Reliving an old trip – 19th June 2005 – Driving Vagar, Streymoy and Eysturoy

There’s something of a “morning after the night before” as I wake up at 11:30, feeling like death warmed up. Maybe it was the whale meat I ate last night…or the copious amount of beer I drank I’m not sure. Either way I’ve comfortably missed my 8am ferry, with connections carefully planned to visit Mykines, the remote island in the West of the Faroese archipelago.

I couldn’t face doing much, but did manage to turn my radio on, I must have tuned it into Radio 4 long wave last night as that’s what came on, and it was cricket commentary from a one day international in Bristol between England and Australia. A few references were made to the heat in England, a whooping 30 degrees, I still hadn’t opened the curtains but was fairly confident it was significantly less than that here. I love holidaying in the arctic 🙂

After a bit more cricket commentary and a bit more feeling sorry for myself and my hangover, I look at the ferry timetable and decide to go for the 14:45 back to Eysturoy (and then Torshavn via bus).  After packing up my stuff I bumped into Valti again (the Icelandic fisherman I’d met the night before) and he offered me a lift as he was “going for a drive”. I still felt like death, but given my lack of transport and desire to see as much of the Faroes as I could I took him up on the offer.

Taking in the view at Eiði

It was absolutely fantasic, even with my hangover. You see so much more in a car than you could on the bus and ferries. We drove around Northern Eysturoy, which has some incredibly picturesque villages including Eiði and Gjogv, the latter of which I realised I’d seen in various tourist brochures. We went for dinner in Hotel Eiði where we had a decent steak and chips and enjoyed the view down to the harbour. The service was somewhat surly, in stark contrast to the Faroese hospitality I’d enjoyed thus far.

Gjogv

After dinner we drove across to Vagar (an island in the west where the airport is), through the recently opened (as of 2005) Streymoy-Vagar tunnel, paying 170Kr for the privilage which Valti and I agreed was a rip off. Still, I guess these tunnels don’t come cheap. On Vagar we got as far as Bour on the West coast before heading back to Streymoy, where Valti dropped me off at the campsite in Torshavn. By now it was almost midnight (and still light of course), but was windy and rainy and putting my tent up was difficult (my hangover still hadn’t completely surpassed), but finnaly getting into bed was heavenly. I slept like a log through the impending storm.

Gjogv