{"id":1228,"date":"2023-08-20T19:05:47","date_gmt":"2023-08-20T19:05:47","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/leavingwithlaura.blog\/?p=136"},"modified":"2023-10-27T22:25:11","modified_gmt":"2023-10-27T22:25:11","slug":"on-the-road-from-the-southeast-to-the-west","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/graceffa.com\/?p=1228","title":{"rendered":"On the road from the southeast to the west"},"content":{"rendered":"\r\n

\u201cWe don\u2019t need to set an alarm for tomorrow morning,\u201d Mark said. I was grateful. Yesterday\u2019s post kept me up until past midnight (focus!) So Mark was already asleep and after I hit Publish<\/em>, so was I.<\/p>\r\n\r\n\r\n\r\n

I woke up rested and feeling like it was around 7:30am. Oops! It was 9:45! We dressed in haste to make it for coffee, tea and breakfast just in time.<\/p>\r\n\r\n\r\n\r\n

After repacking we left Hella for a day\u2019s drive (tourist pace) to Stykkisholmur in the West.<\/p>\r\n\r\n\r\n\r\n

The longest stop along the way was to Fridheimar tomato greenhouses.<\/p>\r\n\r\n\r\n\r\n

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Tomatoes in the greenhouse<\/figcaption>\r\n<\/figure>\r\n<\/figure>\r\n\r\n\r\n\r\n

The greenhouse supplies nearly 40% of Iceland\u2019s tomatoes, so it\u2019s likely we\u2019d sampled some along the way without knowing it. The houses operate year round and are heated by naturally warmed geothermal water. Hydro and geothermal power also greenly supply the electricity, so these tomatoes are not the energy hogs that a hothouse tomato would be in the US. In addition, the operation trucks in 400 tons of CO2 from natural steam to give the fruits an abundant carbon atmosphere. The soil is pumice, very abundant in Iceland. Everything in the abiotic environment, then, has been suitably and cleverly adapted using Iceland\u2019s natural resources.<\/p>\r\n\r\n\r\n\r\n

There\u2019s only one biotic factor missing: a pollinator.<\/p>\r\n\r\n\r\n\r\n

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The bee boxes<\/figcaption>\r\n<\/figure>\r\n\r\n\r\n\r\n

Bumblebees are brought from Holland to fly amongst the tomatoes.<\/p>\r\n\r\n\r\n\r\n

If these plants could talk, I believe they would highly endorse their standard of living. They are simply beautiful plants. When we grow tomatoes in the northeast USA, they are cultivated as annuals, of course. The plants are staked, or caged, or sprawled on plastic. By this point in the summer, the vines start to senesce, looking straggly and yellow.<\/p>\r\n\r\n\r\n\r\n

The Fridheimer greenhouse tomatoes just keep growing. Plants grow from the top up, and you can see how the vines are thick and have a series of scars from where past clusters were attached. New clusters continuously form at the tops of the vines. Everything is exceedingly tidy and clean.<\/p>\r\n\r\n\r\n\r\n

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Abundant clusters<\/figcaption>\r\n<\/figure>\r\n\r\n\r\n\r\n
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Vines near base are older and so thicker<\/figcaption>\r\n<\/figure>\r\n\r\n\r\n\r\n
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Aisles of tomatoes<\/figcaption>\r\n<\/figure>\r\n\r\n
Inside the greenhouse<\/figcaption>\r\n<\/figure>\r\n\r\n\r\n\r\n

Visitors can eat at the restaurant inside the greenhouse and it\u2019s a popular spot for tour buses and families. We didn\u2019t have a booking but were able to sit at the bar and sample \u201cHealthy green\u201d (green tomato juice and seltzer and \u201cHealthy red\u201d (tomato juice with a cucumber garnish), a cup of tomato soup and a roll.<\/p>\r\n\r\n\r\n\r\n

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Our tasting: The cucs and basil are also grown at Fridheimer<\/figcaption>\r\n<\/figure>\r\n\r\n\r\n\r\n

We had a nice chat with the bartender who spied Mark\u2019s Colorado College hat and was curious since he\u2019d spent a summer working in Breckenridge. He amused us with a story of camping in a parking lot near Garden of the Gods, bedding down outside without a tent, and waking up to discover he\u2019d slept beneath a sign warning of rattlesnakes. After that communal chuckle we were told not to be bashful about plucking basil off the bar plant to accompany our snack.<\/p>\r\n\r\n\r\n\r\n

And the flavor was of the most excellent tomato. If there is a terroir, I didn\u2019t detect it. Our soup and beverages were fresh, sweet, and bright, and not very acidic. \u201cPure tomato,\u201d was Mark\u2019s pronouncement.<\/p>\r\n\r\n\r\n\r\n

For the rest of the afternoon, we drove north and west to Stykkisholmur. The landscape is a little different. Some areas have less grassy vegetation. The mountains can have a talus slope of fine basalt. When there is what looks like a farm at the base of a huge mountain, I kept thinking about the angle of repose. If you\u2019ve ever made a pile of sand or soil, you\u2019ll recall that the slopes of the pile are determined by the material\u2014 not by the digger. This volcanic material looks just like one of those piles, and it\u2019s hard to believe that a good rain doesn\u2019t just wash the mountain into the farm.<\/p>\r\n\r\n\r\n\r\n

When we walked to dinner, we saw a few streets of Stykkisholmur. It\u2019s a pretty town.<\/p>\r\n\r\n\r\n\r\n

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California poppies<\/figcaption>\r\n<\/figure>\r\n\r\n\r\n\r\n

And the birdhouses of Beauty Hill, an installation by this couple<\/a>.<\/p>\r\n\r\n\r\n\r\n

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The Birdhouses of Beauty Hill<\/figcaption>\r\n<\/figure>\r\n\r\n\r\n\r\n

We ate at Narfeyrarstofa, a restaurant specializing in local food. They could also boast about specializing in stunning presentation.<\/p>\r\n\r\n\r\n\r\n

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Cod: this dish has been on their menu for 22 years<\/figcaption>\r\n<\/figure>\r\n\r\n\r\n\r\n
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Salad: including black and green sesame seeds and really fresh lettuces<\/figcaption>\r\n<\/figure>\r\n\r\n\r\n\r\n
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Scallops and quinoa: served on a wood board<\/figcaption>\r\n<\/figure>\r\n<\/figure>\r\n\r\n\r\n\r\n

We left dinner around 9:30pm to walk back to the hotel at sunset. The light was gorgeous for a few more photos:<\/p>\r\n\r\n\r\n\r\n

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Finally, the umbels of the day: A sturdy Angelica in a gusty wind outside of a bakery in Borgarness, and a thicket of Sweet Cecily on a path by the tomato greenhouses. Sweet Cecily, in addition to having a fantastic common name, smells like licorice.<\/p>\r\n\r\n\r\n\r\n

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Angelica archangelica <\/em> (You really have to wonder what Linnaeus was thinking with that name! Kind of over the top.)<\/figcaption>\r\n<\/figure>\r\n\r\n\r\n\r\n
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Myrrhis odorata <\/em> (We can imagine what Linnaeus was thinking with this one. But aromarata <\/em>have been more flattering. Maybe he didn\u2019t like licorice. Or myrrh.)<\/figcaption>\r\n<\/figure>\r\n<\/figure>\r\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

\u201cWe don\u2019t need to set an alarm for tomorrow morning,\u201d Mark said. I was grateful. Yesterday\u2019s post kept me up until past midnight (focus!) So Mark was already asleep and after I hit Publish, so was I. I woke up rested and feeling like it was around 7:30am. Oops! It was 9:45! We dressed in […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":1318,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"inline_featured_image":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[23],"class_list":["post-1228","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-uncategorized","tag-23"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/graceffa.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1228","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/graceffa.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/graceffa.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/graceffa.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/graceffa.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=1228"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/graceffa.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1228\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":1325,"href":"https:\/\/graceffa.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1228\/revisions\/1325"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/graceffa.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/media\/1318"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/graceffa.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=1228"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/graceffa.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=1228"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/graceffa.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=1228"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}