Day three - travel day

Time to travel to London, but our plane wasn't scheduled until 4:00 so we had about half a day to do some more sightseeing.  We wanted to go back to the Hallgrimskirkja church so we hiked over there.

 

Yes, that is snow on the ground and you can see the wind velocity by the flags.  It was beyond cold, but when you only have a few hours left in a country you can't be stopped by the weather.

 

The statue outside the church was a gift to the people of Iceland from the United States in 1930 in honor of the one thousandth anniversary of the Althing (the meeting at Thingvellir National Park I blogged about previously).

 

We took the elevator up the church steeple to see the view.  Unfortunately, the weather didn't cooperate very well.

 

Irv was freaked out up there and it was not fully enclosed so the wind was crazy.

 

We made our way back to the sanctuary where we were treated to a practice session by the church organist.  Yes, we asked if photos were okay--we didn't want to be those Americans who don't ask for permission.

 

Here's a 53-second clip of the organ.  I loved it!

 

Beautiful stained glass windows.

 

Very simple, but beautiful altar.

 

Afterwords we decided to find a bakery and get a cake and something hot to drink before we made the trek back to the hotel.

 

It was Easter Monday so almost everything was closed.  Believe it or not, the only thing we found that was open was a Dunkin Donuts.  I never go to Dunkin Donuts when I'm home, but I guess it's okay on vacation especially when it's freezing cold outside.

 

Around noon we made our way to the bus station for the ride to the airport.  The wind was 75+ miles per hour by then so the bus had to go slower than usual.  Our plane was delayed due to the weather. 

 

At the airport you have to board a bus which drives you to the steps to board the plane.  The wind was blowing so hard that they only let about 5 people out of the bus at a time to climb the steps.  After everyone was boarded we sat on the tarmac for a couple hours because the weather conditions were so bad that the ground crew had been recalled into the building so they couldn't load the luggage.

 

Finally, we heard something going on underneath the plane then the captain said it was time to go.

 

We got to London very late, made our way through customs and immigration then went out to find our bags.  We waited and waited, but only four bags ever came out.  Finally, we were told that the airline chose to only load four bags and they left the rest of them on the tarmac in Reykjavik.  They promised them the next morning.

 

We found the underground and took it to King's Cross where we very easily found our hotel.  It was after midnight when we arrived.  We were exhausted by this point, it felt good to get to bed that night.