Tuesday - day 11 - Grundarfjörður, Iceland

Tuesday was our last stop in towns along the northern coast of Iceland. Grundarfjörður (GRUN-dar-FYUR-thur) is actually more on the northwestern side of Iceland.

Carl took a picture to show a "special" kind of yogurt available at the Lido buffet onboard -- Spinach and Kale. He got a spoonful of it one day and we tried it, but we haven't gotten it again. It does not seem to be very popular, but the Lido buffet continues to make it available!

There was another, smaller cruise ship tied up at the pier, but we would be tendering into port.

This is identified to be the most photographed mountain in Iceland, Kirkjufell, also known as Church Mountain.

Town map as we got off the tender

It wasn't a pretty sunny day on the day we were visiting, but we saw this photograph displayed of Kirkjufell (aka Church Mountain) and Kirkjufellsfoss (Kirkjufell falls) so Carl took a picture to show what it *could* look like.

We stopped by Grundarfjarðarkirkja (Grundarfjörður Church), but it was locked so we couldn't go in.

A picture of Kirkjufell from the front of the church -- in the foreground are interesting homes that look like they are built out of shipping containers -- on this end they had a garage door, on the other end, they had a large picture window. They were built like townhouses right next to each other. I'm not sure how the flat roofs deal with snow and I couldn't really see other windows!

Pretty flowers in front of a house in town -- Google Lens says they are Perennial Cornflower, also known as a Mountain Bluet.

We decided to make the walk/hike out to Kirkjufellsfoss (Kirkjufell falls) and the view of Kurkjufell... it would be about 3.5 miles round trip, and the weather wasn't great, but we decided to go for it!

Kurkjufell with some Icelandic ponies and a house near the fjord

Closer up Icelandic ponies - they were in a pasture area that was temporary -- and they were loving those blue flowers!

We walked to a pull-off along the road to see what the signage had to say...

We were walking along a path that was a little separated from the roadway...

A house with an interested geodesic dome that would have a view over the fjord. We wondered if it is a rental accommodation or maybe a place for viewing the northern lights.

Interesting looking plants next to a brook -- Google Lens said that it is cottongrass -- the tufts that remain after flowering definitely look like cotton.

A set of falls along our walk

We saw others taking pictures of the reflection of Kirkjufell, so we did too. It was good that we did when we first got there as later, when we were leaving, the water's surface was rippling so there wasn't a good reflection.

Zoomed in, looking back at our ship at anchor (on the left) and the smaller ship at the pier

Non-zoomed in view looking back at the ships near town -- this was from the top of the waterfall (Kirkjufellsfoss).

Kirkjufellsfoss and Kirkjufell

Selfie with the waterfalls -- it was spitting rain so I had put on my pail-like rain hat

Kirkjufellsfoss

We had passed a stables (where the horses were in the temporary pasture) - a group came by on a trail ride while we were at the falls.

Side note: Carl has decided that "fjörður", appearing at the end of multiple city names, means "Icelandic". So, when I called the horses, "Icelandic ponies", he renamed them "ponyfjörður". And the mountain was "mountainfjörður". After the ponies went by and we were returning on the same path they had been on, there was "manurefjörður" on the path. 

In reality, we think that in "fjörður", "ður" means city/town, and "fjör" means fjord, so, "Grundarfjörður" probably means "Grundar" town on the fjord, whatever "Grundar" might mean!

We found the houses to look quite a bit different in Grundarfjörður than we had seen in other northern Iceland cities -- this one actually is more like the other cities...

... but the houses in Grundarfjörður seemed to be more built like single story ranch houses (like the third one in this picture) or more square and less "pretty" (to my eyes).

Oh good, the ship looks closer now!

We stopped in the grocery store to see what kinds of things they have...

Cereal

Cat food

As we got close to the pier, we noticed this popup camper that has been re-purposed into a temporary souvenir stand!

After we got back on the ship, I took a picture of a "marshmallow" farm (probably silage or possibly large round hay bales in the field).

As we headed away from Grundarfjörður, we had one last view of Kirkjufell, so we took a picture so it can continue to be the most photographed mountain in Iceland.

Back onboard, we were entertained by comedian Steven Scott.

We have two sea days coming up, and we're looking forward to resting and hopefully knocking out our colds!

Monday - day 11 - Ísafjörður, Iceland

On Monday, we visited Ísafjörður (EE-sah-fyur-thur).

We walked down to the area where the Westfjords Heritage Museum was located, but we decided to opt out of visiting this museum today.

We decided to walk back toward the town and along the way saw several boats in the marina.

Looking across the harbor area to the town

More of the boats in the marina

Ísafjörður church

Fire station at end of side street

Coffee house and bakery around the corner and post office across the street.

Entrepreneurial coffee shop signs near the Rainbow Path

Rainbow Path

Same entrepreneurial coffee shop -- this was the sign at the entrance (that wasn't indicated in any other way that we noticed!).

We had seen this flower location earlier and went back to get our pictures taken. We offered to take the pictures of another couple, and they reciprocated. We then chatted with them for a while -- they were on the MSC ship that had been with us at Akureyri the day before and was here too. They live near Dover, England and have been on quite a few cruises. We had a good chat with them.

Though we had walked past these earlier, this time we noticed how pretty these flowers were.

Google Lens tells me that they are Livingstone daisies.

We had gone into the Nettó supermarket earlier -- looking for medications as the pharmacy was closed on Monday (Commerce Day). No medications found, but we found reasonably priced (for Iceland) teeshirts that we purchased.

We had thought that the photo of the Ísafjörður church from a distance would be sufficient, but the couple we met at the flower photo ring encouraged us to visit inside the church.

Some of the pretty houses with the towering sides of the fjord above them

Front of Ísafjarðarkirkja (Ísafjörður church) -- with its organ and pipes and interesting art piece, 

From Google: 

The main altar centerpiece of the modern Ísafjarðarkirkja (Ísafjörður Church) in Iceland features a stunning, minimalist installation titled “Birds of Heaven,” consisting of exactly 749 unique clay doves. 

Key Details of the Altar Piece 

The Design: Rather than a traditional painted altarpiece, the installation displays hundreds of distinct clay birds suspended on the wall, arranged to look like they are soaring upward in flight together. 

Community Project: Every single clay bird was handmade by local residents of the Westfjords town during a collective community art program. It serves as a powerful symbol of unity and local spirit. 

The Setting: The altar is housed inside a striking modernist church completed in 1995 (replacing an older church destroyed by fire in 1987). The sharp, sweeping architecture of the building mimics ocean waves and ship sails.

There were pictures relating the creation of "Birds of Heaven" (Fuglar himinsins) with pictures of the townspeople involved in the building: 

Bertel Thorvaldsen's "Christus" sculpture - the quote at the bottom is "Come to Me" in Icelandic

Looking down a side street to the large mountain with ice fields on it across from the mouth of the fjord

We have seen a few recreational trailers while visiting Iceland -- we are surprised by them being only single axle and by the very long rear overhang/tail wag. You'd have to be very careful when pulling away from a fueling island!

Again we had hot chocolate and water available to us as we headed back to the tenders...

Our tender with the MSC cruise ship at the pier beyond

We need to show our key cards as we go to board the tender.

Getting ready to board the tender...

... finding an available seat on the tender

After getting off the tender, going through identity check and bag check onboard the ship

From our balcony, overview pictures of Ísafjörður

Another picture of Ísafjörður from our balcony

We headed up to deck 9 to get hot dogs at Dive In near the Lido pool.

As we sailed out of the fjord, we got a good view of the fish farming areas in the fjord.

Each of these towns in the north part of Iceland have their own character along with similarities. They are beautiful, though I think they have a lot of cloudy days and very cold and snowy in the winter time. 

The evening show was by the ship's cast and they did a tribute to female singers -- Carl was impressed how they used the screens around the room to look like different components -- the curtains around the stage and the wall sconces were all just being displayed on screens, not physically there.

The same area up around the stage with different lighting later in the show.

We have been to a few productions by the Holland America cast and we're not overly impressed. We decided to give them "one last try" with this presentation and... that's probably it. We've really enjoyed the guest entertainers; the cast just seems lacking. But that's okay, there's lots of other things to see and do on the ship!

After the evening show, we went to a ballroom dance competition. We've gone to watch "Ballroom Dance Hour" a couple of times on the cruise -- there are a few couples who appear to be very good ballroom dancers and we enjoy seeing them. Five of the couples we've seen during the "Ballroom Dance Hour" participated in a competition that the rest of the passengers could watch and enjoy. We had dinner one evening with a couple from Australia that we had watched previously and who participated in the competition. We were watching looking down from the deck above, so we didn't have the best view, but it was still enjoyable to see our fellow passengers strut their stuff!