Gin & Tonics

When I think of gin and tonics, I think of Iceland.

This was just after the Eyjafjallajökull eruption, the one that grounded half the world's flights and kept Iceland largely to itself for a while. The ash had settled. The island was starting to welcome back visitors. 

Three weeks. A rented SUV, a loose plan, and no reservations.

Every morning we would drive with the ocean on our right, as close to the water as the road would allow. We stopped when something caught our eye, a ridge worth climbing, a stretch of black sand that demanded to be walked, a view that appeared around a bend. We parked. We explored. We hiked until our legs threatened to give out.

Lunch, usually PB&J or cheese sandwiches followed by skyr and a cup of tea freshly brewed with hot water from our trusty thermos, was a picnic eaten from the open trunk of the SUV, legs dangling, looking out at scenery that had no business being that beautiful. 

By late afternoon, when our energy reserves were nearly empty, we would pull up a hotel guide, and find somewhere to sleep. No plan. No backup. It always worked out.

One such evening, we found a hotel that was brand new. And I mean that precisely. We were, as the proprietor informed us with some pride, the very first guests to ever stay there. Fifteen rooms, perhaps. Outside, deserted construction zones in every direction. Inside, everything was still wrapped in plastic and smelled of fresh paint. 

We checked in, freshened up, and decided we wanted a drink before dinner.

At the front desk (a galley-style setup, a narrow pi-shape of a counter) we asked the manager if there was a bar. He was young, 21-22 at most, and he lit up at the question.

Yes, he said. There is absolutely a bar. Could we come around to the other side of the counter?

Mildly confused, we took the 3 steps needed to be on the “other side”. The manager, who had been sitting on a swivel chair, spun to face us with a wide grin.

Now, he said, I am the bartender. What would you like?

We said gin and tonics.

He was ecstatic.

He told us this would be the first drink ever served at the bar, and that he had never made a gin and tonic before. He produced a cocktail recipe book, consulted it with great seriousness, pulled out a brand new bottle of gin, cracked the seal, and set to work. The lime garnish was cut and placed just so.

We sat at that brand new bar in that brand new hotel in the middle of a construction zone in Iceland, sipping our drinks, watching this young man check on us every few minutes - is it good? does it taste right? - with the anxious pride of someone who has just done something for the very first time and wanted it to have mattered.

It did.

I still have the coasters from that evening.

Simple things, sometimes, make for the best memories.