May 26th Hateigsskoli Visit, Golden Circle Tour, Last Group Meal

Our last day was a busy one.  We started with two hours at Hateigssskoli, a school of 450 students in grades 1 through 10.  Karla and I like this school because the principal, Ásgeir Beinteinsson, has such a clear vision of promoting learning by ensuring students, staff, and parents are happy with the school and feel it is safe, and by supporting ancillary subjects which foster creativity.  


For example, all students fill out a short survey (which they do not sign) that asks if they are happy with school, if they are being bullied, if they think someone else is being bullied (they are asked to identify the victim), and if they think someone is being a bully (they are asked to name the bullies as well).  It is very simple, straight forward, and direct, but it provides valuable information upon which they can act.  It also makes it very easy to get parents on board to address their child's behavior when they see that numerous students feel their child is engaging in bullying behavior. Throughout the year parents and teachers fill out satisfaction surveys to gauge their feelings about the school.

First graders performing a dance for us.

Third or fourth graders making sweet bread in a cooking class.

Hateigsskoli has drama classes and dance classes that are participated in by every grade.  These creative activities seem to have a beneficial effect on student learning (deeper learning such as critical thinking as well as rote memorization) in the traditional subjects.  Hateigsskoli consistently performs higher than the average for Reykjavik schools, even though they have students from a mix of socio-economic levels.  Research indicates that providing enjoyable and creative classes during the school day improves the quality and quantity of student learning, so Hateigsskoli is not breaking any new ground here, they are just taking advantage this fact.

A Famous Church In Reykjavik

This is a small but interesting church on our walk to the school.

After visiting the school, we took a 6 hour Golden Circle Tour. The first stop was at the rift between the American tectonic plate and the European tectonic plate.  The plates are pulling apart at a rate of 2 centimeters (a little less than an inch) per year.  This rift actually goes all up and down the middle of the Atlantic Ocean, and it is why Iceland has so many volcanoes.  In fact, Island is the largest volcanic island on Earth. Where we were, this rift is a wide valley with the American plate on one side and the European plate on the other.  

Scenery out the bus window just outside of Reykjavik.

Donna about to go down into the rift.

The rift is the big valley at the end of the path an to th right, not the region the path is in.

Karla is standing on the American plate, the valley with the buildings is the rift area between the plates, and the hazy ridge just below the mountains is the start of the European plate.

Amy, Megan, and Donna on the American side in front of the rift valley.

This rift valley is also significant because it is where, starting in 960 AD, the Vikings in Iceland held one of the earliest parliamentary governments.  While most countries in Europe were ruled by monarchs, the Icelandic Vikings implemented a democratically elected parliament - only men of good standing in society could vote so it wasn't a perfect democracy, but it was a good first step towards a democratic republic. This lasted for about three centuries until Denmark (the oldest continuous monarchy in the world) took over.

There was lots of nice scenery on the tour.

Icelandic Horses

Our second stop was at Gullfoss (golden falls) waterfall.  This a huge and spectacular waterfall - everyone was saying that pictures just don't reflect the size of these falls.  We got wet from the mist rising up from it.  As we approached it you could feel the roar of the water.

It is hard to see the scale of these falls in the picture.

Amy, Britta, and Megan getting pictures.

Down Into the Abyss

Mist rising from the bottom of the falls - there are two steps of these falls, this is just the bottom of the last step.

The Upper Step of the Falls

The two people on the left ridge help give an indication of how massive Gullfoss is - this is just the first step.

The third stop was at a geothermically active little area with geysers.  The main geyser goes off about every 6 minutes and it gets about 100 feet high. Our tour guide said every year there are a few fools who don't think the water looks that hot and then the stick their hand in it - it severely burns them and they end up stinking of sulfur.  It was quite windy and the guide advised us to stand upwind of the geyser.  Viewers are able to stand about 20 feet from the mouth of the geyser - in fact, the students were standing about where it was roped off the first time it blew, and it was so loud and had such force that most of them screamed and ran away from it.

After a couple eruptions, our students were calm enough to take some good pictures.

In the background you can see steam rising from the ground in this geothermically active area.

Starting to blow with an upward surge of blue water - keep an eye on the people in the background to judge the size of this geyser.

Going Up

Still Going Up

Up Out of Frame

Dying Back Down

A little pool of boiling water - there were lots of these and other places where steam was just rising up out of the ground. 

Finally, after we returned to the hotel for a quick break, we went about a block down the street from our hotel to a little Italian restaurant for our final group meal. It was a nice cap to the day and our travels. Tomorrow morning the students are going to the Blue Lagoon for a spa, and then in the afternoon we leave for Minneapolis at about 4:35 pm. We get into Minneapolis about 5:55 pm.  There is a five hour time zone difference, so it is a 6 or 7 hour flight.  It has been a good month of travels, but it's getting time to head home.

You don't get to see any real puffins unless you go out onto the sea in a tour boat, but they sell stuffed puffin every where.  And they sell cooked puffin in many restaurants

     

May 25th Finally in Reykjavik

The 5:30 am breakfast made for a very short night after going to a new London hotel after midnight.  We were at Heathrow again by about 7:00 am for our 9:00 am flight, but just like last night, our departure time came and went and they had not yet posted a gate for our flight.  It just kept saying "Please Wait" - exactly what it said last night before they cancelled the flight.  Finally a gate was posted for our flight and we had a smooth and clear aired trip to Iceland.
The Hotel Reykjavik is a very nice, modern hotel.  There is no trace of volcanic ash in the air or the streets.  The students were so tired that I don't know if any of them went out shopping or exploring. Tomorrow morning we have a school visit and in the afternoon we take a bus tour of the Golden Circle.  Hopefully there will be some pictures of the students and the landscape.

May 25 1:20 a.m. no photos, no Iceland... yet

Well, we waited from 10:15 am until 9:15 pm at Heathrow airport and then at the last minute an announcement came over the public address system that our flight had been cancelled.  This was immediately followed by a LOUD collective groan.  Then they told us to go back through customs, reclaim our checked baggage, and then wait for instructions.

After we and all the other people on the flight went through customs and picked up our luggage, we were trying to decide what to do for the night.  We called Darin at Concordia to help us find hotel rooms, but then we figured we should go find out what those instructions were.  It turns out that Iceland Air is putting us up in a great hotel - The Tower Hotel - just alongside the Thames River by the Tower Bridge.  We have a spectacular view of the bridge out our window. The bus driver must not have known his way around London too well, because we drove all over London and past our hotel three times before he finally stopped there.

Everyone seems very tired.

The only bad thing about being in this wonderful hotel is that we are here for less than 6 hours. It was past 12:30 am when we got to our rooms and we get picked up to go back to Heathrow at 6:00 am.  We get a free breakfast that starts at 5:30 am.

We are already booked on a 9:00 am flight to Reykjavik.  This will eat into the time we had hoped to spend going on an all-day bus trip of Iceland's famous Golden Circle Tour (huge waterfalls, geysers, and the place in Iceland where the North American and European tectonic plates are pulling apart), but it will give the students more time to relax in the Blue Lagoon.

That's the plan for now, but stay tuned to find out what really happens.

May 24, 1:45 CDT (7:45 pm London)

Our new flight, Icelandair FI455 is scheduled to depart Heathrow at 10:15 pm.  We're all checked in and have our tickets, so it looks like we'll get to Reykjavik tonight.  It's a 3 hour flight with a one-hour time change,putting us in about 12:15 am.

The airport is really located by a small town called Keflavik, and it is really called Keflavik airport.  It's a ways away from Reykjavik, so we probably won't get checked into our hotel until well after 1:00.  Darin Stromstad, our Concordia guy, contacted the hotel to let them know we will be arriving late.

Apparently there have been no problems with flights from Reykjavik to the USA lately, so we do not expect any difficulty getting home Friday.

Some of the uncertainty today has been a little stressful on everyone, but they're all doing well.

Hopefully my next blog will be with pictures and tales of Iceland.

May 24 travel update

The Internet in the hotel went out at about 8:00 pm last night, preventing us from posting any blogs.

We are currently at Heathrow Airport, but our 1:00 pm flight to Reykjavik has been cancelled.  Darin Stromstad, our Concordia College Global Education Office contact who helped us with all the planning and did all the reservations for this trip, called us about a half an hour ago (around 4:30 am his time) to tell us we have been rebooked on Iceland Air flight 455 which is scheduled to leave late tonight.

Yesterday it appeared that Iceland Air did not cancel flights too far in advance of their scheduled departures, so we will have quite a wait before we find out if 455 gets cancelled or not.

There was one flight that flew from Heathrow to Reykjavik late last night, so a few flights seem to be getting through.

The students are all in good spirits.  They have all voiced concerns about getting back to MSP on time and not getting stranded in Iceland or London for any length of time.  They would prefer returning early to chancing a late return.  Right now it would take a huge effort and $$$ to change our bookings to allow that, but if we are not out of Heathrow by tomorrow morning, we will lobby hard to investigate that possibility.

The only internet available in this part of the airport (we don't have tickets yet so we can't check our luggage or go through security) is at internet kiosks that cost 1£ (about $1.70) for 10 minutes of internet time.  So, we'll keep posting here to let you know what happens, but only once in a while.

May 22 A Good All-Day Trip, but...

To get out of London and see some rural English landscape, we went on an all-day bus tour of Warwick Castle, Stratford-upon-Avon (Shakespeare's birthplace), and Oxford.

Warwick Castle was built by William the Conquerer after he defeated the Brits in 1066.  Since then it has played an important role in English history, especially during the War of the Roses.  The king of England died with no direct heir, so two branches of his family decided to go to war over who should be the next king.  One faction chose the red rose as their symbol and the other chose a white rose.  Thus it became known as the War of the Roses.  Richard Neville, the 16 Earl of Warwick was so powerful at the time that whichever side he decided to support held the throne.  Apparently he was an indecisive fellow and frequently switched sides, changing who was king. This earned him the unofficial title of "Kingmaker."  Anyway, it's a huge castle with ramparts, turrets, dungeons, a huge trebuchet, large halls for social parties, tons of armaments, and several birds of prey. An interesting stop on the tour.

Stratford-upon-Avon is interesting with plenty of history (primarily known as William Shakespeare's birthplace, but also the birthplace of John Harvard who moved to the Americas and founded Harvard University).  Literary sorts seem to be the most taken by this visit.

Oxford University is actually 39 separate colleges, with the most famous one being Christ Church.  Older folks connect Christ Church with Charles Dodgson (a.k.a. Lewis Carroll, the author of Alice in Wonderland), but our students all love it because it is where many of the interior shots of the Harry Potter movies are taken.  We walked through their dining area, which our students all recognized as the Hogwarts' dining hall.

All in all a good day, but when we got back we heard on BBC news that the main airport in Iceland is closed due to a volcanic eruption.  Uh-oh.  And the plume is expected to reach the UK by the end of the week.  We're supposed to fly to Reykjavik on Tuesday and then from there to MSP on Friday.  We're in touch with Concordia's Global Education Office and will consult with them on what will be our best course of action.  We will post whatever we find out as soon as we find out.  Maybe tomorrow the volcano will stop erupting and the problem will go away.

Sorry for the lack of pictures, but I've got a lousy internet connection right now and they would upload way too slowly.

May 18, 19, 20

If you’ve been reading some of the students’ blogs, you already know that our hotel in London has limited and inconvenient internet access. It’s a nice hotel – huge with 1635 rooms on seven floors so the relatively small lobby is always bustling, loud, and chaotic – and it’s in a nice area of London, but all our blogs will be sporadic with few or no pictures until we reach Reykjavik on Tuesday the 24^th.

May 18th

The first half of Wednesday the 18^th was free time until we left for the Bergen Airport at 3:00. Some students went shopping, some went sight-seeing, and Karla and I went to the Museum of Decorative Art.   I know it sounds esoteric and boring, but it has an extensive collection from ancient China & Japan, the Bergen City gold and silver treasures, surprisingly interesting old things, and assorted attempts at decorative art.  This is one of the several museums and activities we require the students to attend even though we know they wouldn’t choose to on their own.

At the Museum of Decorative Art

An Ancient Chinese Scholar's Desk

On the two hour flight to London, Karla and I sat next to an elderly gentleman who didn't talk to us until we were almost on the ground.  Then he said a lot. He works for the World Bank and is heading an $860 million project in Norway.  He agreed with us that prices are high in Norway, but he said the Norwegians aren’t worried about it because they have so much North Sea oil money.  Norway has the highest per capita income in the world.  It turned out to be his 76^th birthday, but not a good one he said because he had to fire someone earlier in the day.

Gatwick Airport is about 30 miles from London, so we had a coach waiting to take us to our hotel in the Bloomsbury region of London.  Bloomsbury used to be known as the intellectual center of London.  Virginia Wolfe (author), John Maynard Keynes (economist), and others used to live here.  Many buildings have round blue and white enamel medallions reporting who used to live there.  One of our favorites is across the street from the Laundromat we use that says Mary Shelley (author of Frankenstein) once lived there.  Today the area is a slightly upscale urban with attractions like the British National Museum. It’s very lively with people everywhere – always rushing to be somewhere. We finally checked in at the Royal National Hotel around 11:00 pm, and then went to a nearby convenience store to get snacks, soda, and have a short tour of the immediate vicinity

May 19^th

As in all our hotels, we purchased breakfasts so everyone will have at least one good meal a day.  With the thousands of people staying here, it seems a bit like a cattle call, but the food is good.  After breakfast we introduced students to the “Tube,” London’s subway system. We showed them where to buy half-price musical tickets and then went to Westminster Abby (where, the women tell me, the prince and his wife were married a few weeks ago), Big Ben, and the Houses of Parliament. The students broke into groups and went off exploring until we met for dinner at an old English pub.  The food was great, fish and chips or chicken and chips, and then it was a short walk to Shakespeare’s Globe Theatre for “As You Like It.”  This is a light play, a bit of a romp – not deep and brooding like Macbeth or Hamlet.  All 18 to 20 roles were played by just 8 actors, which contributed to the light and humorous nature of the play.  It was OK, but not great.

Mounted Palace Guards

Karissa, Alli, Megan, Amy, Britta, Hope, Donna, and Karla at the Pub for Supper

May 20^th

A free day for sightseeing and exploring.  Students figured out what they wanted to do and took off.  Karla and I found a Laundromat. It was a nice break from hand-washing everything in the hotel sink for nearly three weeks.  At about $10.00 per load for washing and drying, we’ll be back at the sink for the rest of the trip.

Later in the day Karla and I went to the Victoria and Albert Museum.  We had not been there before and were surprised by the extensive displays of ancient Greek sculptures and the wide variety of other artifacts.  They even had a hallway dedicated to iron work from a region of Russia.  It was identical to the old wrought iron fences and gates common in small towns (especially around cemeteries) in Minnesota and North Dakota.

At the Victoria & Albert Museum

In the evening, Hope, Donna, Allie, Megan, and Karissa went to Wicked, and Karla and I went to The Phantom of the Opera.  I think Britta and Amy plan to see The Lion King on Saturday afternoon.