Page 20 - 2000 ICELAND

Through her we discovered that our “French” companions were not all from
France. Some of them were French speaking Swiss including Rosemary and

her two traveling companions. We slept in bunk beds and the room was
quite nice (no one snored) and the lights blazed on outside. This night, I

woke up about 1:30 AM and looked out in real amazement to see the sun
still shining. Our internal clocks are all wrong so sleep is still somewhat

fitful, which explains the waking up at 1:30 after having only gotten into bed

about 12:00.

Footnote: Not much was made of the fact that today was American
Independence Day, but Oskar did give Kay and I a candy bar each to
th
celebrate. He made some little announcement about its being the 4 of July
and the French folk politely clapped and we laughingly thanked them for

sending Lafayette at the right time. We felt the “ice” beginning to melt
among the group as people turned and smiled and some even revealed that

they understood what we were saying!

TURF HOUSE MUSEUM

Regular breakfast at 8 and then we left for a “turf house” museum visit at 9

AM. A Lutheran priest and farmer and his family were the latest to live here
and they did so until 1947. The house was originally built in the early

1800s. The structure has turf walls and roof with timbers shoring everything
up. There is a long corridor with many rooms coming off it, a few for living

space, but most for storage of foods and other supplies, another few for
“shops” where blacksmithing, weaving, churning, etc. could be carried on.

The house was originally smaller but was added onto in the l900s. There

were many old implements and storage devices displayed in the appropriate

rooms. The actual sleeping and sitting room functions were contained in
one narrow chamber with built-in

benches which served as the beds
at night and the chairs or “sofas”

during the day. Men were on one