Andrew Testa for The New York Times
In Reykjavik, walking across a frozen lake and the club Faktory.
THE sky above Reykjavik was as dark as black ice, save for a handful of diamond stars. As a cutting wind whipped off the frigid sea and blew down the narrow streets lined with brightly painted storefronts, shivering pedestrians tightened their scarves and scurried into cozy bars and restaurants to find warmth.
It was only 4:30 on a late November afternoon, but the Nordic night had already set in. And at this time of year it was set to stretch on for another 20 hours or so. My cellphone buzzed, and I reached for it with chilled fingers. "Why on earth are you vacationing in Iceland?" a friend texted.
For people looking to escape the cold of winter, heading to an Arctic city where evening spans most of the clock and the temperature hovers around freezing may not seem an obvious choice. But this is Reykjavik, where Icelanders turn their backs on hibernation and luxuriate in an drawn-out night life that revs up as the sun goes down. Indeed, with every step I took in this cosmopolitan city of just over 120,000 people, a litany of surprising experiences would soon unfold, hidden behind closed doors in warm interiors, or laid bare under the frigid majesty of the volcanic landscape.
A friend and I had come here to sample Iceland's natural wonders: thundering geysers, powerful waterfalls and the therapeutic waters of the Blue Lagoon, a vast thermal lake half an hour south of Reykjavik with a turquoise hue so impossibly bright that it looks Photoshopped. We wanted to spot the glowing green ribbons of the aurora borealis, which were reported to be especially luminescent this year because of sunspots casting a wide spectral aura over the North Pole. But it wasn't just Iceland's natural splendors that lured us: we also wanted to get a taste of the rollicking midnight club scene that Reykjavik has been known for since Bjork put it on the map.
What we stumbled upon instead was another slice of nocturnal, urban Iceland: a diverse milieu of funky cafes, cutting-edge restaurants and Icelandic-chic bars, all catering to a cozy chat society that hummed late into the infinite night.
I slipped the phone into my pocket — an answer to my friend would have to wait — and ducked into the Laundromat Cafe on Austurstraeti Street, one of several offbeat cafes where locals kick off the evening in front of a row of beers. Here, tourists find refuge after the brief window of daylight that allows them to explore the astounding panoramas of black lava and crystalline mountains outside Reykjavik.
The polished wooden bar was lined with shelves containing hundreds of used novels and a clutch of red leather high-backed stools. Several suited banker-types had already quit the business district and were hovering over wine and smoked salmon, while 20-somethings in boots and expensive sweaters nursed juices and nibbled on cakes. Downstairs there was an actual Laundromat, where people talked over cappuccinos at a stout wooden table near a toddlers' playroom as their clothes spun dry.
Icelanders, we quickly learned, are efficient and direct, especially in conversation. Ask if the northern lights have been brighter this year and you get a terse yes — followed by silence. Waiters answer questions about the menu with monosyllabic precision, as was the case at Laundromat.
But with a little banter people become warm and eager to chat about their country — especially the nation's lingering economic crisis, a theme that poked its way into almost every discussion. Since 2009, when a financial crash was followed by a plunge in its currency, Iceland has been on sale for tourists. But the weak krona is still hobbling spending power for Icelanders, as one young waiter at Laundromat grumbled, adding that headlines suggesting that the nation has entered a miraculous recovery don't entirely ring true.
Get an Icelander started on the ruggedness of the land, and more tales pour forth about how winter's constant darkness and the summer's midnight sun forge the national character. Eventually, someone will whisper that the island's snowcapped mountains are protected by trolls and elves, mystical creatures that, it turns out, many Icelanders still firmly believe exist today. One loquacious guide on a tour outside the city told us of a fairway on the outskirts of Reykjavik that was diverted around a pair of large boulders believed to be the homestead of a troll who did not want his habitat disturbed by modernity.
This article has been revised to reflect the following correction:
Correction: January 22, 2013
An earlier version of this article placed a bar where writers, journalists and artists drink beer incorrectly. Olstofa is on Vegamotastig, not Nautholsvegur Street. The article also misspelled the name of an appetizer on the menu at Fish Market. It was a minke whale appetizer, not mink whale.
