fantastic dinner!

Candles in the entrance to the dining room.

Candles on the bar.

Shot of Gary on the bar stools staged by the owner of the Hotel Ranga.

An amazing Mushroom Cream Soup with warm Guinness bread.

Salmon, pickled leeks, pureed peas and cucumber salad.

Icelandic Lamb, baby new potatoes, carrots,

and two purees of something that tasted wonderful.

The dessert was named "Eyjafjallajokull" after the volcano... fire and ice.

Bits of licorice flavored cookie that resembled lava rocks,

ice cream, cumquat, watermelon and creme brulee.

Hella What?

When it comes to booking flights, I seem to have a short memory of exactly what pain and suffering I have gone through before.

When looking at new flights, I will think things like, “That’s a nice connection, 6:30 in the morning is a little early, but it will be fine.” Or, “That’s a nice flight, the layover is a bit long, but we’ll find something to do.” Or my personal favorite, “It’s a long flight, but I will be able to sleep on the plane.”

I need some type of warning buzzer on my computer when I start trip planning, something like the Pirate Skull or Mr. Yuck, saying “Warning: Stupid Alert!” Preferably, one of those flashing pop-ups that you cannot remove from your screen. And, once I have completed the trip planning, when I actually hit the “Submit Reservation” button, it should forward me to photos of zombies walking through airports, with the message “This is You on this Trip”. Who knows? It might actually get me to think about the flight times and connections.

Probably not.

Well, we are now in Iceland, at the Hotel Ranga, which is located near Hella, or as Karen says, “To Hella, and gone.”

The only other time I have flown Icelandic Airlines (now, Iceland Air), was in 1972 with a couple of high school friends heading off to a European tour with backpacks. I have fond memories of that flight, mostly involving the fact that we were 18 and they served us beer and liquor as we crossed the Atlantic. We didn’t even have to show fake i.d.!

I have read mixed reviews about Iceland Air, but the service on board was great! The “equipment” (euphemistic term for, the plane) was a bit on the older side. It looked somewhat familiar, but I think it was just the name. The stewardesses, however, were dressed exactly the same as in 1972, complete with little hats and dresses.

The flight was fairly pleasant, only six and a half hours from Seattle to Iceland. Of course, we had to get to Seattle first. The other problem was that it was 6:30 a.m. when we arrived in Iceland, fresh from traveling all night, with our personal time clocks set around “O Dark Thirty”.

Aboard the little De Haviland Bombardier from PDX to SEA

We went through the passport booth, which was the fastest I’ve ever experienced. I think they have the view that if you are getting off in Iceland, you are too stupid to cause any trouble. Customs involved two lines, one marked “If you have something to declare.” And the other marked, “If you have nothing to declare.” As far as I could tell, they both went to the same door, marked “Ut”, which was exactly what it sounded like. So there we were standing “Ut”, looking for our rental car.

They recommend that you rent a four wheel drive in Iceland. I don’t know that it is technically required, but the land is a bit frozen, rugged and barren. After driving for about twenty miles, Karen commented, “This reminds me of the planet Hoth in Star Wars * * * but in a good way.”

"Hoth"

After being here, another good reason to rent an SUV is for personal protection, as everyone else seems to drive big vehicles. I think a Hummer or a 2-ton military vehicle would be just fine.

Part of the reason the land was so barren was that, after getting our car and heading out of the airport, we learned that we were not in Reykjavik at all. There is an airport in Reykjavik, but it is for domestic traffic, a little hard to imagine in a country this size. We were in Keflavik, as in “Where the hell are we?” A long ways from Reykjavik.

We had planned our driving from Reykjavik, not that it particularly mattered. The roads in Iceland are marked with unpronounceable names to places that do not appear on the map. My Google Map directions, directed us to “Head northwest on Einarsnes to Bauganes, continue onto Suöurgata (which, by the way, Google Map cannot find separately, I tried), turn right toward Hringbraut, etc..., none of which showed up on any signs on the road. Karen, in the meantime, has a map and is saying, “We want Highway 1, where are we?” To which I helpfully reply, “I think I saw a 1, but I think I saw a 40 as well.” “There isn’t a 40 on the map.” “What are we looking for?” She spelled out... “H * * V * * E * * R * * A * * G * * E * * R * * Ö * * I”. “Okay, Hagarmommer it is.

What does this next sign say?” “Suöurlandsvegur, sound familiar?” The highway signs had repeated references to “Vik”, which was not particularly helpful since we had no idea where that was. Eventually, we started to see references to “Hverageröi” to which we would say, “It’s that place, Higamakamaka”. We drove by Hverageröi, which is a couple of buildings set in frozen, rugged and barren land, as opposed to frozen, rugged and barren land without any buildings. We then started looking for “Selfoss” which we actually thought we could pronounce. Somehow, I’m not sure exactly, we made it to the Ranga Hotel, without actually taking any wrong turns. The only reason I’m pretty sure that it is the correct hotel is that it matches the photos we have and they claimed we had reservations. Of course, it wouldn’t surprise me to find out that there is another Hotel Ranga sitting out somewhere in separate frozen, rugged and barren land where they are awaiting our arrival.

We are cozy and warm, we have wine and this hotel has a delightful lodge feel to it, wherever the “hella” it is.

View of the Hotel Ranga main lodge from our little patio.

Fred Barnum's 85th Birthday Celebration! - March 10, 2012