Here are a few pictures from the Hiking and Knitting tour with the Elves, a tour that I am now running every other year. The weather was crazy (even by Icelandic standards): from 24 °C to 3°C (75 to 37 °F), sun and snow!
After a flight to the East fjords, we paid a long visit to the puffins and had lunch close to them.
A puffin in its hole: it seams unreal, like a painting!
Then we visited the little fishing village and had our first knitting session.
Our dinner (not joke; we ate the fish that is being unloaded!)Ptarmigan at the steps of the Elves cityThe ever so cute Lindabær and the church
An unusual site in Iceland: an EVENING knitting class OUTSIDE: it’s been 24°C (75 °F) today!
Hiking and knitting, separately or together!
Too hot to knit?
Knitting break!
Everybody knits!Bjarni is working on my Birgitta sweater while I’m resting…!
Knitting break!
This one spot of snow!
This pink carpet!
Extreme knitting with whatever you find on the beach 😉
As the weather gets cold, it’s very important to put more clothes on Guðrún the doll as well!It’s been snowing in the mountains: can you spot the white line?Every single time on this tour, I take a picture of this incredible moss…
And there comes the snow!
We don’t care, we’re knitters and well dressed!Rainbow!
Botanist or knitter seeking inspiration, what do you think?
Those blues!Our marvel of a cook did the last hike with us 🙂That said, nothing better than a hot tub by the sea to warm you up!
It is birding season in Iceland at this time of the year and we saw quite a lot of birds. But also sheep, a seal, a whale, weird rock creatures and a wannabe mermaid…
A cute couple of ptarmigansCan you spot them? Sheep graze wild and free in the mountains all summer and are not easy to be approach!The seal is behind us, but no, not caught on the picture, you’ll have to believe me!The whale playing out there has all our attention (and no, it’s not on the picture either!) 😉
The theme of the tour was the traditional Icelandic lace shawls and for some reason (the snow maybe?), I didn’t take any picture of the 20 something mini shawls we made in all sorts of colors! Shame on me!
Knitting class in our mountain hut.Þórdís shawl hanging there
My little assistants supervising the lace in our guesthouse.Happy Hapisk shawl taking a swirl!
The last day in Reykjavik, we spent a few hours in my studio where we had our last lesson (steeking: unrelated to lace shawls but essential Icelandic skills!)
It is very difficult and can be very messy to choose the right colors!! On the floor, the little Birgitta sweater that we just steeked.We got the visit of Icelandic dyer Maria who came of course with loads of yarns dyed with Icelandic plants (and I didn’t take pictures either…). Here are a few skeins picked up by one lady together with some Gilitrutt and Love Story 🙂
I’m always so pleased to see knitters keep coming again and again in my tours. It tells me I must be doing something right and it is so humbling and encouraging! This Elves tour was no exception and there were a couple of familiar faces who were there for the second or even third time!
Jane was wearing the same sweater, in both Elves tours! Beneath is a picture I took of her in 2014, at the exact same spot by complete coincidence!
So good to have you both back!
If you would also like to participate in one of my knitting tours, have a look here. They are all different, taking you to various places all around Iceland and exploring different aspects of the Icelandic knitting traditions. The hiking part is more or less straining and I have a tour in the spring without hiking at all.
