Iceland, Sunday, September 24, 2023 & Monday, September 25, 2023...

Time to head home. We were out to the coach at 6:30am. Our drive today was from Vik to the Blue Lagoon. It was so very windy. Claude and I both commented it was a "Butt Kickin' Wind". Literally, as I walked from the front of the hotel out to the parking lot, the wind almost blew me over and tried to take my suitcase on its own journey! One little girl was having such a bad time of it, her dad picked her up and manhandled her suitcase and his. It was a mighty wind!!

This are final views of Iceland between Vik and the Blue Lagoon.

The drive from Vik to the Blue Lagoon was about three hours. We would stop once at a nice bakery to get something for breakfast. All of us had opted out of breakfast before leaving. Along the way, McKenna let us see two pieces of Icelandic Krona. This country is really pretty much paper-free. They prefer credit cards. Most of us never exchanged our American dollars for krona. 

The Blue Lagoon is the most visited tourist site in Iceland. It is close to Reykjavik near a geothermal power plant. The water from the plant mixes with the water coming up out of the earth. It is rich in minerals giving it a distinctive blue color. Again, the timing for enjoying this site was perfect. After a week of trekking around Iceland and before the flights that would get us all to our homes, it was very soothing to relax in this warm, mineral-rich water for a couple of hours. A heartfelt thank you to McKenna who had a cellphone that could take some water. She took hers into the water at Sky Lagoon and Blue Lagoon and took any pictures any of us wanted taken. Then she carefully made sure all these pictures were sent to our individual cell phones before we got to the airport. 

And just like that, we headed to the airport for our flight back to Denver. We would spend the night in Denver and catch at flight about 10am Monday straight through to Cincinnati.

We stayed at a Comfort Inn near the airport. When we checked in, they had upgraded us to a beautiful two room suite with an enormous bathroom. It felt really nice to be in a hotel room with lots of room to be. 

While sitting at the Delta gate in the Denver Airport waiting for our flight home on Monday, the gate workers came and brought a cornhole game. They challenged those waiting for their flight to a competition with one of the gate attendants. If the attendant won the game, they got to leave 20 minutes early! Then they brought out a spinning wheel game with snacks you could win. Claude and I played that. It was great fun and helped us pass that waiting at the gate time much easier. 

Our flight went well. Our luggage made to Cincinnati. Our Global Entry card got us right through customs. We managed to get a shuttle to our car pretty quickly and we were on our way home. We stopped at Chipotle's for our evening meal. It was good to have a Dr. Pepper and bean and rice. I was happy. 

This was an amazing trip. I highly recommend it. So much to see and learn and enjoy. New foods to try. Everyday was fun.