The Smithsonian Tour

My husband and I were fortunate to go to Iceland on a Smithsonian tour the last week of October 2021. We were lucky because this was the only Iceland tour the previous year due to the Covid pandemic.

'Luck' seems to have followed us during our tour that included this incredible country's southern, northern, and western coasts, as we also saw the Northern Lights in all their glory the third night we were there!"

  "We had an excellent tour guide, Segrun, a native Icelander who told us incredible stories of the history and folklore of her beautiful country. We were visiting a beach towards the end of our trip in the southwestern part of the country - a black lava stone filled beach. This beach was Snaefellsjokull National Park, and Segrun told us that we should not pick up and keep any of the lava stones. On our final night in Reykjavik, Segrun told us she had a bag filled with lava stones from that particular beach!"

"Then she told us that her grandfather said, "tourists can not take lava stones from that location as it will bring them bad luck!” She went on to say that tourists have been known to send the stones back to Iceland because they did indeed experience bad luck. However, her grandfather said that if an “Icelandic person gifted the stones to tourists, they would have good luck!” Therefore, Segrun asked us to reach into the bag and take one stone for good luck. I love stones but mainly wanted a small lava stone with which to create something extraordinary out of the stone… thus, my beautiful lava stone ring, which Stacey helped design. I brought her the lava stone, along with a silver ring I had purchased at a craft fair on Long Island a few years ago, and with her creative design, I have my beautiful lava stone ring…lucky indeed!"