Iceland review - 2015, Qupperneq 67

ICELAND REVIEW 65
Then the shrieks of the Arctic terns break the silence. It’s
nesting season and they’re at their most aggressive. Above us
they hover ominously, white and slender, their tails split and
wings spread. Black-coated puffins with rainbow beaks peek out
from their burrows lining the island’s grassy edges, then take off
as we move in closer, flapping away. The harbor is filled with
eider ducks teaching a myriad of fluffy ducklings how to swim,
leading them out of harm’s way as the boat docks by the wooden
pontoon.
“Welcome,” smiles Ingi’s wife Ingunn Indriðadóttir, greeting
us with a firm handshake. Without further ado, she invites us for
dinner at their house before the photographer heads out to take
pictures and Ingi takes me on a tour of the island. “You should
grab a stick,” advises Ingunn. They’re for fending off attacks
from the Arctic terns, which don’t hesitate to peck the heads of
people walking through their nesting grounds.
FROM DECAY TO STATE-OF-THE-ART
“I’m the only house owner here who has no family connection
with the island,” Ingi reveals as we walk along the shore. Also
a Húsavík native, like Örlygur, his first visit to Flatey was as a
young man working on a fishing boat. When a friend of his
asked him to take part in his renovation project of a house on
the island, he went for it. But he didn’t stop at that. Ingi is cur-
rently renovating his third house on Flatey and already has his
sights set on the next project. “I just acquired this building,” he
says with pride, tapping a cracked concrete wall with his stick. I
fail to see the attraction. “A new wall must be cemented around
it.” Ingi explains that it’s the old salt fish processing plant, built
in 1950. He takes me inside and sweeps dirt from the wooden
floor boards. “The original floor can be maintained.” I ask
what he intends to do with the building. “I haven’t decided yet.
Probably something history-related.”
History is all around us. Ingi shows me the island’s only sand
beach, facing Flateyjardalur. Standing on the old pier, I see a
hint of the valley with its own abandoned houses. “This used
to be a potato field,” says Ingi of an area now completely over-
grown with angelica. Submerged in the vegetation lies a rusty
rowboat. Ingi points out a pole with a winch, which was used to
haul the boats ashore. We walk from house to house in different
states of reconstruction and he shows me the one he’s working
on now, Sigtún, built in 1954. One part looks like a state-of-
the-art summerhouse, fully-furnished with tile floors and panel
walls, while the other is raw on the inside with a dirt floor. “This
used to be the adjacent sheepcote,” he explains. We walk past
the old school and community center, complete with stage and
dance floor, where old and new islanders always throw a party
the first weekend of August.
Moving on, Ingi takes me to Sólborg. Built in 1954, rebuilt in
2009, it’s the largest house on Flatey and the de-facto face of the
island. Restoring it was hard work, he admits. “Everything had
to be torn out of the house. I almost didn’t have the stomach to
get started on the cellar. It was disgusting.” Deepening it, much
digging had to be done. “That’s when I discovered that Flatey
has a lot of groundwater,” he sighs. The next day, he found the
cellar to be flooded and had to pump the water out of it before
continuing. Today, Sólborg is as cozy as a house can be, sleeping
17. The beds have been made up because guests, attending a
wedding the following day, are about to arrive. The ceremony
will be held inside the island’s iconic countryside church and
the reception will take place outside, weather permitting. One
hundred people are expected.
MYSTERY UNSOLVED
We end the tour inside Flatey’s lighthouse, perched on the
island’s highest point, where the cliffs drop 22 meters down to
a rocky beach. From the tower we have a perfect view of the
island’s houses and hayfields, and a mysterious circular con-
struction Örlygur had mentioned in our conversation earlier.
“Arnargerði is a noteworthy phenomenon: a giant stacked circle,
which can clearly be seen from the air. No one knows how old it
is or what purpose it served, but it’s been there as long as anyone
can remember.” Legend has it that Stjörnu-Oddi Helgason, a
medieval scientist to whom the Odda-tala formula on winter and
TRAVEL
Ingunn and Ingi outside their house, Krosshús.
Puffin burrows line the island’s grassy edges.