Djupivogur, Iceland

Today we have a tour to visit the Jokulsarlon Glacier Lagoon which is 107 miles from the port. Our meeting time was at 8 am. We were at the tender ticket station just before 7 and managed to get on the first tender.

Years ago when they didn’t have this process of tickets, people would line up for the tenders down on A deck and the line would spiral up 4 or 5 floors. It was a mess. This process of getting tickets first is much better. All in the party must b present and ready to go before a ticket is handed out. When a tender arrives the entire group goes down together.

There were only four of us on this tour. We left for the lagoon at about 7:45. It is foggy, cloudy, and rainy. The sun sets about 11 pm and rises about 3 am. It always seems to be daylight but it is never very bright. The sun remains low in the sky.

Views from the ride. Our driver was born and raised here. The summer temperatures don’t get out of the 60s and the winter temperatures rarely are below freezing. This is a lot different than I imagined.

We arrived at the glacial lagoon about 10:30. This gave us about an hour to explore. The lagoon is a holding place for iceberg that break off from the glacier. The water in this fiord is from the sea and the warmer water helps melt the glacier.

It was very cloudy and raining. This really didn’t allow us to see much of the lagoon. Only the closest icebergs were visible. There were a group of kayakers amongst the icebergs and also some amphibious vehicles taking folks on a tour.

We spent an hour here and that included grabbing some lunch. It was already time to head back to the port. Last tender was a 2:30.

We were one of the last tenders back to the ship. The ship was already underway by 3pm.

We did manage to do some team trivia.

A group of camels is referred to as? Caravan

A group of cobras? Quiver

A group of ferrets? A business

Group Of jaguars? A prowl

Group of Jellyfish? A smack

A group of lemurs? Conspiracy

Group of porcupines? A prickle

A group of Rhinos? A crash

A group of skunks? A stench

A group of sharks? A shiver

A group of sting rays? A Fever

A group of frogs? An army

A group of ravens? Unkindness

A group of parrots? A pandemonium

A group of Hyenas? A cackle

We could have this trivia test every night and still do poorly. These have been spread out through any trivia tests but this one was the all in one.

We watched and listened to the piano trio after dinner. The cellist introduced a tune written by George Gershwin’s sister, Ira. Of course we had to let the cellist know that was his brother, not sister. He was quite surprised to hear that. The violinist talked about another composer and said this was her most prolific piece. He obviously didn’t know what the word meant. A prolific composer has composed a great number of pieces. Today they performed threes different versions of Ave Maria. It was their best performance so far. Previous performances have been full of wrong notes and questionable intonation. This group tends to practice if front of everyone before their performance and concert notes are based on “feelings”, not facts. Compared to the other string groups we have heard on other cruises, this is the weakest one. Out of all of the boxes to check on their audition, delivery of high quality music accompanied by correct background of the composer was not on the list. I’m just glad they aren’t the pilot, co-pilot and navigator of the ship.

Tomorrow we arrive in Reykjavik at 10 am.