A year ago, Robert and I set off for 8 days in Iceland, what we had planned to be our great adventure for the year (more about just how wrong we were with that prediction in an upcoming post).

Reykjavik is slightly more than 15º North of Spokane in latitude, and everyone we knew were shaking their heads over how we would set off for the extreme North in the dead of winter.  Sure, we had traveled to Yellowknife (also 15º North of Spokane) to get married, but that was on the Summer Solstice.

Arriving in Reykjavik was almost like coming home after a 35-year sojourn. This was my first visit to Iceland, but I had been stationed in Berlin in my  youth (back when the Cold War was still a very real thing, and long before the EU came into being), and I’d never forgotten the feeling of having found my place half-way around the world from where I had originated.

Sure, our time in Iceland was filed with typical tourist events:  we visited museums and galleries,  and took a Northern Lights cruise bus expedition. But my favorite parts of the trip were  when we headed off away from the tourist areas.  Our first day in Reykjavik, we tackled the bus routes and headed away from downtown to find a Nikon store located in a Reykjavik suburb, so Robert could buy another battery for his camera, as he forgot to bring the charger.  And there was the day we hiked around the harbor away from the tour boats and fancy restaurants, tromping through snow along the semi-industrial business district, to see what we could see.  We ended up on the edge of an empty pier, looking back at downtown and the Old Harbor, one of the major tourist destinations. Robert ventured out along the water line, while I stayed safe on solid ground.

I’d love to return to Iceland soon, maybe next time during the summer when we can rent a car and travel the Ring Road (Route #1), the national highway that runs around the island and connects most of the inhabited parts of Iceland.

But Iceland will have to wait, as our next (as yet unscheduled) big trip will likely be to Morocco, another location roughly 15º in latitude distant from Spokane, just to the South this time.  (Texas is also 15º South, but given the current political climate, I’m pretty sure I’m safer in North Africa than I am in Texas.)