Reykjavík Grapevine - 20.10.2017, Qupperneq 46

We’re just north of Bifröst when
the night falls hard. After a blus-
tery three hour road trip up the
western coast of Iceland, the rich-
ly coloured autumn landscape is
plunged into an eerie, enveloping
darkness. Without the comfort
of highway lamps, distant glow-
ing windows, oncoming traffic,
or even a smudge of light on the
horizon, it feels like driving into
inky nothingness.
After an hour, the lights of
Blönduós appear through the
murk. The town feels deserted,
and we cruise past the floodlit
forecourt at an unmanned gas
station, a closed down factory,
and some shuttered houses. Ho-
tel Blanda is the last building be-
fore the shoreline of Húnafjörður,
and violent, crashing waves are
audible somewhere nearby. Even
with the hotel room window open
just a crack, the wild winds and
the bassy roar of the ocean lull me
swiftly into a deep sleep.
Lonely ram
In the morning, Blönduós is held
under a shroud of grey, spitting
clouds. The shoreline lies just a
few metres from the back of the
hotel, and the tide crashes against
the rocky seawall, sending jets of
spray high into the air.
We drive through the town’s
few residential streets, peering
out at nondescript industrial
units, factories, faceless munici-
pal buildings, a fenced-in pool,
and a supermarket. Route One
slices straight through Blönduós,
bridging the River Blanda on its
way. A picturesque wooded island
named Hrútey sits in the estuary,
and a lonely, colourfully painted
wooden ram stares at us from the
island as we leave the town be-
hind.
Art and prophets
Route 74 is a 20 ki-
lometre strip of
road that skirts
the edge of the
i s l a n d - d o t t e d
Húnafjörður to
S k a g a s t r ö n d .
T h i s d i s c re et
l i t t l e t o w n ,
with a popula-
tion of 498, has
been a trading
centre since the
15th Century, and
looks across the
f jord to the dis-
tant snowy peaks of
the Westfjords. It has
some life to it: people
wander the streets going
about their day, and the streets
are scattered with sculptures,
murals and photographs—all
evidence of the artists who stay at
the NES art residency.
Most of the town’s attractions,
however, are closed down for
the off season. The cosy-looking
Bjarmanes café doesn’t open for
another hour, and a museum ded-
icated to Þórðis, a 10th Century
fortune teller who was the first
named inhabitant of Skagaströnd,
is locked. We peer in through the
windows, and instead take a walk
over some mossy seaside hillocks
topped with a tall cairn. The view
across to the Westfjords is spec-
tacular, and as I look down over
Skagaströnd, I resolve to return
during summer.
Off the map
The road northward is a dusty
gravel track that traces around
the top of the Skagi peninsula.
The first stop is the Kálfshamars-
vita lighthouse, standing tall
and proud amongst some
stunning basalt cliffs
and formations that
resemble a hexago-
nally ti led f loor.
A hundred years
ago, there was a
busy fishing vil-
lage here, but
all that remains
today are the
signposted ru-
ins of several
stone houses.
As we trundle
around the tip
of the peninsula,
t h e o c c a s ion a l
farms give way to
wide tracts of rocky,
untouched land. Dis-
tant mountains are re-
flected in still lakes as the
route winds its way around the
headland, crossing barren plains
and coastal outcrops with no sign
of human interference but the
road ahead.
On the eastern side of the
peninsula lie the high cliffs of
Ketubjörg, where a small, mean-
dering stream plunges over the
edge, tumbling down 100 me-
tres onto the black beach below.
The land is visibly deteriorating
around the cliffside, with large
cracks appearing in the ground.
A wooden stile leans precariously
towards the precipice, the on-
ward path swept away by an ear-
lier landslide. I stand shivering
in the fierce wind, looking out at
the twin islands of Drangey and
Málmey, imagining what life was
like in this unforgiving place in
centuries past.
End of the road
The final stop is Grettislaug, a
geothermal bathing spot where
it’s fabled that Grettir of Grettis
Saga once had a soak. It lies at
the end of Reykjaströnd, a long,
narrow shelf of land between
the tall, jagged mountains of the
peninsula and the rippling sea of
Skagafjörður. We bounce up the
unpaved road, pausing occasion-
ally for herds of horses to cross in
front of us.
Grettislaug is where the road
terminates. The attendant is a
white-bearded Akranes resident
who’s been living here all sum-
mer in a wooden cabin that also
serves as a reception area and
café. He pours us some hot cof-
fee, relating that even during the
autumn he welcomes fifty or so
visitors to Grettislaug each day.
There are two small pools
on the shore, Grettislaug and
Jarlslaug. They’re man-made, but
natural in look and feel, built into
the ground from large stones and
filled from a nearby hot spring.
The water is silky and clear, and
we linger for an hour with the pool
to ourselves, watching the chilly
evening set in. The sky fades into
a gradient of fiery orange, vivid
pink and bruised purple. We leave
the pool reluctantly, drying off
hastily as the temperature drops
and the light fades, before set-
ting out to race the sunset back to
Blönduós.
SHARE & PHOTO GALLERY:
gpv.is/travel
Land’s
End
Exploring the villages,
crumbling basalt cliffs
and remote viewpoints of
Skagafjörður
How to get there
Route One North, then Route 74
Accommodation provided by:
hotelblanda.is
Words & Photos: John Rogers
“A small,
meander-
ing stream
plunges over
the edge of the
cliff, tumbling
down 100 me-
tres onto the
rocky beach
below.”
46 The Reykjavík Grapevine
Issue 19 — 2017
Skagaströnd:'s first inhabitant was a prophet
Car provided by:
gocarrental.is