Monday morning, I finally had my LASIK revision. My appointment was at 9:15 and we were back home by 11am. Everything seemed to go smoothly except I moved my left eye a little during the procedure, which resulted in a tear to my lens. The doctor applied some bandages in the form of contact lenses that would need to be removed the following day. I spent the remainder of the day napping in between eye drop application every twenty minutes, just like before. At 9pm, I could finally go to sleep for the night.
Tuesday, I returned to the eye doctor and she removed the contact lens bandage from my right eye, which looked great. I could tell my vision was improved in that eye, but by how much was hard to tell because the left eye was not ready to have its contact lens bandage removed. It would still need another day or so to heal.
On Wednesday, I returned to the eye doctor and had the left eye bandage taken off. I was still not seeing clearly in that eye and constantly had a burning sensation but I needed the bandage off so we could go to Iceland for the weekend! The doctor reassured me that the reason for the clouded vision was the lens tear and that my vision would continue to improve over the next week while it healed.
We had been surviving off of fast food and leftovers for two days since my surgery. So, Wednesday night, we had dinner that evening at the Seegärtle Restaurant, near our house.
We planned to depart for Iceland on Thursday, but by Wednesday afternoon, we had gotten several notifications that our flights were cancelled. Bad weather in Iceland caused the cancellation of our first flights and then an airport strike at Frankfurt caused the cancellation of our rebooked flights. After lots of arguing with Icelandair, they finally rebooked us on a new flight out of Munich.
Thursday, Matt and I drove to Munich to catch our re-booked flight. We got through security with little hassle, despite the nationwide security workers strike, and luckily were able to get through early as our flight time was moved up and we ended up departing 30 minutes earlier than expected. While I’ve experienced plenty of delayed flights, I’ve never had a flight move UP its departure time, even after 200+ flights; I am so glad we arrived early enough to grab some snacks in the lounge before running to the gate. We landed in Iceland by 4pm and headed straight to the hotel to meet our friends.
We headed out almost immediately to check out downtown Reykjavik. We had drinks at a Tibetan themed restaurant called Himalaya, and then dinner at Reyjakvik’s best steakhouse, creatively called, ‘The Steakhouse.’ It was so good! All of us had steak, except for Patrick who tried whale and horse, which he also said was amazing.
I had been expecting the food to be on par with the quality of that in Tromso; i.e,: bad. It was a pleasant surprise to find that it was MUCH better. After dinner, we went to Pablo Discobar, where we rented a karaoke room for an hour before heading to another bar for one last drink. At our last stop, we met one of Iceland’s most famous pop stars, Paul Oskar!
Friday morning, we were scheduled to go on a tour of Iceland’s Golden Circle. But, when we woke up, we had all received notifications that the tour was cancelled due to weather. Snow and high winds were scheduled to hit Iceland all weekend. We had breakfast, and then headed back into downtown Reykjavik. First, we checked out Hallgrimskirkja, Reykjavik’s main church. Then, we walked around and did some shopping before having lunch at Lebowski Bar.
After lunch, we headed back to the hotel where we were picked up for our Sky Lagoon visit. We received an email in advance advising us of bad weather conditions but we were still eager to visit as it was the first tour that had not been cancelled. When we arrived, high winds and snow had really picked up but we put our heads down and battled our way to the building.
Once in our bathing suits, with hats on, we made our way out into the lagoon. The lagoon is a geothermic spa and is right on the the edge of the Karsnes Harbour and has a 70 meter infinity pool looking out onto the Atlantic Ocean. At times, especially as you got closer to the infinity edge, the winds were so intense and throwing hail at us. We were glad we brought hats. Mostly, we just hung out closer to the inner walls in coves to shelter from the wind and have a couple of drinks. We also completed the Sky Lagoon seven step ritual. The ritual first includes soaking in the lagoon, then a cold plunge, then sauna overlooking the ocean. Once out of the sauna, there is a cold shower, followed by a body scrub, then the steam room. Finally, there is one more shower and then back out into the lagoon. Despite the weather, it was a great time and I would love to come back during better weather to enjoy it a little more.
After Sky Lagoon, we took a taxi to Just Wingin’ It, a chicken wing restaurant opened by a friend of a friend. The friend originally came to Iceland to play basketball and was disappointed by the lack of chicken wings, so first opened a food truck, and then moved on to the two brick-and-mortar locations that are now there. The place was definitely busy but the wings were so good. They were also so big! We ordered way too many and then headed back to the hotel.
Saturday, we finally got to take the Golden Circle Tour. As we departed Reykjavik, we drove through almost white-out snow. Luckily, our bus was equipped for the weather and we were still able to make it to the first stop, Thingvellir National Park. The National Park is the location of where the two tectonic plates, the Eurasian Plate and the North American Plate meet. Unfortunately, we could not see much due to the driving snow.
Once we were back on the bus and headed to the next location, the snow cleared and the sun came out, giving us a really pretty view of the landscape.
Our next stop was Geysir, where there were two active geysirs to be watched. We walked up and watched both, then had lunch in the busy Geysir restaurant.
The last stop of the day was at Gulfoss Waterfall. We made the ten minute walk to the viewing platform from the bus and took it in before grabbing a snack at the cafe and boarding the bus back to Reykjavik.
We were back in Reykjavik by 3pm, so took a short rest and then headed to the Flyover Iceland show. The show is the same concept as the Disney rides, “Soarin.” and gave a birds’ eye view of all of Iceland’s attractions that we couldn’t otherwise see due to the weather. There was also a brief introduction, given by some virtual gnomes that explained how the Icelandic people are able to withstand the long, hard winters. It’s because they always know that life goes on; Spring always comes. Sometimes, I definitely need to be reminded of this.
After the show, we had a final dinner at the pizzeria next door to our hotel and then one last drink in the hotel. Despite the weather and travel issues, it was a great trip. It was so nice to see our friends and to get out and do the things we were able to. I had visited Iceland in early 2016 when they were just starting to make their huge tourism push. Things have definitely changed; most of it for the better. There were a ton of food, drink, and entertainment options that were not there before. Iceland has also built up its tourism infrsstructure that made it much easier to take guided tours, whereas in 2016, we had to rent a car and get ourselves around. It was SO MUCH more crowded though. Each stop we made on the Golden Circle had about 500 people at it whereas there were maybe 50 the last time around. I guess that’s the result of growth. The crowds were definitely worth dealing with for the much improved food quality though.
Our flight back to Germany was at 7am on Sunday, so we were picked up at 4am by the bus. We were at he airport super early, but luckily, Matt and I each got a full row to ourselves and were able to sleep the whole flight back to Munich. After we landed, we were at our car within 10 minutes, and then back in Stuttgart by 3pm. There, we were reunited with kids and parents.
While we were gone, Brooklyn and Ryan spent a lot of good quality time with my parents. On Saturday, Ryan went on another ski trip with his ski club.
The Wrestling semi-finals was also on Saturday and Brooklyn was there all day. My parents were able to come and support her while she was there and then take themselves out to dinner. We are so lucky that they were able to come and enjoy this time on their own, while Matt and I were able to take our first solo trip since moving to Germany almost three years ago.
Gilcrests Abroad 