Horses, Hot water, and Penises

Monday, September 30, 2013
Reykjavik, Capital Region, Iceland
We got out early today as we had a 9:15 pickup at our hotel for our horse riding tour of the red hills. (The point was not the scenery, believe me!)

The iHorse people suited us up and gave us a fifteen minute course on how to ride a horse with all the maneuvers . Howard rode a ten year old blonde mare names Lysander ( translated is 'lightening' - just what he needed!), and Minna rode a ten year old black and white mare named Aaron (translated is Aaron, but not at all biblical). Icelandic horses are very short and are able to go very fast and do so smoothly so the rider feels like he/she is floating. We set out and rode the countryside for two hours across bridges, tunnels, up hills and of necessity down again. Mostly slow riding, but we set out on a fast pace a few times then put the horses in 'float' mode so that they ran along very smoothly, as this is what Icelandic horses are famous for. It was wonderful to get to the float mode, as the gallop was particularly painful for Howard unless he stood up on the stirrups. Honestly he has no real experience with stirrups as does Minna. At the end of the ride we were told not to stand still after we tumble/slide/fall/dismount our horses but rather keep walking. This was painful on our inner thighs, but important . Howard would have loved two large heat packs, and an ice pack between them and a little higher. If he could have left the jewels in the hotel, that would have been great - but how?

We got dropped off at one of the local pools that the Icelanders frequent so often. Almost every village has a pool heated with geothermal water from the ground to about thirty degrees and the locals all over the country go very often as a favourite pastime. This one also had five hot tubs of varying temperatures by geothermal water from 38 to 44 with one filled with sea water so you get the benefit of the minerals. It was most enjoyable, and an experience to remember. Before entering the pool area one must change into nothing in the locker and proceed to the large communal shower room and wash the appropriate parts as diagrammatically explained before suiting up. Often monitors are 'hanging around' to be sure this is done and nobody just dons a bathing suit and goes straight into the pools . The pools and the locker rooms are all very clean and well run.

Next we went to the world famous Phallological Museum of Iceland. The specialty here is penises of mammals found in Iceland. Go know that the only mammal that doesn't have a penile bone is the human. Mammals from the whales down to the apes have them, but after that it is grown on demand. According to the chart, the smallest one is that of a human, the largest is about twenty times larger. They do not yet have a human one (on display) but there are pictures of rarities and the three that have been bequeathed but not yet delivered. They did have two frames dedicated to the Iceland Olympic Handball (seriously, no play on words) team of 2012. One contains the official photo of the team some seated and some standing, whereas the other contains statues of the members' members all standing. The only other people there when we were was an American couple that sociologically could have been any of our friends - oh well most of our friends. All was done very scientifically in the museum except for the gift/souvenir shop.

It was overtime for lunch, so we proceeded to a Danish open-face sandwich shop and had beer and fish sandwiches. The place and the (fish called) plaice were both wonderful. We were quite tired at this point so we went to the hotel room to rest up for dinner was going to happen in a few hours.

After such a heavy over the top dinner last night we decided to do a light dinner tonight. We walked for a while downtown and found a moderate restaurant, called Cafe de Parisand had a steak sandwich and a Iceland lobster sandwich with a couple of beers. It hit the spot.
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