After a few false starts, as usual, spring has finally come to Iceland. Also as usual, there’s a sense of elation in the air. We’ve survived yet another long, dark winter and we’re getting ready to be rewarded for our patience! While winter in Iceland can be charming, with the Northern Lights and starry night skies over crisp white snow, it also tends to be cold, wet, windy and above all, dark. The long nights compel most people to spend most of their time curled up under a blanket with a hot drink in their hands and the weather is a further deterrent from venturing outside. It’s a time for poring over books, educational or otherwise, and catching up on TV shows.
Come spring time, Icelanders understandably get a serious case of spring fever. Everything seems so new and fresh and green and exciting, people all over Iceland tear off their blankets, trade in their teas and hot cocoas for cold beer and lemonade and jump in the nearest swimming pool to bask in the sun. In the towns and cities, schools are letting out students after a gruelling exam season, and in the countryside, it’s lambing season, a fittingly symbolic marker of the start of summer.
The reason for this extreme amount of excitement is of course tied up with the fact that summer in Iceland is short, a fleeting moment of camping, music and midnight sun, all accompanied by the perpetual smell of grilling. In the memory it’s always over as soon as it’s begun, which makes it all the more important to enjoy it as much as you can, while you can.
