[marcus_a_j]

Alþingishúsið (Icelandic parliament)

City Hall

Hallgrímskirkja (Lutheran Church)

Speed humps were everywhere in the City (actually, in every City, Town, Village, and Hamlet in the country). What I like was how the same brick design is used all over Reykjavik.

Laugavegur (Main Shopping District)

Some sort of protest.

Murals everywhere

 

[flar]

Nice shots! Thanks, don't think I've ever seen any pics of Iceland before.

 

[marcus_a_j]

Thanks. I have a whole bunch of the countryside that I will try to get around to posting. I never made it to the any of the glaciers or volcanoes though.

 

[Mustapha]

Very cool picture tour. thanks!

 

[junctionist]

It's one of those cities I've always found on globes and always wondered about. Visually, it's attractive with interesting (if modest) architecture and polished streets. While it doesn't look that vibrant, it's clearly not dead either.

I love what some colour can do to a modern building:

Also, this view terminus is spectacular:

We need to respect our remaining view termini.

 

[Tewder]

Looks so tidy and pleasant.

 

[marcus_a_j]

It's one of those cities I've always found on globes and always wondered about. Visually, it's attractive with interesting (if modest) architecture and polished streets. While it doesn't look that vibrant, it's clearly not dead either.

For a city of ~200,000 (metro) it was fairly busy when I was there. I would attribute that to the large number of tourists with tourism being one of the largest sectors of the country's economy. I was there in early June and the volcano eruption has had an effect on the number of people visiting with air travel uncertainty being the main reason. I am not sure how the tourism numbers are now after a few months since the volcanic ash has been in the news. Sunday to Thursday nights the City is practically dead after 10 pm. Friday and Saturday's on the other hand are crazy with party goers until 7-8 am (I ended up watching game 4 of the stanley cup finals that started at midnight local time in a sports bar that had a dozen or so other Canadians watching the game).

Save for a bunch of the more modern contemporary buildings going up, the architecture overall was pretty basic. Though I never inquired while I was there, my guess is due to the lack of natural resources in the Country and the higher costs of importing certain building materials. There still is a bit of charm.

I love what some colour can do to a modern building:

That building caught my eye very early in my trip before I was able to make my way there. As the pictures show, many of the modern contemporary buildings have the standard black and gray cladding and glass. They are decent individually, but when the majority of the newer buildings start to look identical they lose their appeal.

Looks so tidy and pleasant.

It was. Barely any litter in the streets (including cigarette butts)

 

[ganjavih]

Thanks for the tour. Looks quaint... part Scandanavian, part Canadian Maritime.

 

[Long Island Mike]

Marcus: Neat tour of Reykjavik,Iceland!
Ganjavih: I agree with you on your observation above...

It looks like a very neat city...was their any language barrier for an anglophone?
That Lutheran Church and its design is quite impressive...
I noticed some graffiti in one pic and I also like the murals...they can make virtually any wall interesting!
For a small City it again is interesting...How is the Icelandic monetary exchange rate against the CDN and US Dollars?

LI MIKE

 

[AlvinofDiaspar]

LIMike:

1 Cdn to ~115 Kronur (cup of coffee @ ~300ISK)

AoD

 

[marcus_a_j]

AoD - more importantly, a pint of beer was 700-800 ISK (most local beers were OK, none were great, one was piss). On average a dinner time meal with one pint was about 2500 - 3000 ISK, so approx. $20-25 CDN

LIMike - No language barrier at all. Iclanders learn english in schools, and given the importance of Tourism for their economy, english is almost their unofficial second language. One of their local alternative newspapers (same type of content and format as NOW and EyeWeekly in Toronto) was produced in english.

 

[ceaz40]

I visited Iceland in 1987....had a great time.....the nightlife was fun....though strange.....it was May and the sun really didn't set.....I'd go out of a bar at 3 in the morning and the sun would touch the horizon and go back up lol.....I almost had no idea what time it ever was.