Walden World

The wacky and wonderful tales of Beth's and Catherine's global adventures. And all things Walden too.

Thursday, September 06, 2012

Raw Seafood, Hot Pots and Rain...oh and Lava too...

In the town of Syykkisholmur on the edge of the Snaerfelles pennisula there is an excellent public geothermal pool complex, as everywhere in Iceland.

Outdoors in 8 degrees celcius and in cold and nasty rain you can lounge in an Olympic sized pool heated to body temperature by the volcanic water. To boot, it features a really terrific two story water slide, also heated to body temperature.

Then there is a large hot wading pool and then hot pots:  mineral water baths heated to 42 degrees where you just sit back, keep warm and stare up at the raining sky.

After a sea tour this morning wherein we visited a number of quite bizarre volcanic basalt islands,  we were treated to the crew doing a brief net bottom drag which elicited a bounty of scallops, sea urchins, star fish and crabs.

With a delicious Chilean Sauvigion Blanc to accompany the feast, the sailors began shucking and we ate gobs of raw scallops pulled straight from the seabed. We were also introduced to sea urchin cavier which was as excellent as the scallops.

Catherine spent her between scallop time, rescuing every crab or star fish which had been pulled up and returned them to the cold and briny deep...

You can see here Catherine's rescure operation:



Back to land and then a drive around the famous volcano Snaekesfelles covered in snow and shrouded in mist.

Icelandic ponies, posing sheep and multitude of rainbows covering the icy sky.



Last night as I blogged, the guy from the hotel ran in breathless to announce a full display of Northern Lights dancing green and pink in curtains in the sky above.

He even started phoning each guest in the hotel to wake them up to see the display.











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