Allison's Wanderlust: Day 3: Stykkisholmur

A taste of the sea for me today - I headed east bright and early this morning to Stykkisholmur for the Viking Sushi Tour. It's a 2 1/4 hr boat cruise in the island-studded bay of Breidafjordur to experience the ocean's splendor, see all kinds of nesting birds, ie Puffins, and they throw in a little treat of a seafood tasting buffet too. Midway through they drop down a basket to the seafloor, drag it a bit, haul it up and serve anything that's edible!

I had my scallop & urchin roe sushi style w/ soy & wasabi

Some serious birders on board!
Birds nesting in unique horizontal 4-sided basalt columns

It was a gorgeous day but brrr, that wind was cold. And note to any women traveling to Iceland: bring headbands! The wind blows non-stop. Really.

Or headband, hat, and hood :-)

Luckily, I pre-warmed myself this morning by having a good long soak in the Stykk's community pool. Icelanders take their bathing very seriously. Any hamlet of any size has a geothermal swimming pool, consisting of a warm lap pool and a hot tub. And they take their cleanliness to a whole 'nother level. First you must shower, naked, with soap, before donning your suit to go into the pool. And they have diagrams posted showing you all the bits to remember to wash, just in case you're not sure. Then you dash outside into the 'fresh' air and hop into the nearest spa. After you're parboiled to a fine degree, you get out, dash back inside, scrub down again, and emerge fresh and pink and clean like a new born baby. I think I'm going to plan where I stay around community swimming pools...

Anyway, I wasn't done tasting after my Sushi boat tour. Next I drove down to Bjarnarhofn to the famous Rotten Shark Museum to try putrefied Greenlandic shark. When in Rome...

(I don't think I liked it too much...)

The museum was kinda fun. It's a family farm, a family that never threw anything away so there's all kinds of antique farming tools, fishing tools, typewriters, rusty household junk, stuffed animals, etc. on display. The enthusiastic host said his family were farmers/fishermen minding their own business when tourism created an interest in the rotten shark business (Icelanders don't actually eat the stuff but us crazy tourists do!), and voila! A biz was born.

By this time it was past 3pm and sadly time for me to make tracks. I took the sage advice of the tourist info lady in Stykk and headed south an hour + to then head north on Route 1 in order to stay on the paved roads on my way to "The North". There is a gravel road that cuts due east but I drive like a granny on gravel and it is a rental car whose paint job I'm responsible for...so tarmac it is.