Iceland Babymoon day 4: Museums and Monuments

After all that driving, we decided to lay low today and meander around the capital of Iceland and check out some art and history. This is one of the most recognizable buildings in Reykjavik, The Harpa Concert hall I mentioned in the first post by Olafur Eliasson. The building is made of distinctive colored glass inspired by the basalt landscape of Iceland. 

We walked into town from our hotel today since the weather was pretty nice, and saw lots of cute colorful buildings. 

And really pretty graffiti. 

Statues in squares. 

We checked out the photography museum where the exhibition featured a selection of works by Hasselblad Award winners, with a particular focus on portraiture. Seen from the eyes of seven photographers, with works from the late 1940s until 2014, the exhibition featured seminal pieces by legendary photographers such as Irving Penn – and his portrayals of Salvador Dalí and Marcel Duchamp – or Richard Avedon, depicting the power elite of 1970s America. The exhibition also includes Avedon’s iconic fashion photograph Dovima with Elephants, Evening Dress by Dior, Cirque d’Hiver, Paris, August 1955. Pictured below. 

Stunning! So many of them were amazing but this was one of my favorites. 

We tried to find some lunch when we saw this sign. Definitely a Babymoon lunch spot! There's actually a laundromat on the bottom floor with a kids play area and upstairs was the restaurant. We've noticed Scandinavian countries like Iceland and Denmark are very baby/kid friendly in general.Then after I took this picture I noticed Mike's face...

That handsome devil. 

One of the more popular squares. 

This was the settlement museum which I was intrigued to see since it was the spot where the first settlers of Iceland settled! They went into the history of Iceland and how it came to be 1000 years ago. Most of the settlers in Iceland were Norwegian and Gaelic. 

This was the actual house that was here that had a hearth in the middle, stables where animals stayed with them, and a porch. 

Artifacts from times past. A walrus tusk! Apparently they are rare to see here but there is a lot of ocean life and fishing in Iceland. 

Coast guard boats in the harbor on the way to the Harpa Concert Hall. 

This building is pretty much all windows. And it lights up at night. 

So geometric. They had actual artists and shows getting ready so we didn't stay long but took a quick look around.

Mountains in the distance. 

Then we walked down Laugavegur street, the Newbury street of Iceland where there were lots of shopping spots and restaurants. 

They already had some Christmas decor up!

We went to the Lebowski bar, which had every White Russian you could imagine and milkshakes. They had a projector screen that played music and displayed facts about the movie. 

They also had a Chuck Norris grill which we didn't go into but was pretty awesome. 

Ironic shop signs. 

Cool rock wall buildings. 

This is the Hofdi house. It is best known as the location for the 1986 Reykjavík summit meeting of presidents Ronald Reagan of the United States and Mikhail Gorbachev of the Union of Soviet Socialist Republics. That effectively was a step to the end of the Cold War.

Hallgrímskirkja church is a Lutheran church and the tallest church in Iceland! It definitely has a more unique design that many of the churches we have seen. 

After we walked up an appetite, we went to this soup place on Laugavegur street called Svarta Kaffi that had this amazing cauliflower soup in a bread bowl. Tasted like broccoli chowder. Definitely the kind of meal we needed on this cloudy chilly day in Iceland. 

We are going home early since we need to be up early to head to one of Icelsnds largest attractions, the Blue Lagoon a large geothermal hot spring. We'll hang out there until our flight at 5!

Iceland Babymoon day 5: The Blue Lagoon and Home