Any idea what kind of spider this is?

This little guy lives on the island of Borøya, off the southern coast of Norway. I was experimenting with my macro lens and found him on the eaves of the cabin I was living in.

I have no idea what kind of spider he is, but he looks good in the picture. I really like how his legs stick pretty much straight out rather than bending a lot (think daddy longlegs). If you're an entomologist (or just play one on TV), let me know if you can help me out. Thanks.

Back from Norway

Iceland, Day 2: The Blue Lagoon, or Ninety Minutes of Being Pelted in the Face

CLICK ON THE PHOTOS TO ENLARGE THEM

As with most of our days in Iceland, on Day 2 it was pouring down rain. Tuesday was especially bad, as there was a strong wind and the temperature was hovering right around freezing (pre-wind).

Today was our Blue Lagoon day. Anyone who has ever been to Reyjavík swears by the Blue Lagoon. I'm not much of a spa guy, but I figured when in Rome...

I hadn't known it before I got there, but the Blue Lagoon is a geothermal spa that, according to the Lonely Planet guidebook,

owes its existence to the nearby Svarsengi geothermal plant, which is powered by superheated seawater drawn from deep bore holes in the lava. After the steam has passed through the turbines, huge condensers convert it back into water, which is channelled into a huge artificial lagoon that permanently hovers at 37˚–39˚C.

We hopped on the hotel shuttle and headed to the Reykjavík bus station (BSÍ), where we transferred to the Blue Lagoon bus. This is what it looked like pretty much all the way there:

The view from the bus

The first thing you have to do upon arrival is get hooked up with a blue, plastic wristband. The wristband allows you to use the lockers in the locker room. The lockers were really cool, if lockers can be cool. The next thing you do is get naked and shower. I had heard about "shower police" who were there to make sure you showered appropriately, but thankfully we were left to shower on our honor. (The shower is necessary because the water isn't treated chemically like a swimming pool, so they want to divest you of anything harmful before you muck it up for everyone else.)

The natural pools outside the spa campus

Duly bathed, I headed down to the entry pool, where I met A. This is an indoor pool that is warm and gets you prepped to move out into the outdoor lagoon. There's a door that hangs just above the water to keep the elements out. You could swim under it if you wanted to, but that wasn't any fun. A was wearing a dark blue fleece hat, which I thought was a little funny looking. I didn't think it was so funny once we headed out into the nearly freezing rain.

It's kind of wild when everything below your neck is toasty warm while your head is being buffeted by icy wind and rain. We were forced to move backwards into the wind, as the raindrops and ice pellets hurt our face if we turned around.

Floaters in the mist

We stayed in for about 90 minutes, taking in the entire pool. There was so much steam coming off the water that at times we couldn't see more than about 3 feet in front of us.

The water is kind of a milky blue, and even though the lagoon is only about 3-4 feet deep, I couldn't see my hand past six inches under the surface. It was a little creepy. The water is cloudy because it contains blue-green algae (cyanobacteria), mineral salts, and a fine silica mud at the bottom. The silica can be used to exfoliate your skin, so A and I both tried it. She had no problems with it, but I ended up getting it in my eyes. It's kind of gritty and uncomfortable, and for about 6-7 minutes I was completely blind. I tried to rinse my eyes out in the lagoon to no avail. So I turned my face into the rain and tried to let the fresh water pummel the goop out of my eyes. Eventually I was able to see again, but I stayed well away from the silica mud. (Besides, to get to the provided containers, you had to haul yourself halfway out of the warm water. Talk about a shock to the system when you stood up...)

A and I figured his was a lonely job...

Once we'd hit our limit in the lagoon, we headed inside, where we showered again (using TONS of conditioner to get the chemicals out of our hair) and then got ready to leave. We ended up missing our bus by two minutes, which meant that we had to stay at the Lagoon for another two hours. It wasn't exactly a hardship, but it would have been nice to get back to the hotel a little sooner.

A and I ended up having linner there. She got a sandwich of some sort, and I got to try out the world-renowned Icelandic hotdog (pýlsur). They are an institution in Iceland, and I was much more inclined to try them as opposed to putrefied shark (hákarl). The pýlsur traditionally come with raw onion, crunchy deep-fried onion, ketchup, mustard, and tangy rémoulade. It was really good, and is probably the cheapest food I ate while in Iceland. I also picked up some dried fish bits, but have yet to bring myself to try them.

The infamous Icelandic pýlsur...

Once it was time to go, we ended up on a smaller, shuttle-type bus. The driver stopped for gas on the way back, leaving the engine running the entire time. Very strange. At least we didn't blow up.

Ultimately, while I may not be much of a spa guy, I must admit that I enjoyed the lagoon quite a bit. It was interesting to be there in the off season when the weather was horrible. There weren't many people and at times it felt like we had the entire place to ourselves. While I'm sure the views are much better when you can see more than three feet in front of you, this was still a great way to experience the Blue Lagoon (as long as I stay away from the silica mud).

Iceland, Day 1: The adventure begins

My flight was supposed to leave at 2045, but we ended up leaving BWI a half-hour late. We were never given a reason. It was actually fine by me, as I had about 11.5 hours to kill in Reykjavík until A arrived from Norway.

We flew over on a 757-200, which has a three-and-three seating setup. Thankfully I was in a row of seats all to myself, although I found out that I'm too tall to take advantage of them when I tried to lay down to sleep. So instead I sat up and watched the movie, 1982's Tootsie. They also showed the "Vitameatavegamin" episode of I Love Lucy. Nothing but cutting-edge entertainment on Icelandair, folks.

I arrived at Keflavík around 0700 GMT, only to find that I had to go through security again, after sitting on a plane for 6 hours. It seemed a bit silly to me, so I flat out asked a screener "Why are we doing this again, since we just did it before we got on the plane?" He responded with "Because we don't trust other countries' security procedures." Honest, but frankly a little insulting.

Sunrise over the lava floes

After a bit of confusion regarding the Arrivals signage (and the lack thereof), I picked up my luggage and made my way to the Flybus (airport shuttle). I got my round-trip ticket (which saved me a little bit of kronur), and then rode past the snow- and moss-covered lava fields on my way into Reykjavík. I got to watch the sun rise over the distant mountains, which was quite pretty. I'm sure I failed to appreciate it entirely because I was pretty tired, but it was still quite something.

After arriving at the Icelandair Nordica Hotel, I was given the keys to a very nice room on the fourth floor. Sadly, it was a smoking room and I had to return the keys for another room, this time non-smoking and on the third floor. It wasn't as good as the first room, but in many ways it was preferable. It was weird, though. The third floor was a non-smoking floor, yet they had this sort of phone-boothesque structure near the elevator where people could smoke. It kind of reminded me a bit of the Cone of Silence in some ways, but maybe that's just me.

The view from the better room

I crashed and burned for a little while, catching about two hours' sleep. Before I conked out, though, I turned on the TV. Let's just say you shouldn't go to Iceland if you're a TV junkie. However, on one of the Icelandic channels, they kept playing the same four music videos over and over. I am now the owner of the latest Robbie Williams track, "She's Madonna." When I was there, I couldn't figure out why I liked it. I just discovered that the Pet Shop Boys helped it along. That'll do it. (The audio clip doesn't really do the track justice, so check out the video here before you accuse me of having bad taste in pop music...)

After a quick nap, I set out to visit the Reykjavík Art Museum: Kjarvalsstaðir. Even better, the guidebooks told me that the museum had no entry fees on Mondays. So I set out from the hotel, only to find out that the city of Reykjavík (along with rest of Iceland, I would discover later) does not really do anything to get rid of ice on the sidewalks. The streets were bone dry, but the sidewalks were a fricking skating rink. Lots of little shuffle-stepping, trying not to become a casualty on my first day in the country. Before one can visit an art museum on limited sleep, one must fortify oneself. I did so at Reykjavík's own Ruby Tuesday. They haven't gone all upscale like the ones in the States, so it was a bit jarring yet endearingly familiar. Ordinarily I would have skipped the U.S. chain restaurant when traveling outside the states, but my Icelandic is nominal at best, and I was too tired to try anything more exotic. So sue me.

A view along the way

After a pretty decent burger, I worked my way to the museum, only to find out that the guidebook was wrong. Free admission day is now Thursday. I showed the guidebook to the woman at the desk, and she said she would get in touch with their marketing department to have it corrected in the next edition. Fat lot of good that did me 500 kronur later. The works on display were decent, and there was an installation dealing with waterfalls that I quite enjoyed. The fatigue was catching up to me, though, given the jet lag and shuffle stepping, so I decided to call it a day around 1500. I began working my way back to the hotel, but first I needed to stop and pick up some provisions (Kleenex, water, Hob Nobs, etc.). I nearly killed myself sliding down a stairway, but thankfully some spirited flailing and a vise-like grip on the railing saved me from face-planting.

There's not much more to report for Day 1. A arrived around 2000, and that's all I have to say about that. (I will mention that she brought me Norwegian chocolate...)

Back from Iceland

Just got back from Iceland last night. I will post photos and brief overview of the trip over the coming days. Please bear in mind that SCAD's Spring Quarter also started this week, so I will have to pay attention to classes, too...