On this trip to Iceland, I was determined to cross the Arctic Circle as I have an ambition to cross the Arctic Circle in every country in the Arctic. In Iceland, this meant travelling to the island of Grímsey.
I had quite a few difficulties getting to Grímsey as I didn’t have a car, so I’m detailing my journey and the problems I encountered in this first part about the island of Grímsey in the hope that it will help you avoid the same pitfalls.
Most people who go on holiday to Iceland never venture further than Reykjavik with maybe a day trip out on the obligatory Golden Circle tour. For someone who likes to discover new things, Reykjavik is rather dull these days.
I journeyed into the suburbs on arrival in Reykjavik to check out the art installation Höfuðstöðin, which was well worth going to. It was also very off the beaten track, bus to the outskirts of the city and then a 15 minute walk alongside a stream to a building in the middle of nowhere.
The art installation consisted of 3 rooms, starting off in darkness with artificial fur in dark purples, blues and greens, leading to a larger room with bright and vivid coloured fur against the wall and hanging from the ceiling and finally a smaller room with mostly white fur with a few pastel shades thrown in. It was like a dreamscape. I took a lot of photos, mostly undisturbed as there were only 2 other lots of people who came in to look while I was there. It took me a lot longer to get there than to walk around, but it was still worth the effort of the journey.
And now I was heading up North, just like I did 9 years ago when I went to see the powerful waterfalls around Myvatn, like Godafoss and Dettifoss. That time I had driven up there around the ring road. Now car hire was so ridiculously expensive I had decided to fly to Akureyri. I couldn’t face 8 hours each way on a bus. Akureyri is apparently very busy these days too, although I wasn’t sure how busy a town of around 20,000 could be, there wouldn’t be enough accommodation to support too many tourists.
And on Wednesday I was sailing up to the island of Grímsey, the only place in Iceland to cross the Arctic Circle, a tiny and remote outpost with just 2 guesthouses. I imagined it would be impossible for Grímsey to be crowded. I would easily be able to find a spot to myself. Some people didn’t stay overnight, I was staying 2 nights. Probably far too long to stay there, but I was going to properly explore the island.
Northern Iceland is a deserted outpost without the infrastructure to support the increasing number of tourists, particularly from the cruise ships that are now frequently docking in the port.
I flew to Akureyri to find that the airport bus was no longer running, despite the fact that there were more than enough people landing and in need of transport to the town to make it worthwhile. This meant the arriving tourists were fighting for the few taxis and when they were all gone I had to phone for one to come back for me.
Things didn’t improve when I got to Akureyri. Despite my “guesthouse” room, which resembled a hospital ward, being large and clean, the shared bathrooms were appalling. In both bathrooms, the shower doors were hanging off their hinges which meant the doors didn’t close and water went all over the floor, which basically made them unusable. In one bathroom there was a huge hole in the ceiling above the shower. On further inspection, the bathrooms on the floor below had shower doors that weren’t broken, so I simply used them for my stay. But as accommodation in Akureyri was scarce, it was at a premium, so I was paying £123 a night for the pleasure of staying in this, let’s face it, hostel, with shared bathrooms with broken showers. I wasn’t impressed.
Worse was to come. I had read on the internet that buses from Akureyri connected to the ferries going to Grímsey. This turned out to be a lie. They did no such thing. There was a bus just after 8 in the morning which got into Dalvík at 8.51 where the ferry to Grímsey departed from at 9. But the bus stop wasn’t at the dock, it was a 15 minute walk away. Who had organised this timetable? Why not have the bus leave a bit earlier so people could use it and comfortably catch the ferry? There were no buses later than 3.30pm and the earliest the ferry ever docked was 5pm. So no connecting buses on the return journey.
I went to tourist information to try and work out what I could do about this. It was established that I could probably get the bus on Wednesday morning and make the ferry, it was a shorter walk than 15 minutes apparently and the driver may be kind and drop me off close to the dock. So even though I panicked it may not work out, I decided that was what I was going to have to do.
I rang the local taxi company to possibly pick me up at the bus stop in Dalvík to take me to the dock. They said the bus driver should drop me at the dock and they would contact the ferry and tell them I was arriving by bus and they should wait for me. I really didn’t like all these ifs and buts and relying on bus drivers to drop me at undesignated stops and ferries having to wait, but I didn’t really have much choice.
Now I had the conundrum of what to do when I came back from Grímsey. There were no buses, so I had to do something else. I could overnight in Dalvík when I got off the ferry on Friday and get the bus the next day to Akureyri. That was when I spotted my next problem. There are no buses on a Saturday. Was I back in the Dark Ages? What the hell kind of place has no buses on a Saturday? So now I had more rearranging to do.
There was accommodation in Dalvík on Thursday night. But that meant I had to change my arrangements on Grímsey and also on the ferry. I was already past the date where I could change my accommodation on Grímsey free of charge, but I thought it was worth a phone call and the owner of the guesthouse agreed to let me change my reservation to one night without charge.
The ferry was never full, so I knew I could get back to the mainland on Thursday, but again, it was worth a phone call to see if I could change my ticket or if I had to buy another one. If I had been in Egypt I wouldn’t even have bothered asking, when I’d been in Egypt and bought the wrong ticket by mistake, there was no leeway, I had to buy another ticket.
However, in Iceland, especially in Northern Iceland, they are rather more relaxed and even though I hadn’t made a mistake in my booking, they were quite happy to change my reservation for free, they weren’t even particularly interested in the reason. I think even if I had just changed my mind for no good reason, they would have let me change my ticket for free. So the laid back attitude in Northern Iceland does have some benefits. Now all I needed was for the stars to align and for me to catch this ferry to Grímsey on Wednesday.
I tried to enjoy my day on Tuesday, but it was difficult not to think about all the obstacles that faced me the following day and so I never really relaxed and I didn’t sleep well either.
If I had realised what a nightmare it was going to be getting to Dalvík on the morning of the ferry crossing, I would have booked to overnight there the night before as well as the day of my return to Dalvík. Certainly I would advise anyone without a car to travel to Dalvík by bus the day before and stay there overnight, so you don’t have to rely on the kindness of the bus driver to drop you by the ferry or panic about the bus being late.
I was up early and at the bus stop over half an hour before the bus was due. As I crossed the road to the bus stop, the pedestrian crossing was on red, but I crossed the road anyway, you needed binoculars to see the nearest cars which were in the distance, stationary at the next set of traffic lights. A local man at the other side of the crossing didn’t cross on the red light and as I crossed against the light, he told me it was red and called me crazy. Had the distant cars been speeding towards me with Nigel Mansell behind the wheel, I might have needed to worry. Since they weren’t even moving I was in no danger.
When the bus arrived, which was actually just a minibus, I asked the driver if he could drop me close to the dock as I was trying to catch the ferry to Grímsey. He said he should be able to do that for me. It was hardly the most affirmative sentence I was hoping for, but I assumed that if he wasn’t prepared to drop me near the dock he would have said no. There were 2 women who also got on the minibus and were going all the way to Siglufjördur, the ultimate destination of bus 78. So I wasn’t going to be inconveniencing anyone. No one else was going to Dalvík to catch the ferry to Grímsey. Presumably because they had realised the buses were useless and they had decided to overnight in Dalvík to be on the safe side.
I didn’t enjoy the drive to Dalvík, I was constantly looking at my watch, wondering if I’d catch the ferry or not. The driver first pulled into the petrol station, the official bus stop in Dalvík and picked up a waiting passenger. We were a bit early and I wondered if he would wait until 8.51 before departing, but he didn’t, he set off straight away and then he dropped me within spitting distance of the ferry. He pointed out the ferry, all I had to do was walk down some steps, across a road and I was at the ferry. I had made it!
Now I really could relax and enjoy myself. I was going to Grímsey!
The ferry crossing was 3 hours and I went to the upstairs lounge where there was plenty of space and put my rucksack down and then I went up on the open air top deck. I had assumed that the ferry crossing would be quite cold. In fact, despite it being August, Iceland was pretty cold, so I had brought a winter coat with me as well as a waterproof and my down jacket. I had deliberately brought my big suitcase and my small suitcase, so I had plenty of space for all my stuff. The main reason for the 2 suitcases was so I could leave the big one behind in Akureyri and just take the small one with me for the 2 nights on Grímsey. It turned out I was now only having one night on Grímsey, but as I was staying in Dalvík on Thursday night, I was still going to be away for 2 nights.
It was quite cold and windy on the ferry crossing so I was pleased I had the winter coat on. First off we passed the island of Hrisey which is very close to the mainland and has a settlement in the south. I had no desire to go to Hrisey. The main reason I was going to Grímsey was because I have an ambition to cross the Arctic Circle in every country that crosses the Arctic Circle and island of Grímsey is the only place in Iceland that crosses the Arctic Circle. If you stay on the mainland you won’t cross the Arctic Circle. Crossing the Arctic Circle in Iceland would be my sixth out of eight countries that cross the Circle.
I took photographs of Hrisey as we passed and then the last photos of the mainland before it disappeared from sight and we headed into the open waters of the Atlantic. With no more land visible until we got close to Grímsey, I retreated to the lounge and fell asleep for an hour or so, which I needed after the lack of sleep for the past couple of nights. When I woke up we weren’t too far from Grímsey and I went up onto the top deck again to take photos of the island as we approached.
I could see the orange lighthouse on the south of Grímsey and also my guesthouse was visible as we got close, it couldn’t have been any handier, basically it was just at the top of the pier, a couple of minutes’ walk.
Despite all the odds, I had made it to the island of Grímsey. Now my adventure to cross the Arctic Circle in Iceland could begin.
I travelled to Grímsey in August 2023.
I got the ferry from Dalvik to Grímsey. A one way ticket costs 4,000 ISK which is approximately £25. During the summer there are ferries on Sunday, Monday, Wednesday, Thursday and Friday. They all depart from Dalvik at 0900h. They return from Grímsey at 1400h, 1600h or 1700h depending on the day. Tickets for foot passengers can only be booked online through the Road Administration website.
I stayed at Guesthouse Gullsol on Grímsey, which is just a short walk from the harbour. A one night stay in a single room with a shared bathroom cost £56. I booked this through Expedia.
I stayed at Hotel Dalvik on my return from Grímsey. A one night stay with a shared bathroom cost £46. I booked this through Expedia.
The minibus from Akureyri to Dalvik costs 2,280 ISK each way which is approximately £14. Advance reservations are not needed, payment is taken on the bus. The bus runs every day except Saturday.
I flew to Akureyri from Reykjavik Domestic Airport with Icelandair. The flight time is 45 minutes and a return ticket cost me £210. I booked this directly with Icelandair.
There are several places to stay in Akureyri. I am not detailing the accommodation I used in Akureyri as I would not recommend it.
