“Fellowship of the Ring Road”    The reasoning behind Carol’s and my decision to rent a camper van was a Plan B idea for having a place to sleep, in the event we arrived in a remote village lacking available hotel accommodations. We’d both camped in our distant pasts, but recent impulses to rent a […]

Photos by Carol Madigan    The thing I like most about my irrational fears is that they’re so unhinged from reality that I can take solace that they will never come to be.    And so it was on the third full day of our Iceland adventure that I found that my credit card was […]

Photo Credit: Carol Madigan    Carol and I have reached a compromise between our competing travel objectives. Mixing her desire to plan, see and experience as much as she can with mine, which is  to plan, see and experience as little as possible, we came up with the following compromise for our first day in […]

Photo Credit: Carol Madigan    We loaded up on wine in the Reykjavik duty free shop, less out of a sense of economy than the angst of trying to find a state liquor store in the Icelandic hinterland in the shadow of happy hour. This added considerably to the schlepping after the airport bus left […]

Photo Credit: Carol Madigan    We copped the last two standby seats on what turned out to be Delta’s first Minneapolis to Reykjavik run in more than a year and a half, and we were boarded immediately as the gangway door closed shut behind us. I had my phone perched on the “reserve” button for […]

Photo Credit: Carol Madigan Minneapolis-Reykjavik 30 seats    When Carol informed me I was in charge of photocopying our travel documents, I knew it meant I wasn’t being allowed anywhere near the suitcases or packing. Trying to fit every clothing contingency for a trip to Iceland into two carry-ons requires the engineering skills of astronauts […]

   Annie Kisska chose to study German as a middle schooler, because it was very different from the Spanish she had been speaking, growing up at home with her mother and nanny.    “My mother had worked in South America for a number of years, and our nanny mostly spoke Spanish. I was looking for […]

Standby status: Santa Ana – Minneapolis 19 open seats Minneapolis- Reykjavik 32 open seats    Always Bring Coats. That’s what the title of today’s blog stands for. By design, Carol and I choose to travel in what the tourist industry calls the “shoulder” season – not off-peak, but as close as possible without getting ridiculous […]

May 17, 2021 Dear diary,    Reid said he was interested in learning more about Icelandic history. One of the contributors to an Iceland travel tips fb page suggested a book, Island on Fire, about Iceland’s volcanic past. I know the risk I’m taking. His children have told me something about his “phases,” when he […]

Photo credit: Lovisa Photo  Planned departure: 5/27/2021 Available seats: (LAX-JFK: 110)  (JFK-Reykjavik: 38)    To be successful, this standby trip can’t be approached with the usual lack of study and planning that I normally apply to my travels. In past trips to Europe, we’ve been able to adjust on the fly depending on seating availability […]