I’m back from FRIGGING ICELAND! I saw geysers and kissed puffins and somehow managed not to eat any sharks or whales!
Iceland’s many attractions include an aquarium containing only dead animals, and an ultra-hipster pub with a barber who made my little brother look exactly like one of the bullies from Back to the Future. Highly recommended.
I ended up wearing a lot of Thierry Mugler Womanity on this trip, since Iceland contains many watery attractions (geysers, thermal pools, whale-watching tours) and Womanity is the closest thing to an aquatic fragrance I own. I also wore some Jo Malone Blackberry & Bay, which went nicely with the intensely green landscape. Gorilla Perfumes The Smell of Weather Turning seemed well-suited to Iceland’s capitol, Reykjavik, where everyone was much cooler than me. I also snuck a few spritzes of Drew’s Atelier Cologne Vanille Insensee.
Have y’all taken any fun vacations this summer? What perfumes did you wear?
SCENTS OF SELF 
Looks like an awesome vaca and Womanity was a great choice for it! I’ve not done much traveling this summer, but was in L.A. for the weekend (carry-on only) so took a decant of Dior Addict Eau Sensuelle. It was suitable for our outings, although maybe the lighter Addict Eau Fraiche would’ve been more appropriate for Raging Waters water park! 😉
You know, Mrs. Scents, my family goes to the LA area (Garden Grove, specifically) every winter for Christmas, yet I’ve never been to Raging Waters! This must be remedied this winter. I haven’t tried the Addict Eau Sensuelle, what do you think of it?
It’s nothing really too special, but it is a decent powdery-soapy-clean-lilac-white musk scent. There’s gossip on the web that it could just be Addict to Life reconceptualized (new bottle, new name, same juice), but I’ve never smelled it so I can’t say!
Iceland looks like an awesome vacation spot. Hope that you, Drew and your family had an amazing time! Didn’t really do a vacation, but did travel to Houston to move my daughter into her first apartment for the school year. Rotated through Bottega Veneta and Chanel No.19, 31 Rue Cambon and Cristalle. Those scents kept me sane, particularly with the awful airline experience we had. Suffice it to say, I think this airline forgot what polite, customer service is. On a happier note, DH and I are going to Disneyland next week. Still haven’t figured out what scents go well with amusement parks!
We did, Tatiana, thank you so much! Although we also had a pretty awful flight on U.S. Air- THREE HOUR DELAY!! Houston is a lovely city, where will your daughter be going to college? (Please don’t say Rice, or I will be terribly jealous!) 31 Rue Cambon is one of the last Les Exclusifs I haven’t tried, what do you think of it? I would think Disneyland would call for a fun, simple scent, maybe Bond Coney Island or that United Scents New Jersey. I’ll have to ask my mom, who worked at Disneyland as a teen!
Delays can’t be helped. But what can be helped is the attitude of the employees. Saying you can’t be bothered to answer a customers question is just not acceptable.
Yes, my daughter is a sophomore at Rice. She was also accepted at JHU, but decided it was farther than she wanted to travel for school. And probably too cold in the winter for her taste. (CA girls here)
Rue Cambon can only be described as a chypre. If you don’t like chypres, you probably wouldn’t like Rue Cambon.
I don’t seem to have too many fun, simple scents. I tend to go for dark, spicy, smokey and chypre. Although, my daughter gave me a bottle of L de Lolita, so maybe that will work. And I found a bottle of Tommy Girl at Marshall’s for next to nothing and I feel like it’s a light hearted scent.
Good luck and much success when you start back at school this fall.
Disneyland – how fun! I reckon a sweet-candy fragrance would be appropriate (probably the only time it is!! :P) Something like DKNY Delicious Candy Apples! (although it’s a few years old now and I’m not sure they are still around!)
Awesome photos, Ari! Thank you for allowing me to escape to Iceland through your photos.
I am wearing L’Air du Desert Morocain today because it’s been so humid in NYC I needed something reeeeaaallly dry so I wouldn’t melt! And it worked!
Wow — you kissed a puffin! I think I would like that experience better than the dead animal aquarium, but I seem to recall you have a thing for aquariums (aquaria?).
Since I don’t work full time, I haven’t had the need/resources to take a real vacation, but we did actually get a couple of weeks of hot (for Vancouver) weather. Among others, Andy Tauer’s Cologne du Maghreb got lots of wear — refreshingly herbal.
Did you come across any fragrances by Reykjavik-based artist Andrea Maack?
Unfortunately not! I found virtually no perfume in Iceland, despite no lack of looking. I’m so glad that you got a few weeks of nice weather and Andy Tauer! I’ve never tried Cologne du Maghreb, but I’m planning to do his 5 sample set sometime very soon.
I do love aquariums, but this was by far the oddest one I’ve ever been to. At least the animals had been stuffed to have happy expressions!
I am glad you are back and delighted that you had yourself a time… but disappointed that Etat Libre d’Orange has not yet made a perfume called “Kissing Puffins”. I imagine it would be salty-fishy-seaweed-ish, and the bottle would make some pretty bizarre sounds when picked up and snuggled.
I squee-ed at your last line! This puffin did not make any noises, but he or she did scratch me fairly vigorously with his or her adorable webbed feet. Good thing that Zelda gives me so much practice with getting scratched- it barely phased me! There are far too many aquatic perfumes and far too few salty-fishy-seaweed ones.
Puffin smooches sound COMPLETELY AWESOME. Glad you had such a good time! And if you have pix of your brother rocking his Menacing 1950s Teenager haircut, please post them. I’m dying to see.
We didn’t really do vacation this year, just hauling Bookworm around on the big college tour. And it was MIZZERBAL hot. Someday I’m going to take a summer vacation in a coolish spot.
Actually, in July-August of 2007 The CEO did a research trip to Australia and NZ for six weeks and I got to join him for the last three weeks of it. Weather was very comfortable in NZ, except for the days we got rained on (holy MOLY, can it ever rain in NZ, which I guess accounts for all the greenery). I wish I’d been into perfume at the time, but I think I only had The Healing Garden In Bloom (inexpensive fresh floral with gardenia/rose/freesia) with me. Oh, the things I could have worn in New Zealand…
Oh, New Zealand must have been so beautiful! Lord of the Rings scenery everywhere you look!
The puffin was SO sweet and tiny, and as far as I know I did not contract any puffin kissing diseases! It might be a little early to tell, though. So tell up- which colleges did Bookworm like best??
We did a few long weekends (Martha’s Vineyard, the Berkshires) and about 5 days in Maine. If I never went to the vineyard again it would be too soon. That was more of a work trip for hubby though so it wasn’t our choice to go there. I love the Berkshires though. Maine was okay. Someday I’ll find my perfect vacation spot. Right now I find going away a bit of a hassle with finding someone to care for my critters and what not. Plus if we fly we have to deal with Logan Airport in Boston which is always a hassle too.
Your trip looked like fun. I’d love to kiss a puffin too. I kiss my parrots so I guess that’s similar.
Oh, I was so lucky that I was able to find a sorority sister to care for Zelda at the last minute. A few vacations ago I had to take her to the pet hotel, and her cage was SO small. I hope I don’t ever have to do that again!
So your parrots let you kiss them?? This puffin was pretty eager to get out of my hands and be put back into its Stella Artois box.