I was on the ferry to Grímsey and around 3 hours later we were almost there. After sailing on the Atlantic Ocean with no land in sight, I could now see the island in the distance.
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.
The guesthouse had a kitchen and a lounge and one downstairs room. All the other rooms were upstairs, including mine and to get to it I had to climb a loft ladder. It was a bit awkward, I climbed to the top of the ladder and my room was just to the left. I had to open the door still standing on the steps and then sit on the floor to get into my room, there wasn’t the space to stand on the floor next to the door as it opened outwards. But it wasn’t impossible. You then dropped the hatch so you could walk across the upper floor and get to the bathroom. There was only one other room occupied tonight, by an American father and son. They headed out to explore and I wasn’t going to be far behind them.
I decided to ditch the winter coat and waterproof trousers and wear my down jacket and leggings so I’d be more comfortable on my long hike. My plan was to walk the perimeter of the island. This route is 6 miles and takes 6 hours, allowing for photo stops and time to enjoy the scenery and the experience of the walk. I had no intention of racing around the island as fast as I possibly could. I wanted to savour my time on Grímsey.
You don’t need to stay overnight on Grímsey. Most days the ferry stays for 5 hours, so it is possible to get the morning ferry, spend 5 hours on the island and then head back to the mainland in the evening.
Anyone who comes to Grímsey as a daytripper will want to go to the Arctic Circle, so my route was going to take me to the lighthouse which was on the southerly extreme of Grímsey and in the opposite direction to where all the daytrippers were bound to walk. Even those staying overnight seemed to head straight to the Circle, so once out of the village of Sandvik I didn’t see a soul.
I walked down towards the church, a plain, wooden building just out of the town centre. I walked into the churchyard and up to the door to see if it was open. It was, and to my surprise, it was a shell inside. Lots of pieces of wood and tools, but no seats or anything. It wasn’t until I got back to Reykjavik and went into Hallgrimskirkja, the iconic church in the Icelandic capital, that I discovered why the inside of Grímsey Church was a mere husk.
The original church on Grímsey burned down on 21 September 2021. It is thought that the old electrics in the church were the cause of the fire and from the first sparks, the wooden church was a pile of ashes within minutes. Nothing could be saved, everything inside was completely destroyed.
There was no mention of this on any information boards when I was on Grímsey. I found in general there was a lack of information on the island, but maybe part of the charm was making discoveries for yourself.
However, there was an extensive display in Hallgrimskirkja and as part of the exhibit were 2 bells that Hallgrimskirkja have donated to the church in Grímsey, which will be shipped to the island when the construction is complete.
After the church, I followed the road out of the village and down to the southerly tip of the island. There are a few small islands off the coast of Grímsey, so I stopped and took a photo of those. There was an abandoned house up on the hillside and beyond that was the southern coast and a beach. In the distance the bright orange 9 metre tall lighthouse beckoned.
I followed the road up to the lighthouse where there was a picnic table and plenty of opportunities to take photos of the lighthouse and the coastline. The bright orange colour of the lighthouse make it an appealing subject in photographs and I used my selfie stick and my tripod to get a few photos with me in them too. I got lots of photos of the lighthouse from different angles and as I followed the path away from the lighthouse, there were some nice shots behind me too, this was the angle where I could get the door of the lighthouse in the frame.
The road ran out beyond the lighthouse and I followed a slightly muddy path along the east coast towards a gate. This is the path less trodden on Grímsey. Most people will walk the west coast both north and south, but not many bother walking along the eastern cliffs, especially not where I ended up walking on the ankle breaking marshland!
Grímsey is pretty flat, but it is higher in the middle and it is a bit of a climb to get to the highest point. As I went through the gate, at first I didn’t realise that I had managed to leave the hiking route behind as I followed the coast. But as I picked my way along the marshy terrain, taking care with every step as I was never quite sure how far my feet were going to sink into the undergrowth, I worked out that somewhere I’d gone wrong.
I slowly followed what looked like a sort of path. I couldn’t get lost, I was on a tiny island, but I had read not to get too close to the edge of the cliffs as the ground had become unstable because of burrowing puffins! There were no puffins around in August, they had left the island about 6 weeks ago, but their empty burrows could still be a possible hazard.
Gradually the path seemed to take me a little further away from the cliff edge and I began to climb towards the middle of the island. As I climbed to the highest point, I could see the main hiking trail. I wasn’t sure exactly where I’d gone wrong, but I was grateful to be back on a path where I could walk without testing every step to see if my ankle disappeared into the spongy brush.
I continued to walk towards the northern part of the island and to the Arctic Circle. As I walked further along close to the eastern shoreline I saw a huge hill in front of me. I hoped I didn’t have to climb that. It did look pretty steep. Was this the most northerly point of the island? Would I have to climb this enormous hill to get to the Arctic Circle?
I consulted my map and was relieved to discover this was not the most northerly part of then island. The path veered off to the left, but there seemed to be a more minor path straight ahead so I decided to follow that. This was my second mistake of the day.
It soon became clear that I had followed another unofficial track that I shouldn’t be on and was once again picking my way over the potentially ankle breaking marshy tundra.
I could see the official path over to the left and made the decision to cut across to it in the most direct way I could as I couldn’t see a way round to it if I carried on straight ahead. I most definitely shouldn’t have been walking here, but if I turned round I would have been following a track I shouldn’t have been on either, so I didn’t see that it made much difference.
This was the only time I actually saw anyone on my lonely hike, a couple with a little girl who were walking back to the village. Testing every step, it took me less time to get back to the hiking trail than I anticipated and with relief I resolved not to take any more detours.
Once I rejoined the official trail I could see the most northerly section of the island and the sphere ahead which was the marker for the Arctic Circle.
Grímsey is very strange when it comes to the Arctic Circle. There are 2 Arctic Circle markers, one by the airport which is in the wrong place and the other is the concrete sphere on the northerly peninsula. Neither of them have any signage that state this is the Arctic Circle. At the airport there is a signpost with signs pointing to various places around the world and the distance it is to them, but nothing that says Arctic Circle.
At the sphere there is nothing at all. No signpost, no information, absolutely nothing.
In fact the only place where you see the words Arctic Circle are on a signpost on the road to the airport pointing that the Arctic Circle is in the direction of the airport. So there’s a sign pointing in the direction of the Arctic Circle but nothing to indicate you have reached the Circle.
Maybe the residents thought the sphere needed no explanation, why else would you put a concrete sphere on the island far away from all the buildings of the village and the airport? The concrete sphere could only mean that you had reached the Arctic Circle.
I stopped to take a lot of photos of me at the Arctic Circle. This was me crossing the Circle in country number 6 out of 8 and I had a marker to commemorate it, even if it didn’t say Arctic Circle on it. I even looked on the sphere to see if there was any sort of inscription carved into it, but found nothing.
Despite there being no bold “Arctic Circle” proclamation, I took lots of photos and then continued on the path. I was going to walk right to the northern tip of Grímsey. It was getting later now, but I had food at the guesthouse, so I didn’t need to worry about the restaurant being open when I got back and this far north in August, I still had plenty of daylight left.
I walked to the end of the path and looked around trying to work out which particular point was the northerly tip of the island. I consulted my map and went as close to the edge of the cliff as I dared, set up the tripod to take more photos and then decided that was enough. I’d noticed there was a bit of a hill to climb to get back to the village on the west coast path and it was going to take me another hour if I carried on taking photos.
This hike had already taken 5 hours, not that I hadn’t thoroughly enjoyed it, apart from the bits where I’d had to pick my way over the marshy ground, but Grímsey was a place that I really loved.
I got a stunning photo of the sun starting to sink in the sky by a cove. I couldn’t get down to the cove, but that didn’t matter, the view from this location was amazing.
By now I was getting cold and tired, so I reduced the number of photos I took as I continued down the western coastline. However, as I got close to the airport, I couldn’t resist walking over to the signpost indicating the distance to various destinations around the world and taking some photos there. Then it was the final haul back to the guesthouse for something to eat.
The next day, I had until 2 o’clock before I had to catch the ferry back to the mainland, so I decided I was going to go back up to the Arctic Circle and the northernmost tip of the island one last time.
I called at the signpost again and took a few photos and then stopped at a place with a view of the cove and the northern peninsula that I’d missed out last night because I’d had enough. I got some beautiful photos from there and took more at the spot where I’d got my sunset photo the night before.
Then I went back to the sphere and took yet more photos and finally to the most northerly point and got another set of photos.
I’d pushed the time as much as I could, I now had to walk back to the village. If I had time I could grab something quick to eat from the restaurant before getting on the ferry.
I knew I had enough time that I didn’t need to walk at breakneck speed, so I enjoyed my hike and the view as I headed back to the village.
I had enough time for a piece of hot apple and caramel cake in the restaurant. It was very nice. I regretted not setting off on my walk earlier and getting here earlier to savour the food, but never mind.
I bought myself a shot glass to celebrate my time on Grímsey and no doubt at the airport on the way home I would buy something to fill it!
Now it was time to say goodbye to Grímsey and I really had loved it here. It’s definitely somewhere I would go back to if I had the opportunity, next time I would plan things better. If I went again, I would also go when the puffins were there, it would be wonderful to see them.
However, Grímsey was very quiet when I was there and I had loved that about it too. That was because it was low season now, it was getting colder and the puffins had gone.
When I had been considering travelling to Grímsey in either June or July during puffin season the guesthouses were both sold out on some days and not just on Summer Solstace like you might expect. So there would certainly have been more people about. Having said that, my guesthouse had 6 rooms and the other guesthouse was a similar size, so it wasn’t like there would have been no room to move.
I think even at its busiest time, I could probably have done much of that hiking route in the south and be on my own for most of it. And I’m almost certain I could take a wrong turn across that marshland and have an isolated spot on the island all to myself.
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.