We hiked up to the Myrdalsjokull glacier. 
The weather kept changing drastically during our hike. One minute it would be sunny and the next freezing and raining like in this photo with my sister. 
All along the way we saw these streams running down from the sides of the mountains. 
In some places there were so many they made a loud rushing sound. 
Of course Dave as usual was way ahead of the rest of us….. 
and was the first to reach the sign that said we shouldn’t proceed any further without proper ice hiking equipment. Since everyone else seemed to be ignoring the sign we did too and kept walking closer to the glacier. 
My intrepid brother-in-law Ken climbed a little further and higher than the rest of us.
When we got up right close to the glacier the sun came out.
And Ken and Dave hammed it up a bit for the photographer. 
This fellow hiker lived in Columbia for most of her life but now resides in Florida. Here she is telling Ken and Dave about the effects of the recent hurricane in her home city of Fort Lauderdale. 
She offered to take group photos of us. 
Myrdalsjokull is Iceland’s fourth largest glacier covering nearly 600 square kilometers. 
It is on top of the volcano Katla which erupts every 40-80 years. The last eruption was in 1918. 
Apparently at places the ice on this glacier is hundreds of metres thick. 
On our drive home from the glacier we stopped at another lookout point to see the iconic local landform nicknamed The Three Trolls. Can you see the faint rainbow off to the left?
Although the constant switch of the weather from cold and rainy to sunny and warmer all day wasn’t convenient it did create many beautiful rainbows
and some lovely light effects over the ocean. 
We’ve only been in Iceland a couple days but I’m beginning to believe what writer Stephen Markley said is true……. 
“The problem with driving around in Iceland is that you’re basically confronted by a new soul-enriching, breath-taking, life-affirming natural sight every five minutes. It’s totally exhausting.”
Other posts……………….
Hiking Up to the Church in Vik Iceland
My friend Sue and I toured Ernest Hemingway’s house in Key West and saw the more than fifty cats that make their home there, direct descendants of a feline that was a gift to Hemingway from a Florida sea-captain. Apparently during the hurricane a group of dedicated employees stayed behind to protect the Hemingway house and the cats even though authorities ordered them to evacuate and Hemingway’s granddaughter urged them to evacuate as well. 
In Marathon Florida we went for a sail on a boat our friends Ed and Millie had worked on during an earlier visit to the Keys. I have read that at one point Marathon was completely underwater and many marinas in the area look like giant shipwrecks. 
I wonder how our boat the Geni Green and its Captain Jay fared? 
Another thing we did in the Keys was take a drive down Alligator Alley. We saw literally hundreds of alligators. 
News reports say that thousands of these alligators have been displaced from their natural habitat because of the hurricane and some are wandering the streets of Florida’s cities and towns. 
Every summer since I’ve been seven I’ve spent time at this lakeside cottage. Its been in our family for three generations. My brother and his family are the current owners and they work so hard to continually improve it. They keep it looking absolutely lovely! I am so appreciative of the way they are maintaining a piece of our family history and also how generous they are about sharing it with family members. They warmly welcomed me this last weekend when I drove out for a quick visit. 
I have lived in twenty- one different homes since I was born, but the cottage has been a constant in my life. Spending a day there always calms my spirit and rests my mind. Sitting around a dancing fire under a black sky brilliant with stars, long chats with family members, reading a good book in a comfortable sunny spot, eating a perfectly barbecued steak at the picnic table, having my morning coffee looking out over the glassy water, hearing a loon call, seeing a doe and her fawn on the road, dipping into the lake for a refreshing swim, watching hummingbirds, going for a boat ride and being disconnected from my cell phone and the internet. It’s the best kind of therapy. 
We were invited to the new home of friends who recently moved to the St. James area of the city. The only bus I could take arrived a good forty minutes before our dinner date time. Walking towards our friends’ home from the bus stop I came upon a lovely little park I didn’t even know existed. 
As I wandered into Benjaminson Park I came upon a sign that explained the park had been named after Skuli Benjaminson (1879-1970) a pioneer who had owned one of the first homes in the area. He helped chop down trees so Portage Avenue could be built and was instrumental in bringing power lines into the area. 
He was the only owner of a car and telephone in the neighborhood’s early days and he generously provided communication and transportation services to his neighbors. 
Benjaminson Park is lovely. There’s a bench under a tree which is the perfect place to read. 
You have a lovely view of the river. 
I sat reading my book for a good half hour enjoying the beautiful purple flowers around me, the birds swooping down to the river and the leafy greenery. I was almost sorry to leave but a fabulous meal with great friends awaited me.
Winnipeg is full of little parks like the Benjaminson. It would be neat someday to do a pilgrimage and try to visit them all. 
