The Faroe Islands
Múlafossur is the name of the waterfall in this photo, which drops into the Norwegian Sea from the town of Gasadalur. A photo not too different from this one is what ultimately put the Faroe Islands on Matt’s radar several years ago. It felt surreal to be here, recreating it.
“Don’t Wait to Travel”
We didn’t travel internationally growing up. There were three of us. It was expensive.
Then, during my junior year of high school, for my parents’ 25th anniversary, they went to Italy for a month. My parents hadn’t left North America since they had my oldest sibling, so they were about decades overdue for some travel. When they got back, they raved about how amazing the trip was - how exploring Rome and Florence and the Amalfi Coast had changed their lives.
After that trip, the one piece of parenting they impressed upon my siblings and me was, “Don’t wait to travel. Get out as much as you can, as soon as you can - don’t let kids or anything else get in the way.”
And now, here we are: four thousand and seventy-four miles from our house - in a place that most of our friends have never heard of - because of some advice my parents gave me fifteen years ago. What a wild life this is.
The small village of Saksun is home to just eleven people and showcases the typical, traditional Faroese home: with stones along the sides, and grass growing along the roofs. The stone and grass have been used for centuries to protect people from the harsh winds and driving rains that characterize the climate.
The Sheep Islands
The Faroe Islands aren’t a place that most people I know have heard of. They’re an archipelago of eighteen small islands that connect the Atlantic Ocean to the Norwegian Sea, equidistant between Iceland, Scotland, and Norway. Originally inhabited by Irish monks somewhere between the fourth and sixth century, they were later conquered by Norse Vikings in the ninth century, before Norway eventually took them over. The lands were then ruled as part of the Kingdom of Norway from the year 1035 up until 1814, when an alliance between Norway and Denmark dissolved, and Norway gave the Faroe Islands to Denmark. As one older Faroese man told us, Our history and culture is much more aligned with Norway than Denmark, but when Norway had a chance to leave Denmark, they were so eager to go that they forgot about the Faroes.
From a visual standpoint, the Faroes are what you’d get if you mixed Kauai’s Nā Pali Coast, Iceland’s southern coast, and a small, Alaskan fishing village. They’re shaped like dragon scales: steep, rolling ridge lines rise out of the sea with shear two- and three-thousand foot rocky cliffs falling into the water all along the way.
In the old Norse, the name Føroyar (Faroe Islands) literally means “sheep islands.” It’s a name that the the old Nordic vikings gave the archipelago over a thousand years ago, and with good reason. Even today, with the human population near it’s peak, there are still more sheep (70,000) than people (50,000) that call the Faroe Islands home.
This image of the town Funnigar encapsulates what nearly every town we came across looked like: these beautiful clusters of houses and buildings at the base of a mountain, emptying out into one of the Faroese fjords.
Why Start in the Faroes?
Some years ago, I saw a photo of a waterfall called Múlafossur. It was taken by legendary photographer Chris Burkard, and it depicts this beautiful coastal waterfall whimsically pouring out into the open ocean. I didn’t know where it was, but I’d never seen anything like it. Over time, I came across different versions of that photo again, and eventually learned that Múlafossur is a famous waterfall that runs through the town of Gasadalur, in the Faroe Islands.
Given the remoteness of the Faroe Islands, and given how extreme the weather can be there, Natalie and I wanted to give ourselves the best possible chance to be there when the weather might cooperate - which is typically July and August. So, we gave ourselves a few days to cope with jet lag in nearby Reykjavik (Iceland), and then hopped on a short flight (seventy minutes) over to the Faroe Islands.
Aside from spending a few days in Iceland, Natalie and I knew we wanted to start our trip off somewhere where we could unplug, take in nature, and hike everyday - and the Faroes were just that. We’ll post a more comprehensive guide of where we hiked, what we learned, and what our recommendations would be for someone visiting the Faroe Islands in a later post. Until then, enjoy a few of our photos from the Faroe Islands!
