Iceland & Sweden

Matt's father, Chris, passed away from lung cancer in November. Matt had luckily been able to go visit his father, who lived in Sweden,  shortly after his diagnosis. Chris lived in Sweden for nearly 20 years, and once his funeral date was decided upon we decided that Matt and I would go and the children would stay with my mom. 

While making arrangements to go to Sweden, we looked at airline prices and found that you can fly Icelandair for a very reasonable price and have a stopover in Iceland for a few days with no penalty. So, Matt and I had a weekend in Iceland.

When we landed in Iceland in the early morning, the winds were blowing and howling. It was quite a Icelandic welcome. My first thought was, "Why the h&** did we come to Iceland in December?! We thought this would be a good idea?". 

The sun didn't come up until late morning and you don't see any form of life on the street until it does. We also discovered that the Icelandic people are night owls---the streets are filled with people drinking at the bars until 2-3 a.m.

It was a quick stopover, but one we can check off the bucket list. Iceland...been there, done that. If we return, it will definitely be in the summer.

The view from our hotel onto the main shopping street in Reykjavik.

A selfie on the high street.

The Hallgrimskirkja church with a statue of Leif Ericsson in front.

A view of Reykjavik from the Hallgrimskirkja.

A view of the sea and mountains from the Hallgrimskirkja.

Waiting for our flight from Reykjavik to Stockholm. We sent this photo to Chloe, the mannequin was wearing most of her Christmas wish list. 

 We left Reykjavik for Stockholm and stayed at Matt's father's home with his wife, Marie. It was nice to see family and meet some of Matt's aunts and uncles I had never met before, even if the occasion was a sad and somber one.

Marie sharing some Swedish Christmas traditions with us.

Iris looking out the window.

Matt and his brother Rob.

Matt with the ABBA display at Arlanda airport.

 We flew back home via a hour-long stop in Reykjavik. We had to walk out to our plane to board. I took a photo, only because what international flight in 2015 do you ever have to walk out to get on board in the plane? Everyone kept checking with each other to see if we were all going to NYC, afraid we were getting on board some puddle-jumper flight to Greenland or the far north!