Day 4 Again with the Rain

We had discussed driving to Sandoy today, but the weather is again mostly rain so we again spend the day in Torshavn. This isn't nearly as hard of rain as the previous 2 days in spite of the forcast calling for twice the rainfall as yesterday. But it is a constant drizzle with a few heavier spells. 

We started off with a long, lazy morning of watching boats before heading to the National Gallery of Faroes Art, by way of a very nice park in the city. The signs list a bunch of birds, but we pretty much just saw ducks and pigeons. 

There are a few sculptures outside of the museum: 

Hans Pauli Olsen: Over and Under the Water (1986)

Hans Pauli Olsen: The Shadow (1987)

The museum is undergoing some renovation work, so only a small portion of it is available. On the plus side, this means they are not charging admission. It's a nice little collection, with some cool pieces: They also occasionally invite musicians in to get inspired by the pieces and record the results.

Elinborg Lützen: Fairy Tale Scene (1973)

Ole Wich: 3D Dímun (2009)

Edward Fuglø: Colony (2006)

Absolutely no idea, and couldn't find in the museum catalog

In the gift shop, they had some clay cups that are clearly by the same potter that's making a lot of Raest's dinnerware. Bill got himself one - I am completely out of mug space at the apartment. If they had had a t-shirt with the birds, it would have been hard to resist. 

 Next up, we hit the national liquor store in town - something seems to have happened to the barrel aged aquavit we got at the distillery. The walk back was through an apartment complex with a fantastic view. And we see the very first cat we've found on the island:

We spent the next bit of the afternoon at the same cafe we visited the first day. I got a nice slice of cheesecake with a chocolate ganache top, marzipan crust, and blueberries. The apparent danger of looking at art in a museum and seeing cards that say who donated it is the reminder that art is a thing you can own. Bill has continued to think about one of the pieces we saw at the gallery shop we visited a couple days ago, and after staring at the picture of it on my phone and then on the gallery website, we decided to go back and ask some practical questions about shipping just in case that was too expensive to be reasonable. 

Reader, it was entirely reasonable. Hopefully in a couple weeks, Bill has a new painting of Fuglafjordur by local artist Ian Luid, who is currently residing in Torshavn, but is originally from Fuglafjordur. The gallery owner also told us that he's autodidactic, and that he doesn't produce much work. There is a Danish couple that has bought one of his pieces each time they've come to the Faroe Islands, and he hopes the news of this sale to Americans will cheer him up enough to finish his latest painting. Bill and I interpreted the discussion differently as he took away that Luid doesn't need to paint constantly for income and can be selective and I concluded that he has depression issues and only paints when he's not in a depressive state. No idea, but either way his work is evocative and a great addition to our small collection. 

 The last item on the agenda was PAZ, the country's 2 Michelin star restaurant. Again, Bill got the wine pairing and I got the "juice" pairing, which was largely fermented beverages, but did include one alcoholic items. I expect Bill provided a great deal of detail on the dinner, so I'll stick with a summary version. I absolutely get why this is a Michelin star restaurant. The service is thoughtful and attentive and the food is fantastic, forming a cohesive overall dining experience. That said, I 100% cannot comprehend how they have 2 stars and the place we were earlier this week has zero. It's as though the whole system of categorization is arbitrary and at the whims of folks who clearly have a different idea of a good time than I do. Take that entirely as a swipe at the rating system and not the restaurant as, again, these folks have clearly earned the recognition. 

 For the Juice pairings, they the hay was in the same ferment as the elderflower, which was also quite successful. Their gooseberry drink was good but not as amazing as the one from a couple days ago. The potato based drink paired with fish was probably the must successful as a pairing. The crowberry drink was paired with crowberry course and the rhubarb drink with the rhubarb course, which unsurprisingly work. My favorite dish overall was Ptarmigan, Reindeer, Wild berries which layered a sweet, mildly gamey bird with slices of fat and a berry chutney, and had great presentation: 

The horse mussel was also great again, hopefully I see that on a menu in the future. Here are some additional food pictures:

During dinner we also decided to get up stupidly early in order to catch a ferry to Suðuroy, the southernmost island. Okay, mostly I decided and I got us ferry tickets for a full day. Lots of things will be closed on Saturday, but not as many as will be closed on Sunday (the last day we could reasonably go) and we have dinner reservations Sunday that we'd miss based on the ferry timetable. After dinner, I went pretty much immediately to bed and Bill decided to go hear live music at a bar that had a cocktail menu. I found him asleep on the couch with his feet up on the coffee table when I got up in the middle of the night. I shook him awake twice suggesting he come to bed before I moved his water to a table where he wouldn't kick it over and put his phone on the charger. With a 5AM alarm, I went back to sleep.