Hverageroi! This is the name of a town in the southern part
of Iceland. We never did learn quite how to pronounce the word! The Icelanders
we met couldn’t understand our English pronunciation and we weren’t able to
imitate the Icelandic way of saying the name.
Icelanders have their own language and it did seem unusual
to our ears. The words seemed soft and almost blurred together. It was unlike
other tongues we have heard in our travels. However, for the most part communication
was easy. Both English and Danish are subjects taught in school and most
Icelanders seemed to be fairly fluent with spoken English.
In Hverageroi, we especially enjoyed the town swimming pool.
It was an outdoor Olympic sized pool with two smaller hot tubs. All of the
towns we visited had their own swimming pool and often a large sports arena as
well. With the advantage of thermal heating, the pools are able to stay open
year round. There didn’t seem to be any shortage of hot water. This was
especially true in the area around Hverageroi.
The natural underground heat source has also benefited
commerce in town. While growing greenhouse tomatoes and lettuce might seem a
bit of a contradiction in a location so close to the Arctic Circle, in
Hverageroi it is indeed a reality. I believe that the greenhouse operators have
even experimented with growing bananas!
We walked lots while we were here. We circled the many
greenhouses and walked around the fenced off thermal area in the centre of
town, watching the steam rise from the various hot spots in the ground. Then we
walked along a trail down by the river. In the past this area was known as a
wool trading post and we passed by the remains of the old wool shed on the
bank. Power and heat were generated from the hot springs.
It rained while we were in Hverageroi so we didn’t take
pictures. However, this was the one spot during the week where we found
Internet access. There was a small shopping mall consisting of a grocery store,
coffee shop, two souvenir stores and a post office. When we sat on the floor
outside the post office we were able to connect to an Internet server. If we
walked the dozen or so steps to the coffee shop we lost the connection.
Because this was one of the few places we found with
Internet access and the bonus of public washrooms, we did spend an hour or so
in the mall. During that time several tour buses pulled in for passengers to
use the facilities. I mention this because of the general scarcity of public
WC’s for travellers. This mall would
have been the first stop for tour buses out of Reykjavik on the way to the famous
geyser. I will write more about the geyser in the next post!
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