It's Week 8. This experiment is half over and it's been interesting, not stimulating, but interesting.
I am intrigued by the unexpected delicacy of professional football players. The frequency with which they are injured argues against the efficacy of this sport. My feeling is that brittleness of bones and the elasticity of muscles and tendons are almost more vital areas of interest to NFL coaches than the ability to pass, punt or tackle. I wonder if how the pro football ranks in injuries when compared to other "violent" contact sports? Does putting on the armor of pads make the players feel more invincible? Does that act incite opponents to more physicality than if they were playing rugby with no pads? Does the NFL audience/fan base wait as eagerly for the thunk of body slamming body as the NASCAR fans watch for the crash of cars?
Enough philosophizing. Perhaps if I cared more, I'd actually investigate. Unlikely.
The Rowdies and I are holding our own. We are 4th in the standings as of right now, so far I'm satisfied with my "coaching" performance. I used quotes as I don't consider myself a coach, more a recipient of some luck. I've found that coaching is mostly watching for player injuries and hoping there's a better substitute out there no one else has yet grabbed.
I fully comprehend why this pastime can become a time consumer. Serious participants would have alerts set up to warn whoever there is a change to a player's status or when a free agent is available. I check once or twice a day, when I remember.
I am excited about re-engaging with Sandi, Tom and Janet on Sunday for the television viewing of games! Sunday after this coming one, I'll be enjoying the convivial aspects of the experiment. Until then, Happy Halloween!
Thursday, October 26, 2017
Tuesday, October 24, 2017
Iceland - Epilogue
Leaving Silica was like leaving family. The manager, Adda, came out to bid us farewell and hope we enjoyed our stay. Our Greek waitress brought gave us hugs and well wishes. Even the desk clerk, Isene, hoped we would return. NEVER has a hotel staff been so effusive as I left the facility! My favorite concierge, Wendy, was off today. I wish I'd known, but I left her a scarf as a thank you.
Our cabbie to the airport, a tall robot leggy blonde named Briet Sunna Valdemarsdottir, was so charming that the trip felt like ten minutes. We learned, to both our surprises, that the base in Keflavik had been abandoned by the US military in 2006. The barrack and facilities now house a rehab center for high school drop outs with families seeking to turn their lives around. How Iceland! Never waste a resource! And, her father is "the Icelandic Elvis," an impersonator who placed 4th in a world-wide competition is Nashville a few years ago, despite being unable to speak English - he learned the song lyrics "much like a parrot learns to talk" according to Briet!
Our trip home was wonderful. Icelandair flight service is great. The Boeing 757-200 may well be my favorite airplane for comfortable travel. My seat mates were from Merritt Island; she and I chatted about gardening, quilting and traveling - he slept.
Aside: please appreciate this notice which was part of the plane's exterior next to the entry door… I love the concept of naming each plane for something or place specific to the country. I wish I'd paid attention to our inbound flight! I'm guessing this is only possible because Iceland has only one airline.
Arriving in Orlando early, Barbara and I were excited about getting on the road in time to be home by midnight. Uh, no such luck. Customs was a breeze. Immigration was a breeze. The airport's baggage handlers, though, stymied our plan to get away quickly. "Inclement weather" and "construction issues" delayed our baggage TWICE: first wait happened from plane to customs (that was the weather delay). Once we passed customs, we had to reload the bags onto another conveyor to carry them to the baggage terminal as the people shuttle couldn't hold passengers and luggage (this was the construction delay). Upshot - a plane load of tired, annoyed humans and 1 dog got their bags at 11:50 PM!!!
Barbara and I loaded up on Diet Coke and headed for The Burg, arriving at 2:38 AM, we crashed until about 10 this morning! I do have to admit that I-4 is a MUCH quicker drive at that time of night!
All in all, this was a very positive trip. I don't really have a desire to return to Iceland for an extended visit, though as a stopover to Europe it might have all. Icelandair offers passengers to Europe a no-extra-charge policy of up to 6 days stay in Iceland if you've booked a round trip ticket. That might be a possibility. Even though we missed out on the Northern Lights, I had an A+ experience. I now know why people flock to hot springs!
My favorite advertisement from this experience: Icelandic sheep - free ranging since 836!
Our cabbie to the airport, a tall robot leggy blonde named Briet Sunna Valdemarsdottir, was so charming that the trip felt like ten minutes. We learned, to both our surprises, that the base in Keflavik had been abandoned by the US military in 2006. The barrack and facilities now house a rehab center for high school drop outs with families seeking to turn their lives around. How Iceland! Never waste a resource! And, her father is "the Icelandic Elvis," an impersonator who placed 4th in a world-wide competition is Nashville a few years ago, despite being unable to speak English - he learned the song lyrics "much like a parrot learns to talk" according to Briet!
Our trip home was wonderful. Icelandair flight service is great. The Boeing 757-200 may well be my favorite airplane for comfortable travel. My seat mates were from Merritt Island; she and I chatted about gardening, quilting and traveling - he slept.Aside: please appreciate this notice which was part of the plane's exterior next to the entry door… I love the concept of naming each plane for something or place specific to the country. I wish I'd paid attention to our inbound flight! I'm guessing this is only possible because Iceland has only one airline.
Arriving in Orlando early, Barbara and I were excited about getting on the road in time to be home by midnight. Uh, no such luck. Customs was a breeze. Immigration was a breeze. The airport's baggage handlers, though, stymied our plan to get away quickly. "Inclement weather" and "construction issues" delayed our baggage TWICE: first wait happened from plane to customs (that was the weather delay). Once we passed customs, we had to reload the bags onto another conveyor to carry them to the baggage terminal as the people shuttle couldn't hold passengers and luggage (this was the construction delay). Upshot - a plane load of tired, annoyed humans and 1 dog got their bags at 11:50 PM!!!
Barbara and I loaded up on Diet Coke and headed for The Burg, arriving at 2:38 AM, we crashed until about 10 this morning! I do have to admit that I-4 is a MUCH quicker drive at that time of night!
All in all, this was a very positive trip. I don't really have a desire to return to Iceland for an extended visit, though as a stopover to Europe it might have all. Icelandair offers passengers to Europe a no-extra-charge policy of up to 6 days stay in Iceland if you've booked a round trip ticket. That might be a possibility. Even though we missed out on the Northern Lights, I had an A+ experience. I now know why people flock to hot springs!
My favorite advertisement from this experience: Icelandic sheep - free ranging since 836!
Sunday, October 22, 2017
Iceland - Silica property
What a gorgeous morning! The sky is clear, but it’s 32 degrees!! Saw this map of the Silica property. 
After breakfast, Barbara and I decided to walk to the mountain. As soon as we stepped out the hotel door, we were greeted by the sight of the sun through the steam rising. Gives a new dimension to Land of Fire?
We found snow lightly on the ground, so walked slowly over some slippery lava.
The path wound over hills of lava and by empty pools of silica, which made us aware of why keeping our feet in the lagoon was sometimes tricky.
I have been constantly amazed by plant life that grows so expansively on the lava.
As we came to the end of the path (1.5 miles), we discovered a sign stating this area is the Svartsengi Resource Park. The park recycles the geothermically heated silica water of the Svartsengi and Reykjanes lava fields through their power plants to feed the fish farms and algae farms of the Blue Lagoon. The path ended at the base of the mountain called Sylingarfell, which we didn’t climb as its 197 meters was a bit much for me.
A bit further on we passed a very unusual lava site. I want to find out what caused the whorls in the lava.
We joked about walking a stile over the steam pipe from the power plant. Another new experience!
We arrived back at hotel, put our names in again for the Northern Lights tour (very hopeful as the sky’s clear and cold). Then we spent the next 90 minutes in the lagoon, wondering what the rest of the world was doing as we floated and swam. We went all the way to the end of the lagoon and discovered a mini-spillway and a river of silica heading off into the lava field. We wished some one made a silics-proof camera case!
The clouds swept in denying us the Lights tour. Our wonderful concierge, Wendy, brought us a treat to ease our pain.
We are spending a quiet evening sorting clothes and packing for flight home. It’s been a great trip.
After breakfast, Barbara and I decided to walk to the mountain. As soon as we stepped out the hotel door, we were greeted by the sight of the sun through the steam rising. Gives a new dimension to Land of Fire?
We found snow lightly on the ground, so walked slowly over some slippery lava.
The path wound over hills of lava and by empty pools of silica, which made us aware of why keeping our feet in the lagoon was sometimes tricky.
I have been constantly amazed by plant life that grows so expansively on the lava.
As we came to the end of the path (1.5 miles), we discovered a sign stating this area is the Svartsengi Resource Park. The park recycles the geothermically heated silica water of the Svartsengi and Reykjanes lava fields through their power plants to feed the fish farms and algae farms of the Blue Lagoon. The path ended at the base of the mountain called Sylingarfell, which we didn’t climb as its 197 meters was a bit much for me.
A bit further on we passed a very unusual lava site. I want to find out what caused the whorls in the lava.
We joked about walking a stile over the steam pipe from the power plant. Another new experience!
We arrived back at hotel, put our names in again for the Northern Lights tour (very hopeful as the sky’s clear and cold). Then we spent the next 90 minutes in the lagoon, wondering what the rest of the world was doing as we floated and swam. We went all the way to the end of the lagoon and discovered a mini-spillway and a river of silica heading off into the lava field. We wished some one made a silics-proof camera case!
The clouds swept in denying us the Lights tour. Our wonderful concierge, Wendy, brought us a treat to ease our pain.
We are spending a quiet evening sorting clothes and packing for flight home. It’s been a great trip.
Saturday, October 21, 2017
Iceland - Reykjavík
We woke to a marvelous view of the Silica lagoon. Misty clouds rising into windless air. Postcard pretty.
The bus to Reykjavík was an easy ride of less than hour. We left the central bus terminal and walked up to the top of the city to the Hallgrimskirkja, which, if we interpreted the signs correctly, is a Lutheran church. It was clean, crisp and serene inside. I felt photography was inappropriate in this space, which is unusa as I’ve taken pictures inside any number of churches before. One really cool tidbit is that someone created a wrought iron frame mounted on a pole through which one can photograph the church. I should have scrunched down just a bit more, but the effect obvious. 
We stopped at the Einer Jonsson Sculpture Garden and were awed by the bronzes. The one I liked best was Memorial to a Lost Airliner. Though I tried several times to get a quality picture, nothing captured the feeling, so I let it go. I’ll try to find a photo on the web later.
Following Marco’s suggestion from yesterday, we wandered down toward the harbor via the closed-off street , the site of the Soup Festival. We missed the festival but did encounter this intriguing lady:
We were intrigued with this housing row as it echoed the famous Rainbow Row in Charleston, SC.
We stopped to salute the Leif Eiricsson memorial, thanking him for finding Vinland!
We shopped in an amusing store:
We admired the swans and ducks guarding the waterways of the city:
Lunch was at Primo, a marvelous Italian bistro that’s been on this site since 1876. The food was fabulous. The atmosphere intoxicating; it’s been decades since I dined at a restaurant sporting real
tallow candles.
Our postprandial stroll offered an inquisitive feline watching a bird, an interesting wharf-side mural, a potted plant we couldn’t identify and an abandoned hexagonal building we could find no information on:
A quiet bus ride back to Blue Lagoon and a walk through the lava field to Silica gave the gift of an evening sky reflected on the geothermal pools we passed:
The tour companies declined to schedule Northern Lights tours tonight, so we have only one more chance. Fingers crossed!,,
An aside: Our hotel has an efficient, environmentally sound toilet flushing system - large and small buttons reflect toilet use!
Iceland - The Golden Circle
Mountaineers of Iceland picked us up at just after 8 AM. Hafsteinn (call me Haf) was our guide, accompanied by two videographers from the company (Alex and Marco) who rode along to take pictures for a new brochure and website update. And, thank goodness they were there. Read on to discover why.
Our tour vehicle is a one-of-a-kind truck made here by the company. It takes a Ford F350 Super cab engine and and front end, then melds that to the body of an old Expedition, creating a limo-like, 6 door off-roader that rides very smoothly on the paved roads while being able to navigate the lava beds and glacier tracks of this tour.
We drove around the coast road but the morning was kind of foggy with limited visibility, so not much to see except for rugged cliffs, pounding surf and lonely cottages and houses. I can’t help wondering how these folks stay sane out here in the hinterlands but I guess their daily lives are so focused on working that they have little down time.
Our first stop was the small waterfall, Flaxa Tunda, which houses a big salmon ladder off to the left of the falls and some gorgeous scenery.
From there , we traveled to the bigger falls at Gulfloss and discovered the tale of Sigridur who with her sisters began leading tourists to the hard to reach falls in the late 1800’s.The water falls into a gorge that I could not climb down to get a good image of, so you’ll just have to imagine the 100’ chasm into which the water flows. This water comes from the Langjokull glacier which is our next stop after the geysers.
The smallish geyser park offered a 20 minute stroll over lava beds winding through a series of fumaroles and geysers, one of which had the nicety to erupt while we watched. It wasn’t Old Faithful but it was cool.
Snowmobiling on a glacier was a lot more involved than I anticipated. First, we had to stop and let the air out of the tires so they had more surface on the iced-over lava of the road, then we had to suit up in first a heavy snowsuit, then in a bright orange weather-all cover up, followed by a head/neck warmer and topped by a heavy duty motor cycle helmet with visor. I could hardly move, getting into the truck to drive up to the glacier filed and the snowmobiles was a feat!
All was worth it to stand on a glacier and walk around throwing snowballs and looking at bleakness wondering how Peary and Amundsen ever managed to stay alive! The black over the snow is not all lava, most is the ash from the 2007 eruption which is gradually going away but covers everything! It even rains ash when the mists come and dirties the car windows so riders can’t see a thing.
After the glacier, we went to the national park to view where the tectonic plates between Europe and America meet. About three years ago, the plates jarred apart and left a huge ravine that sports a walkover and was where a season 2 episode of Game of Thrones was filmed. Amazingly enough, the water here is 100% clear and people dive in it. We came across a few divers returning from their swim. Then we hiked through a birch forest over trails that rivaled those of the cliff walk on Guernsey until we came to the tectonic plate wall!!! Humbling! Mom would have been in 7th Heaven!
This is looking down into the Earth where the plates jarred open three years ago. There’s no way to get an accurate sense of the depth of this hole.
All over Iceland we saw the ponies and the sheep for which the island is famous. We even spotted a riding club out for a jaunt.
As the tour wound down, we stopped for excellent pizza at the biggest farm furthest from the sea where everything on
the pizza was locally sourced!
We arrived back at Silica, tired and happy after a 10 hour tour of this scenic and intriguing country!
Our tour vehicle is a one-of-a-kind truck made here by the company. It takes a Ford F350 Super cab engine and and front end, then melds that to the body of an old Expedition, creating a limo-like, 6 door off-roader that rides very smoothly on the paved roads while being able to navigate the lava beds and glacier tracks of this tour.
We drove around the coast road but the morning was kind of foggy with limited visibility, so not much to see except for rugged cliffs, pounding surf and lonely cottages and houses. I can’t help wondering how these folks stay sane out here in the hinterlands but I guess their daily lives are so focused on working that they have little down time.
Our first stop was the small waterfall, Flaxa Tunda, which houses a big salmon ladder off to the left of the falls and some gorgeous scenery.
From there , we traveled to the bigger falls at Gulfloss and discovered the tale of Sigridur who with her sisters began leading tourists to the hard to reach falls in the late 1800’s.The water falls into a gorge that I could not climb down to get a good image of, so you’ll just have to imagine the 100’ chasm into which the water flows. This water comes from the Langjokull glacier which is our next stop after the geysers.The smallish geyser park offered a 20 minute stroll over lava beds winding through a series of fumaroles and geysers, one of which had the nicety to erupt while we watched. It wasn’t Old Faithful but it was cool.
Snowmobiling on a glacier was a lot more involved than I anticipated. First, we had to stop and let the air out of the tires so they had more surface on the iced-over lava of the road, then we had to suit up in first a heavy snowsuit, then in a bright orange weather-all cover up, followed by a head/neck warmer and topped by a heavy duty motor cycle helmet with visor. I could hardly move, getting into the truck to drive up to the glacier filed and the snowmobiles was a feat!
All was worth it to stand on a glacier and walk around throwing snowballs and looking at bleakness wondering how Peary and Amundsen ever managed to stay alive! The black over the snow is not all lava, most is the ash from the 2007 eruption which is gradually going away but covers everything! It even rains ash when the mists come and dirties the car windows so riders can’t see a thing.
After the glacier, we went to the national park to view where the tectonic plates between Europe and America meet. About three years ago, the plates jarred apart and left a huge ravine that sports a walkover and was where a season 2 episode of Game of Thrones was filmed. Amazingly enough, the water here is 100% clear and people dive in it. We came across a few divers returning from their swim. Then we hiked through a birch forest over trails that rivaled those of the cliff walk on Guernsey until we came to the tectonic plate wall!!! Humbling! Mom would have been in 7th Heaven!
This is looking down into the Earth where the plates jarred open three years ago. There’s no way to get an accurate sense of the depth of this hole.All over Iceland we saw the ponies and the sheep for which the island is famous. We even spotted a riding club out for a jaunt.
As the tour wound down, we stopped for excellent pizza at the biggest farm furthest from the sea where everything on
the pizza was locally sourced!We arrived back at Silica, tired and happy after a 10 hour tour of this scenic and intriguing country!
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