The Icelandic Canadian - 01.06.2004, Side 20

166
THE ICELANDIC CANADIAN
Vol. 58 #4
Onward to another farmyard, once
owned by Amma’s great grandparents.
Unfortunately, there was no answer at the
door. Stefan stated that the owners had
recently abandoned the farm. He said that
more and more people were moving to the
cities, just walking away from their farms
when they were not able to sell them.
It was Monday, August 3rd. Much
time had been spent looking at pictures in
photo albums lined up in Stefan and Anna’s
living room. We made a short trip to
Akureyri where we visited a museum and
shopping centre and then headed back to
the farm. Stefan and Afi visited while I
decided to go out for another walk. The
drizzling rain all day caused me to walk on
the gravel road. The pastures were soaked.
This was a very mountainous area.
However, they became almost invisible due
to the thick clouds that had filled the val-
ley. It seemed that you could raise your
arm in the air and lose sight of it with the
grey haze. It felt as though I could walk
Pickerel • Salmon
Shrimp • Goldeye
Lobster • Crab
Hardfiskur
and more!
We pack for travel
596 Dufferin Avenue
Winnipeg, MB
„ 589-3474 „
□------——--------d
forever in this beautiful environment, tast-
ing the freshest air in the world. When I
returned to HKdar, I found Afi and Stefan
still talking in the same room and sitting in
the same chairs. This was a good time for
me to page through my dictionary.
Now, Tuesday, August 4th. There is a
light mist outside. The temperature is 8C.
This day, Gudmundur Oli Palsson (the
Police chief from Sudarkrokur) would be
picking us up at 1 PM. The time with Stefan
and Anna had been superb.
Again, on the road with Gudmundur
Oli in his Landrover, we arrived at his
house in the early evening after visiting sev-
eral museums and an aquarium. Enroute,
we pulled over to the side of the road and
progressed to a grassy area where an
unusual stone was sitting. It was a fairly
large dark grey stone with some holes
through it. It held a plaque which read
“Skeljungs Steinn”. Gudmundur Oli told
us it was a ghost stone that long ago, the
people in the area had apparently caught a
ghost. They tied the ghost to this stone
with some rope that was run through the
holes. Then, they went away to decide
what fate they should deal the ghost. The
next morning when they went to check, the
ghost had disappeared and the stone had
mysteriously been moved across the road.
This is just one of many interesting ghost
stories in Iceland.
We carried on a desolate road to have a
look at the sea. The water was very cold,
however, just twenty feet away was a water
hole, filled with hot water. It looked like a
jacuzzi that would accommodate four or
five people comfortably. Gudmundur Oli
told us the story about the area, when
many years ago a man had killed another,
and then came to hide out at this out of the
way place. After a few months, he had
become lonely and decided to walk up to
the main road. There, he kidnapped the
first woman he saw and brought her to live
with him. When he tired of her, he let her
go and kidnapped another. The outlaw
lived in this fashion until he was eventually
caught some twenty years later.
The next morning, we left Gudmundur
Oli’s house to visit his wife at her business.
She owns and operates a dry cleaning store