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West Iceland is home to Europe's most powerful hot spring, Iceland's most significant lava tube, fascinating glaciers, beautiful waterfalls, some of Iceland's most important historical sites and more. It has three main districts:
Borgarfjordur
Borgarfjordur has rich history, with Reykholt where Snorri Sturluson, author of Snorra-Edda and Heimskringla lived and featuring a medeval and cultural museum dedicated to his memory. In Borgarnes, the main village of Borgarfjordur, the Settlement Center can be found.The landscape is magnificent and includes the magical Hraunfossar waterfalls, Surtshellir lava cave, Deildartunguhver hot spring and Eiriksjokull glacier.
Snaefellsnes
The Snaefellsnes peninsula has its unique mountain ridge with the majestic Snafellsjokull glacier at its west end. The region around it is a national park, named after the glacier.
Breidafjordur
Breidafjordur is a natural reserve, a wide bay with countless small islands and home of thousands of birds. The inner part of Breidafjordur is the agricultural area Dalir. In Haukadalur is the old farm site Eiriksstadir, the home of Eric the Red, the first European to land in Greenland (in the year 984 AD). His son was Leif Ericsson, the first European to land in America (in the year 1000).
Snaefellsnes is a large peninsula extending to the west from West Iceland ending with a national park, Snaefellsjokull National Park, where the glacier towers over the scenery, as can sometimes be seen from Reykjavik, lending its beauty to the area.
Snaefellsnes peninsula
The peninsula stretches over 100 km to the west as a mountain ridge that includes active volcanoes and is unique in the variety of mountains found.
A few small and beautiful villages are located on the south side and a few fishing villages are on the north side: Rif, Hellissandur, Olafsvik, Grundarfjordur and Stykkisholmur. The last one is highly popular for travelers, featuring a volcano museum and a ferry that takes you across the fascinating Breidafjordur bay to Brjanslaekur on the south border of the Westfjords.
Other museums you might want to check out are the Maritime Museum at Hellissandur, the regional museum Pakkhusid at Olafsvik, and, last but not least, the shark museum at Bjarnarhofn, indeed listed as the nr. 1 Snafellsnes attraction by Lonely Planet Travelers. Also, many of the Icelandic sagas take place at Snaefellsnes.
Snaefellsnes has an abundance of interesting sights. At the national park, you can witness the impressive lava formations of Djupalonssandur creek and test your strength on its four stones, see the two massive lava formations that compries Londrangar, explore the Saxholl volcanic crater and enjoy the echo of 'The Singing Cave', Songhellir. You may also hike on the majestic Snaefellsjokull glacier. The glacier has strong ties with folklore and was the setting for Jules Verne's Journey to the Center of the Earth.
Other sights we can recommend at Snaefellsnes recommend include Raudfeldsgja canyon, east of the national park and the rugged and colourful Berserkjahraun lava field, near Bjarnarhofn, on the north side of the peninsula.
Last, but not least, Snaefellsnes is one of the main setting for Laxdaela saga. Chieftain Snorri godi, Gudrun Osvifursdottir, Bolli Thorlakssson all lived there as well as his namesake Bolli Bollason, the first West Norse member of the Varangian guard, an elite unit of the Byzantine army. Iceland's most famous mass murderer, Axlar-Bjorn, also lived at Snaefellsnes.
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Grundarfjörður is a small town found on the north coast of the Snæfellsnes Peninsula in the west of Iceland. It has an approximate population of 872 people and has been twinned with the French town Paimpol since 2004.
The town’s main industries lie in fishing and fish processing. Grundarfjörður also bears host to substantial ship traffic, a consequence of’ the settlement’s natural harbour.
More recently, it has become a centre for tourism, due to the incredible beauty of the features on the Snæfellsnes Peninsula. It is developing to meet the needs of those who travel through it.
Grundarfjörður boasts a public library, a historical centre, a resident’s café and a photography exhibition, Bæringsstofa, which is a collection of pictures by the late Icelandic photographer and honorary citizen of Grundarfjörður, Bærings Cecilsson.
Asides from accommodation and amenities, Grundarfjörður offers the opportunity to partake in numerous outdoor activities, ranging from horseback riding and camping to ice-climbing.
One can also find a nine-hole golf course beside the town.
Kirkjufell Mountain
Visitors to Grundarfjörður will likely visit the town’s main landmark, the photogenic Kirkjufell, which translates to ‘Church Mountain’. Clearly distinguishable, and standing alone on the edge of the sea, its dramatic slopes, steeple-like peak and surrounding shorelines make it one of the country’s most beautiful summits.
Kirkjufell is often called the most photographed mountain in Iceland, due to the variety of different way you can shoot it, and how starkly different it appears under different lights.
Besides the mountain itself, one can find Kirkjufellsfoss (Church Mountain Falls), a beautiful three-pronged waterfall, which is often favoured as a foreground.
Rock climbing is possible up Kirkjufell, but only for the very experienced as there have been accidents before.
Folklore & History
Nearby, one can find the town and municipality of Stykkishólmur, which has a population of 1,195, and is a centre of commerce and services for the region. The town, more than any other in the region, is considered mystical, with many folk stories and Sagas referencing it.
The road from Grundarfjörður to Stykkishólmur crosses a wide lava field known as Berserkjahraun. The name of this lava field is derived from the Eyrbyggja saga, in which it said two berserkers (Viking Warriors) were slaughtered by their master because one of them fell madly in love with own daughter.
It was said that the master had then pave the road across it before killing them.
Grundarfjörður is an important historical town in Iceland, having been a centre of trade for the Snæfellsnes Peninsula since at least the 15th century. The town was certified official as one the country’s six designated marketplaces in the year 1786.
There are a number of antiquity sites around the town, however, that point to the region being well-inhabited as far back as the Viking era.
Like many places on the peninsula, it is likely that it could have been one of the first inhabited places in the country, due to its harbour and the wealth of fish that live just off its shores.
Melrakkaey ("Fox Island") is a small island found at the mouth of Grundarfjörður. Melrakkaey was protected in 1972 and today, only those with permission from the Nature Conservation Agency may visit.
As with the majority of islands along the shallow, 50 km (31 mi) bay Breiðafjörður, Melrakkaey was, historically, a source of sustenance for the local population. Not only was the island used for fishing—ruins of these fishing outposts still exist—but the tall, columnar basalt cliffs on the island's north, east and south sides ensured that a variety of nesting birds called Melrakkaey home. This meant a reliable source of meat and eggs, making the island a makeshift pantry for the community.
Amongst the seabirds that still nest on Melrakkaey today are cormorants, glaucous gulls, shags, eiders and Iceland's favourite resident, the Puffin. Regulations were put in place on visitor numbers in order to protect the wild bird species.
Melrakkaey was once known as "The Reverend's Island" to Danish Sailors due to it belonging to a 14th-century parsonage nearby. The island was pledged to the church after an elderly local woman lost her two sons at sea and could not find their bodies. The parsonage used the island for haymaking, and there was even a house built on the island to facilitate such a practise.
