It looks like the surface of the moon, if the moon had been left out of the refrigerator for too long and was starting to fester. Iceland, chew-toy of Thor's dog, whose toothmarks pock the landscape alongside the jagged, volcanic crevasses that form the cold vulvas of old mother despair. Not a vacation spot. A forbidding tundra suitable only for mammoth and the brave, ruddy Inuit. You realize after a few minutes that the pride of Iceland is its sheep, which they dissect in innumerable ways to make sweaters and hats and mittens and mutton and all manner of dumb things made of wool, like torturous underwear that nobody could wear except Christian martyrs.
Food is limited.
But in Reykjavik, you actually get a choice of cuisines. You have the choice of Chinese, or Italian. We were horribly excited to go to the flea market. We got up hours early and left the Hotel SAGA, which was sort of like a Hyatt Regency you'd find in pre-Lech Walesa Poland. Vast empty banquet halls with people sitting at huge round tables, huddled together against the emptiness, taking turns at the mutton and smoked fish buffet.