My full name, which is quite a mouthful, is Helga Jonina Margret Stefansson, and I am a walking contradiction. I was born in Winnipeg to Icelandic Canadian parents, which means my DNA is essentially composed of Viking resilience and prairie politeness. But for the last forty years, I have called Piraeus, Greece, my home. I live in the tension between three worlds: I have Icelandic blood that craves the sun but Icelandic skin that wants to hide from it, Canadian habits that involve apologizing to inanimate objects I bump into, and a thoroughly adopted Greek spirit that has learned to argue with passion and eat supper at 10:00 p.m...

During the British occupation of Iceland during World War II, a soldier identified only as “P.N. W-T” published an account of his visit to Geysir and Gullfoss, while on leave, accompanied by five companions. His story was published in four installments in The Midnight Sun (November 2-23, 1940), a four-page weekly edited by the British Army chaplain, Canon John C.F. Hood...

Þrístapar is the most poignant cultural site in northern Iceland. This exceptionally well-designed tourist site, 15 minutes by car south of the community of Blönduós, chronicles two executions carried out in January 1830. The last executions to take place in Iceland’s 11 century history. Two young people, Agnes Magnúsdóttir and Friðrik Sigurðsson, were locked into indentured servitude that was commonplace at the time, and indeed for much of Iceland’s history. The psychological and physical harshness of their lives took its toll. Ultimately, they killed two of their farm masters, Natan Ketilsson and Pétur Jónsson...