Final Iceland Observations

As we sit here drinking a tall boy and waiting on our overnight train to Slovenia from Zurich, here are some final observations on our nine days in the country of Iceland   • First and foremost, the landscape and scenery are beautiful! Around every road corner, there is another “wow”. • The Icelandic people are wonderful. Their second language taught in school is English and they are all completely proficient at it. Plus, they are all courteous and polite...we never encountered a rude native. • Clean, clean, clean. We never saw one piece of trash anywhere and we traveled almost 1,400km across the country. This was evident by the pride the Icelandic people took in their work. • Silent, silent, silent. We NEVER heard one car horn honk the entire time. In fact, we never heard any noise except late Saturday night coming from a bar near our hotel in Reykjavik. These people do know how to party! • The entire country is connected. The smallest coffee or food stand has wireless. There’s really no need for currency...be it parking, food, bar, or museum admission, a tap of the card will pay the bill. • We never saw a billboard! • Unfortunately, the country is expensive...particularly food. A pizza and a few beers could cost the equivalent of $100. • The country is proud of itself. Roads are kept, street signs and maps are up to date, and personal properties are pristine. .We only saw one policeman during our entire stay. Very safe country.   So, with that we end the first segment of ATW70. Tomorrow Friday, May 23rd we head to Zurich, Switzerland for one night so we can stage ourselves the following night to catch the overnight train to the country of Slovenia. This will be the first of three countries comprising the second segment, “The Balkans”. Stay tuned!!