This will probably sound like a quirky travelogue. Meaning topically ambitious. That’s to be expected when you encounter a place you once discounted, only to find it rich and full.

Such is Iceland, Europe’s westernmost country.

Its topics are as diverse as those of us who visit. If you love geology, you will find your passion in the otherworldly landscape. If you are descended from Celtic or Nordic people, you will find your history. If you are a student of languages, you will make surprising connections between distant continents.

It took six years, but my daughter finally convinced me to accompany her to Iceland last month. When she first proposed the idea, I must have given her a look of perplexed shock. I’m sure I asked why we would want to visit such a cold, God-forsaken place. So she hauled out the web sites and sold me on the unexpected reality that this actually was an intriguing idea.

I have to say, five days in this land of tectonic tumult shook my world a little. Just outside the airport, rock-speckled dirt plains created the impression of a moon landing. Snowy mountains ringing these plains confirmed that we were still on this cloud-capped earth. Arriving in Iceland sets up an inevitable curiosity about the geological wonders in store. And there were certainly plenty of those.

A guided tour revealed features of our planet in breathtaking, beautiful flux. We traveled through moss-covered rocky plains and snowy ridges. We viewed multi-tiered waterfalls and steam vents with a power plant nestled into them. The tour guide’s claim that this steam was sufficient to heat the entire country explained why all the buildings were warm – hotels, restaurants, stores, museums. While the wind whipped off the ocean, chilling roadways and pedestrian zones around Reykjavic’s short buildings, the great indoors was always warm.

Americans have Old Faithful. Iceland’s “Geysir” region demonstrates the translation of the word minimally anglicized to “geyser” – “majestic and powerful.” The site of an erupting pool of water vindicated these defining adjectives. For those precious few seconds, looking up at this 35-meter waterspout was like glimpsing one of earth’s treasured secrets.

Further along the “Golden Circle,” in the national park of “Thingvellir,” a vast plain mediates the North American and Eurasian tectonic plates. The two plates rising out of the ocean meet at different levels, with a visible and ever-changing crack separating them at one point and a tall, dark wall of rock at another. Looking up at this towering North American cliff, one can see why the unusual landscape is a filming site for such otherworldly television shows as “Game of Thrones.”

Today’s Icelanders are descended from the Irish, Scottish, and Norse settlers who fled wars to settle on this island a thousand years ago, followed shortly by the Danes. While Icelandic children must learn Danish in school, English is impossible not to learn; it is printed on signs and menus around the capital city and is the common language among visitors from around the world, making Iceland a comfortable country for English-speaking visitors.

The linguistic legacy of settlement and conquest extends beyond Scandinavia, even as far as Africa. Through the window of a cozy coffee shop one morning, I saw a meat truck idling in the road. A chicken was painted on the side of the truck, and beside it, an Icelandic word I’d seen on menus: “kjuklingur.” The word for “chicken” resembled the name of a South African acquaintance’s scrawny, chicken-legged Pomeranian pup: “Kuiken.”

And why not? When the Dutch colonized South Africa, they brought the language that became Afrikaans, yet another branch of the Germanic family that includes English, Icelandic, Dutch, Danish, and a host of others. The words for “chicken” are cognates – words from different languages with a common ancestry.

And they offer a perfect example of international connection. So too an encounter in the airport the day we flew home. As we rushed through the airport, the flight attendant ahead of us turned and did a double take. “You were in the coffee shop this morning,” she said.

Flushing with the recognition, I realized such intimacy is a consequence of living in a country of 320,000 people.

There’s something to be said for that.

Renee Gravelle is a Dunkirk resident. Send comments to editorial@observertoday.com