Many places are beautiful, but some places are epic! The Faroe Islands are certainly in the epic category, and the first island to greet most visitors is the MOST epic of them all (in my humble opinion). Introducing Vágar, gateway to extraordinary vistas, troll fingers and a mythological shapeshifter.
If you missed my previous post, please start here: Introducing the Faroe Islands
There are two ways to get to Faroe Islands: fly into Vágar Airport or take a ship. We flew and our first glimpse of towering mountains jutting up from the sea with a single landing strip wedged between was the perfect introduction to the Faroes. In dense fog, it felt like we were flying into a Jurassic Park movie. 
We knew this place was a good fit as soon as we arrived because everyone was wearing hiking boots. The airport was small and crammed, the baggage claim wait was ridiculously long, but the energy and excitement was contagious. You could feel everyone’s expectation that adventure awaited! Our adventure began somewhat sooner than we expected. The airport was small, so locating the rental car building was easy. What WASN’T easy was finding our rental car company. We saw all the other companies, with happy adventurers waiting to pick up their cars. But no FaroeGuide anywhere to be seen. Thankfully they answered our phone call, because they’d forgotten to mention that they don’t have an office at the airport. I believe the conversation went as such:
FaroeGuide: Yes, so sorry. I meant to email you the pick-up details but it got busy and I forgot.
Eric: Where exactly is the car?
FaroeGuide: Across the road from airport, near the green building.
Eric: The green building? (asking with doubt in his voice because the only green building we see is a dilapidated shack)
FaroeGuide: Yes yes, green building. Can’t miss it. Your car will be there waiting for you.
Did I mention that it was raining and we had wheeled luggage? [note to self: this is why we usually travel with backpacks.] After sprinting through the airport parking lot and crossing the road, we headed towards the car we thought was ours when a man popped out of the car. He handed us the keys to a different car, showed us where to return the keys, and proceeded to leave us…with no instructions, map or questions about insurance. Thankfully, we’d done our research. I knew to pick up a map at the airport, and Eric had already learned about road signs, driving rules, parking timers, and tunnel tolls (which I’ll cover in a later post).
There is literally one main road that connects the six villages on Vágar. You can’t get lost, unless you don’t know your East from your West. So despite this being our first time driving outside the US, we had no issues getting where we needed to be. We spent our first two nights at an AirBnB in Sandavágur, which had a gregarious hostess named Tom. She had a scrapbook of suggested restaurants and things to do on the island, a Spotify playlist of Faroese music, first-aid kits and reflectors (for hiking in fog), movies, books, a fully stocked kitchen, and WASHCLOTHS! We had a beautiful view of the water and village, which had one of the prettiest churches in the Faroes. The church was fairly new (built in 1917) but it had a large rune stone from the year 1200 that translated to “Torkil son of Onundar, man of the East from Rogaland, lived in this place first.” If I ever get to write a Viking romance novel, I think Torkil might just make an appearance.
We picked up food provisions at a tiny market in town, ate pizza at Smiðjan in the neighboring town of Miðvágur, then finished off the evening with a walk up to Trøllkonufingur. The path to Trøllkonufingur (which means “troll woman’s finger”) began in Sandavágur. There was a sign for it and we simply drove up that road until we saw parked cars. We could have driven a little further, but the walk was so pretty and we were happy for a chance to stretch our travel legs.
For our second day on Vágar, we attempted to hike from Bøur to Gásadalur. According to the Hiking in the Faroe Islands guidebook, which is freely available online, this hike was only supposed to be 3.5km and was described as “Moderate to Difficult” and “steep and difficult to climb.” The Faroese are apparently not prone to exaggeration, because that was truly an apt description. We didn’t realize just how difficult it would be, and in our naivete we added an additional 4.5km by starting our walk from town (rather than the trailhead). In hindsight, I’m glad we did because the walk from Bøur offered magnificent views of the islands Tindhólmur and Gáshólmur and the Drangarnir sea stacks. Plus, the town of Bøur was beautiful and deserved a leisurely stroll.
Tindholmur is the large island that looks like a sleeping dragon. Drangarnir is the set of small sea stacks on the left.
Rare to see cattle in Faroe Islands
New grass roof in process
Something important to note about hiking in the Faroe Islands — there are no road signs designating where to pull off for a trail. Some trails don’t even have a sign at all! At least not when we went. The trail notes said it began about 1km south of the tunnel entrance, but even with that knowledge we would never have seen the trail if cars hadn’t been parked in the lot. There was an unmarked road leading left, just before the entrance to the tunnel. Following that road, we found a bench and trailhead sign…and that was when we realized the trail began by going directly up the mountain. No switchbacks, no gradual ascents…just straight up at about a 45 degree angle. Add to that rain and dense fog, and you’ll understand why we didn’t complete the hike. We DID make it to the summit, however. We ate sandwiches in the rain and didn’t mind because it was just so astoundingly beautiful.
We saved our knees by avoiding the most difficult part of the hike, the descent to Gásadalur. We turned around and drove to the town instead. This was our first experience with one of MANY tunnels which connect islands and mountain towns throughout the Faroe Islands. Before that tunnel was built, the ONLY way to get to the town was via the trail — and the tunnel was only completed in 2006! One of the reasons the town probably survived such a remote location was because of its amazing waterfall — Múlafossur.
Had we completed the hike, this would have been the conclusion to that trail. Driving to this outlook was SOOOOO much easier. The village may be small, but it had a very chic cafe where we had our first nordic sandwiches. Otherwise known as Smørrebrød, these open-faced sandwiches typically had a dense multi-grain or rye bread with some type of protein and greens artfully arranged on top. We tried a few on our trip, and all were equally delicious and fun. Eric’s favorite part of Gasadalur was a little red cabinet which housed homemade rhubarb jam and baked goods. You just put your money in a tin coffee pot, self-serve and on the honor system.
Self-serve farmer’s market in Gasadalur. Sølubúð means “store” in Faroese.
Abandoned stairs in Gasadalur, remnants of WWII British occupation
There were two hikes on Vágar that we had planned to do, but due to cost and time we did not. The very popular hike to Bøsdalafossur began charging a $20/person hiking fee, which sadly is a trend in the Faroe Islands. There are no public lands, and some landowners are choosing to limit access by charging fees. I understand their perspective but it still makes me sad. The other hike which we didn’t have time for was Vatnsoyrar to Fjallavatn, which takes you to a remote lake in the middle of the island.
We DID have time for a little mythology, however, so I’ll leave you with this statue of The Nix — a Faroese shapeshifter that lives in the water and tries to glamour people into the ocean, where it then proceeds to drown them. This statue isn’t far from the Vágar Airport, just off the road heading towards Vatnsoyrar.
Stay tuned for more, as we travel to the puffin island of Mykines.
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