We stayed in Northern Ireland at my parents’ place until Saturday when we came back to London; a rather gruelling 15 hour trip consisting of walk, bus, taxi, ferry, train, train, train, tube and walk! Spent a couple days writing my next ChessPublishing update and then Tuesday was time for the next tournament. I met up with Simon Williams (of gingergm fame) at Heathrow airport and we had a smooth flight across to Reykjavik. Sue was unfortunately unable to accompany me on this one but had packed for me and written down instructions; she’s a perfect manager . At the airport I went to the flybus office and was impressed by their pronunciation of my first name and we were efficiently onto the bus to the capital. After 50minutes we transferred onto a minibus for 5minutes and we finally arrived at Hotel Baron at around 2.20am in the morning.
The life of a chess player consists of a lot of travel unfortunately but at least we get to see some great places. This morning Simon and I explored the capital It seems a very pleasant place although rather cold with snow everywhere. We’re playing in the town hall surrounded by a frozen lake. Very picturesque. I’ll try and take some photos and upload them for you. I’m going on a trip tomorrow morning to see some of the scenic spots and we’re also thinking of hiring a car one morning. I’m ashamed to say that in a lot of places I’ve been to I’ve only seen the inside of my hotel and the playing venue so I’m trying to rectify that.
Hopefully I’ll manage to get online soon and can upload this. The games start at 4.30pm every day and hoping to continue on my success from Bunratty. No idea what the pairings are yet so we’re preparing by simply resting and watching English baseball (our tv is limited!) I’m cheering on the Mersey Tigers against Guildford Heat – the loser buys the first round!