Traveling with a Busload of Torons.
We arrived for our tour. I’ve never been on a vacation tour, but am sharp enough to know that our “coach” is tour verbiage for a bus. After being up for more than 24 hours, there’s nothing like the drone of the buses engine coupled with the drone of our tour guide Olifar Magnussen to ease me off to sleep, as the 15 minutes of things I’d actually like to see in Reykjavik get stretched into 6 hours, as they employ Nordic stall tactics until you can check into your room. I stayed positive even when one of the major stops was essentially an Icelandic Panera, but with nasty soups of the day like Lamb meat soup. Olifar explained about 30 times how seeing the Northern Lights had no guarantee and would be up to chance. Despite my frequent dozing, I got the gist, although I didn’t understand why our Northern Lights excursion was cancelled on the only decent night in the forecast. I remained a beacon of positivity melting the cynicism of Andrew and Keith, who’s karma’s as gray as the threatening skies. As Andrew and his mom walk 7 miles a day, they lead me in an 8-mile Bat-tan Death March through Redjavik’s 4 blocks of attractions never once pausing to go into a store or stop for a bite of Elk. Still, I remained positive. At dinner, they rang a bell and changed a number on a tote board. I assumed it was someone finishing the kitchen sink Cookie Monster Sundae like in the good ok’ US of A. Nope! They celebrate the birth of each new baby as a national event, as it’s so rare that their Svens and Helgas remove their long-johns to canoodle in these frigid temps. While Day 1 was a bust without the Northern Lights, Day 2 promised an 11-hour tour, “the wonders of sniffkissinkoogledissen”. Oh wait, that was cancelled too. Wonk-wah!
Rubber Chicken 