The area in the far north-east of Iceland is largely wasteland, it is a bit like Svalbard (Spitsbergen). You can really wonder why someone wanted to settle here – and that there are still buildings 1000 years later! But it turns out that these have been valuable areas. The main reason is fish, of course, and in earlier times most certainly walrus.
Desolate but dramatic nature in the north of Iceland.
Perhaps something more surprising for us Norwegians: driftwood. Iceland was dependent on imported wood for centuries, and Denmark’s trade monopoly did not help the situation.
Sheep and driftwood at the far north.
Owning land with a large influx of driftwood was very lucrative, and large quantities of wood have always drifted to the north coast of Iceland.
Neatly and less neatly stacked driftwood in the northwest of Iceland (Vestfirðir).
We went for a walk beyond Hraunhafnartangi in the hope of being able to swim at Iceland’s northernmost point. There is a lighthouse there, and next to it are the remains of a turf house. But we couldn’t swim there this time, the swells were too big.
North Cape Iceland. The old lighthouse keeper’s residence is still struggling.
On the way back, just before arriving at Raufarhöfn, we found a great beach close to the road. Clear water, birds and a sheltered bay with fine-grained sand. Can’t ask for more then, right?
Fishing is Iceland’s main industry, although tourism is well on its way up to number 2. In 1970, fish accounted for a whopping 90% of the export. This has been gradually reduced, but fish still accounts for almost 40%. The country is therefore very vulnerable to fluctuations in fish stocks and prices on world markets.
Who’s fishing who in Fáskrúðsfjörður?
One result of this is the many fishing conflicts Iceland has been involved in. Especially with England, which resulted in physical attacks in the 60’s.
Fishing history in Siglufjörður.
In Norway, it is perhaps the quarreling about ‘Smutthullet’ (the Loophole, a 62,400 square kilometers area of the Barent’s sea) that is freshest in the memory. When the cod fishery stopped in the 90’s, Icelandic fishermen had to find new places to find fish. The solution was to start fishing in Smutthullet, outside the 200 nautical mile economic zone from both Russia and Norway, but that was not very popular neither in Russia nor in Norway. The Norwegian coastguard took the Icelandic trawlers ashore and fined them. In 1999, an agreement was concluded between Russia, Norway and Iceland on quota exchange, which put an end to the unregulated Icelandic cod fishing in Smutthullet.
Dramatic nature in the northeast of Iceland.
In Iceland, a system of fishing quotas came into place as a law in 1983. At the first allocations, in 1984, they based the quotas on fishing experience per vessel.
Þórshöfn.
In the north-east of Iceland, there is not much else to live on other than fish. There are a few villages, one of which is Þórshöfn with barely 400 inhabitants. Here man found a very safe natural harbor. The god Þór was thanked for this, hence the name.
Colorful stone figures by Þórshöfn.
The morning bath at Þórshöfn is best taken in the sea. We followed the stone edge just out of the town, where the residental area starts – there you will find a nice little bay. The stone edge was decorated with painted stones in bright colours, presumably made by school children.
A morning bath in Þórshöfn is just right.
This far north, you can expect exceptionally beautiful, crystal clear water and an abundance of birds. Absolutely wonderful!
After a refreshing bath in Þórshöfn, an excursion to Langanes and the wrecked Douglas DC-3 R4D-S aircraft is just right. The accident occurred in 1969 during landing with a strong crosswind. The plane (from the US Navy) is located where the old airport used to be, and serves as a shelter for sheep in bad weather.
The Douglas plane wreck at Langanes.
You will need to pass a fence and join some icelandic horses to get near it, but the farmer did not come running to send us away, so we guess it was ok to have a closer look.
Southwards from Sandefjord, two long peninsulas run between the Sandefjord fjord and the outer Oslofjord, inspiredly named Østerøya (the Easter Island) and Vesterøya (the Western Island). 1000 years ago these were real islands, and you could sail inland from Oslofjord via Tønsberg to Sandefjord.
Vøra was at the bottom of the sea some 1,000 years ago.
When digging a cable trench on Auve, above Vøra on Vesterøya, a number of antiquities were found in 1972, and a Stone Age settlement was later archaeologically excavated. Of the finds, no less than 71 pieces of amber and a whopping 41,021 pieces of pottery have been counted. Much of this was extremely well preserved, as it lay in a sand dune formed by flying sand between 2000-2500 BC.
We were at Vøra to meet Knut’s sister Brit and her husband Stein, who have built a beautiful house on the old seabed. Brit is planning to start winter swimming, so it was a brilliant idea to start the swimming season in April together with Tobatheornottobathe!
Brit and Stein’s dream house.
It turned out to be a great beach bath (the house has its own beach line), with the Master of the Masters’ House (season 2022) in the background, but without hard competitions this time. Next time maybe we will be competing sitting in 90 degrees?
The house of the Masters!Some resisted the temptation. Photo: Une Hunstad Løwø
Easter was approaching the end and so did our Ireland tour, in Cork. By Cork we find the world’s second largest natural harbor (after Sydney): Cobh.
This drew our attention to one of the songs that we play together with ‘The Dirty Old Band‘.
The Irish rover (Trad) On the Fourth of July Eighteen hundred and six We set sail from the sweet Cobh of Cork We were sailing away With a cargo of bricks For the grand City Hall in New York ‘Twas a wonderful craft She was rigged for and aft And oh, how the wild winds drove her She stood several blasts She had twenty-seven masts And they called her ‘The Irish Rover’
Cobh Cathedral, or ‘St Colman’s Cathedral’, has Ireland’s highest spire with its 300 feet.
Cobh was named Queenstown 1849-1920, after a visit by Queen Victoria (a little boring if all places she visited would change name?). Around 2.5 out of 6 million Irish emigrants left Ireland via Cobh during the years 1848-1950. A journey across the Atlantic was an expensive and very dramatic event. The travelers had to borrow money from most of their relatives to afford the tickets, and it was unlikely that they would ever return. The farewell therefore became a kind of a funeral, since they were not going to see each other again. In the evening and night before departure, it was customary to hold a wake for the traveller, also called an ‘American wake‘. The setting was usually sad, although there was a hope for a better life behind the decision. In poor families, it was not usual to sing, dance or drink alcohol during an American wake. The usual thing to do was fasting. To break the fast one had to go to church, and in Cobh Cathedral for many years they held mass very early in the morning so that the emigrants could eat before boarding the ships.
Cobh is a colorful, small town.
Cobh today has just under 13,000 inhabitants, and it is a colorful and cozy little town. The main industry is tourism, with a focus on its status as a port city, and around 100,000 cruise tourists arrive the city each year. Besides ‘The Irish Rover’, which with its 27 masts would have been a very large ship, there was another giant that left Europe from Cobh: The Titanic. Cobh, then known as Queenstown, was the Titanic’s last port of call. But it was much too big for the quay, so contrary to what is shown in the film, she was anchored outside the islands of Haulbowline and Spike. Transport to and from took place with smaller tender boats.
‘America’, one of two tender boats that shuffled to and from Titanic in 1912. Photo from the Titanic Museum, Cobh.
123 passengers boarded the Titanic from Queenstown (and one lucky soul left the ship). Of these, 44 people survived. The old ‘White Star Line’ office is today a museum. Quite small, but pretty good. A very wise move to get close to the disaster is that the ticket you get is a copy of what the ticket from 1912 looked like – inscribed with an actual name among the 123. At the end of the tour, you can look up your alias yourself and find out if you survived or not.
Boarding card a la Titanic.
Idun was assigned the 30-year-old maid Marcelle (Maggie) Daly, who traveled third class and survived. Knut’s alias was Thomas Myles, aged 60, who traveled in second class. His family was visited by a survivor a few weeks after the accident, who could tell them that Mr Myles was allocated a place in a lifeboat, but stepped back, as it was ‘Women and children first‘. Unfortunately, Knut did not survive, but he kept his honor.
Now time was just right for a bath, and we actually saw some youngsters jumping from the pier by the Titanic Museum. But then there was this thing about permission. On the way to the pier, the prohibition sign was impossible to ignore, so “we” decided not to have a bath in Cobh city center anyway, since around 50% of tobatheornottobathe doesn’t like to break rules if not necessary.
Knut scouts for a suitable bathing spot. The wooden structure is the remains of the quay from 1912.
Instead, we went for a beach bath! Winter swimming has become popular also in Ireland, and we had received a tip about Cuskinny beach, which is less than 3 km from Cobh. The beach is shallow, so unless you want to wade far far away in mud, you should go there at high tide. We did, and this was a very nice bath. Beautiful, clear water, not too fine sand, and quite a few bathers with and without wetsuits and buoys.
Dogs and ladies at Cuskinny Beach, Cobh.
As very often before when taking a bath in not exactly warm water- it was the ladies who were in the majority (we only saw a couple of men among the 15 swimmers). And the average age was high, when Idun waded into the water she was actually the youngest. A splendid bath in wonderful sunshine!
Cuskinny beach
Once back at the car park, a sauna had suddenly appeared. It was Mike who had built a wood-fired sauna from a horse transport wagon. Awesome! He drives from beach to beach, and charges 10 euros per person per half an hour.
It is better to have a sauna when you know about it before you are finished bathing, so this time we didn’t try it.
ToBatheOrNotToBathe went to Limerick one day Musicians’ pubs were not far away. The Shannon was rough, But the bathers were tough: “Time’s always right for a bath!”, as they say!
On an island with almost no soil at all, one might wonder how they found wood in the past, for all possible needs. Some use simply had to be stopped – for example, firewood could be replaced by dried livestock dung. Other needs are more difficult to quit, be it trusses for roof structures, or wood for boat building. One solution could be trading with the ‘mainland‘. But something that always helped was wreck looting, stranded boats were not left untouched – everything that could be used was salvaged. And on the Aran Islands they also built boats almost without the use of wood.
Canvas boat, Inisheer.
The Aran Currach is a light type of boat, built up of moldings covered with canvas and tarred. It is very well adapted to heavy sea and can withstand quite bad weather. It is said that the fishermen at the Aran Islands did not learn to swim back in the days. The idea was that if the sea was so rough that the currach went down, they wouldn’t survive anyway. Swimming skills would only prolong the agony, which would end in a certain death anyway.
Skeleton of Currach boats, Inishmore.
In ancient times, the currachs were covered with cattle hides, and it is considered likely that the first islanders came to Ireland and the Aran Islands in such boats (in the Stone Age). The canvas boats are vulnerable to punctures, and normal shoes cannot be used. Instead, traditional Irish leather moccasins with the hairs out, the so-called pampooties, are worn.
Slightly discolored pampooties, on display at Tigh Ned’s Pub, Inisheer.
A somewhat more solid boat, Plassy, shipwrecked on a reef outside Inisheer in 1960. HMS Juliet was commissioned by the British Navy at the beginning of WWII, and it served, among other assignments, during the Allied landings in French North Africa. After the war the navy no longer had use for the ship and it was sold as a merchant ship in 1947. In 1951 it was bought by the Limerick Steamship Company, and renamed MV Plassy, after the bank Plassey by the river Shannon, upstream Limerick city. When she sank, Plassy was filled with general cargo consisting of, among other things, whiskey, woolen yarn and shoes.
Plassy, Inisheer.
It was an hazarduous rescue operation by night, March 8th, 1960. The crew of 11 couldn’t get ashore on their own, because the lifeboat had disappeared in the storm. Conditions at Inisheer were even simpler then than now; no cars, electricity, roads – or even toilets (!), as was stated at the 50th anniversary of the incident. The 15 rescuers – also known as ‘The Rocket Men‘ were already struggling to get the equipment cart out (which got stuck 4 times on the way to the sea), but the weather was getting worse and there was almost no visibility due to swirling sand. Once by the shore, they needed 3 attempts to get a line shot over to the ship. Most of the men wore pampooties on their feet, but as they became too slippery on the rocks, some of the rocket men ended up working in their woolen socks.
Pictures from the rescue operation. From the Tigh Ned’s Pub, Inisheer.
The rescue itself took 4 ½ hours, using a breecher buoy. This is a device where short canvas trousers are attached to a lifebuoy, which is pulled forward using a rope and a pulley (as a zip-line). This way you can save one person at a time, and the operation at Plassy was very successful. The whole crew were rescued, albeit quite chilled, after being pulled ashore through the cold water. This happened during lent, but the islanders immediately broke it by giving the shipwrecked whiskey to warm themselves. The crew had been paid the day before and the money was in their pockets, so they went straight to the pub to dry the money in front of the fire. That was how the money could be spent straight away.
More or less safe on shore
Two weeks passed until the weather became suitable for the ship to be embarked again. The islanders boarded at low tide, and salvaged both wool, shoes and whiskey. They were also able to pick up doors and other wood, which fit well into ongoing construction projects. The priest insisted from the pulpit that robbing the wreck should not happen, but that didn’t help at all, instead that’s when the looting really picked up speed. Bottle after bottle of Scottish ‘Black & White’ was hidden in the potato fields (they wanted to avoid problems with customs), and shoes exchange took place for months afterwards. It took time to get the right and left shoes interchanged so that a suitable pair was obtained. As a well-deserved ‘punishment’, the customs officer had the flu with him when he finally showed up – which put all the islanders to bed.
Knut in search for the right place to have a bath.
We wanted to swim at Plassy’s! The wreck is now situated on Inisheer itself, this happened in a later storm. Here it is relatively shallow with a continuous train of incoming swells. There were some discussions about the bathing place. Knut wanted to swim as close to the wreck as possible, but Idun was skeptical. After all, we had been warned against swimming on this side of the island, because of the tides. But a short distance away there was a small beach, and there it was possible to have a bath without being knocked unconscious against stones and rocks.
A wreck bath was just right, even if it got a little bloody.
Plassy has become a tourist attraction in itself, and it has been decided to leave the wreck where it is. As part of the opening sequence of the TV series ‘Father Ted’, she has become part of the Irish folk soul. And fine, she is, we think. Rust can be very beautiful!
Sources: – The article ‘The Plassey Shipwreck‘, Ireland’s Own, on the occasion of the 50th anniversary of the sinking. – Wikipedia
Inisheer has an airport, but we recommend arriving by boat either from Galway via Inishmore, or from Doolin, County Clare. In the summer season, up to 1,000 day-trippers come ashore here every morning at 11 am.
Inisheer. An Trà (The Beach) in backlight.
The name Inisheer means ‘The Easternmost Island’, it is also the smallest of the three Aran Islands. Smallest and nicest, we think! The island is approximately circular, with a circumference of 12 km. This is a wonderful place to be! The winds are strong and the weather is steadily unstable, but the village by the harbour is cosy, warm and friendly with myriads of stone fences, green grass and ancient monuments.
Horse and stones, Inisheer.
The stone fences date partly from the Bronze Age, when the first soil was made from seaweed, kelp and sand. Further subdivision into very small fields came with population growth and potato cultivation some 3000 years later. Nevertheless, it is the remains of ancient graves, forts and churches that make the biggest impression on this island.
Cnoc Raithní. The lowest layers are dated 2500-1500 BC. The light mast is of a slightly more recent date.
The Bronze Age tomb of Cnoc Raithní was well hidden and forgotten until the sand suddenly blew away during a storm in 1885. Excavations revealed urns with cremated bones and a bronze awl. The upper parts were built by early Christian islanders around 500-800 AD.
Cultural landscape, Inisheer. In the background to the right, Inishmaan (the middle Aran Island) can be seen.
The highest point on Inishmore is dominated by O’Brien’s Castle (Irish: Caisleán Uí Bhriain). Today’s ruins date from the early 15th century, erected by Clann Teiges, from a branch of the O’Brien family. The castle was taken in 1582 by ‘the O’Flahertys of Connemara‘ and again in 1652 by Oliver Cromwell. O’Brien’s Castle has remained in ruins ever since. But it is beautiful, in all its decline!
Caisleán Uí Bhriain.
Today, there are 260 people living at Inisheer, divided into only 6 surnames. As a result, first names and nicknames are often descriptive, so here you should stay average, not to be ‘doomed by the name‘!
Time moves slowly on Inisheer. Reliable electricity became a fact as late as 1997 (!), and ATMs do not exist (they take credit cards, so there is no crisis without cash). Despite the small population, there are actually several pubs at Inisheer. And Knut was very excited indeed about this one, equipped as it is with a flag quiz in the ceiling:
Flaherty’s pub, Inisheer. A flag quiz is always just right!
The first thing that greets you when you arrive in Inisheer is the beach (An Trá), which we highly recommend. Here we had a really nice Easter bath, and it is perfect also for swimming. At lunchtime you will even have the beach all to yourself, and that’s fine too.
At Inishmore, human remains have been found as far back as the Stone Age, and some of these remains are very easy to spot. The most impressive monument of them all is Dún Aonghasa, a Bronze Age fortress that was constructed around 1100 BC.
Dún Aonghasa (in the background) is visible several kilometers away. The outer (lowest) walls encircle a total of 14 acres.
There are two explanations for the name. One is that it originates from the God Aengus, who plays a central role in 5 myths in Irish folklore. Aengus was associated with youth, love, summer and poetry. The other explanation is that the fort was built by King Aonghus Mac Úmhór, who led his people to the shores of Galway Bay and onto Inishmore after losing the war against Clann Chuian.
The walls have been restored several times, and the retaining walls are of recent date.
The fort consists of three sets of ring walls. The two outermost walls form a semicircle against the cliffs to the west. Between the two outermost walls a field of upright stones is planted, called ‘Chevaux de frise’, as a protection against invasion. The area is difficult to pass even today.
The innermost wall on the left. In the background to the right, outside the middle wall, is a glimse of Dún Aonghasa’s ‘Chevaux de frise’.
The innermost (and thickest) wall is believed to have been circular when it was first built, and also when it was restored some 1,500 years later (in the early Middle Ages). After collapsing into the sea, also the inner wall appears semi-circular today.
The innermost wall was restored in 1884-85.
Dún Aonghasa was investigated archaeologically in 1992-95, and a number of interesting findings were made, including house foundations and Bronze Age graves. These islanders cultivated barley and oats. Compared to other Bronze Age settlements, the Aran population had more sheep and less cattle and pigs. The latter probably because the pig’s tendency to dig in the soil is not sustainable on islands with almost no soil at all. The menu was otherwise based on fish, shellfish and birds, especially guillemot, but great auk bones have also been found (extinct in Ireland some 3,000 years later, in 1835 and in the rest of the world some years later).
The podium in the center has an unknown function, but may have been some kind of a stage.
After a visit to Dún Aonghasa, time will be just right for both shopping, lunch and bathing.
Knut has found a café with a thatched roof. It is mostly the tourism industry that builds such houses today.
This far into ‘County Wool‘, we were sure to find woolen hats and clothes to buy. But since Idun knits quite a lot herself, it is not interesting to buy knitted sweaters, and it doesn’t help that they are very, very, very beautiful. In these islands, each family has its own patterns, and ‘Aran knitting‘ is popular throughout all of Ireland. The typical ‘Aran Sweather’ dates from around 1900, and it used to be offwhite with textured pattern all over. This time tweed was what tempted us the most, and Idun found herself a nice hat, she thought. Knut, on the other hand – completely overwhelmed by the selection, didn’t find any new sixpence this time.
Too many choices for a simple man.
Finally we were ready for a bath, and Kilmurvey Beach a couple of km below Dún Aonghasa is absolutely perfect, also for swimming.
Kilmurvey Beach, Inishmore. Bathing temperature at Easter time: approx. 8 degrees Celcius.
Here you will find fine, white sand, a bench to put your clothes on, and great swells that are fun to fight with, but not dangerous. A great bath!
In the summer of 2019, Idun’s older sister Jorunn had another big birthday to celebrate. The celebration was a cruise with ‘Hurtigruten’ from Longyearbyen to the island of Moffen, 80 degrees north.
The Lønnech glacier seen from the ship ‘Nordstjernen’ (the North Star).
On day 2 of the cruise, we entered the Magdalene fjord north of Ny-Ålesund. Here it is wild and beautiful, and you can admire glaciers surrounded by pointed mountains.
Nordstjernen in the Magdalene fjord.
Presumably this is where the name ‘Spitsbergen’ comes from. The fjord’s name is from the 18th century, named after the biblical Mary Magdalene.
Gully bay. Can nature be more beautiful than this?
On the south side of the Magdalene fjord is a headland with a fine sandy beach, one of the few places in the area where it is possible to a) disembark b) bury corpses c) have a bath
An English whaling station was built here in the 17th century.
One of four blubber oven foundations at Magdalenefjorden.
During 200 years of whaling, many people were buried here, and the place is today called Gravneset (the Grave Headland) with Gravnesodden at the end. 130 graves have been found, many of them long after the whale station itself had closed down. The sailors preferred to bury the dead here, where it was possible to dig holes for bodies, instead of throwing the corpses into the sea. The graves are English, Dutch, but also many Basques are buried at Gravneset, they were skilled whalers. In the 1970s, you could still find bone remains in the area, dug up by foxes, polar bears and souvenir-chasing tourists. Today, Gravneset is protected, and large parts are fenced off to avoid wear and tear of the cultural heritage.
Gravneset by the Magdalene fjord.
The guides had insisted for two days, that it was compulsory to have a bath at Gravnesodden, imaging that maybe 2-3 people would take the bait and actually have a dip. But that was a severe underestimation of the Løwø family. We ended up with 17 bathers from the ‘Birthday group’ – a new record!
This is how it looks like when 17 people go swimming at 79°33′ north. Photo: Berner Hestø
And the bath itself? Absolutely gorgeous! A white sandy beach, crystal clear water decorated by ice cubes – and 3 degrees celsius.
Swimming in the Magdalena Fjord, perhaps the most beautiful fjord in the world. Photo: Karina Løwø.
In addition to the buried people, there was also an arctic tern (Sterna paradisaea) who wanted to see us leave Gravneset:
Get the heck out of here!
… so then we did. And as ice bathers on a cruise, this time we got physical proof of the bathing madness:
The Kings Bay (Kongsfjord) in the northwestern part of Spitsbergen is one of the most beautiful fjords in Svalbard. On the south side of the fjord you will find the researcher town Ny-Ålesund with the previous coal producing ‘Kings Bay Kull Company’, and on the north side you find ‘Ny-London’, a disused marble mining village.
Blomstrandøya. ‘Nothing less than an island made of pure marble’ (quote: Ernest Mansfield).
The marble deposits on Blomstrandøya were discovered in 1906. Development of the site began in 1911 and was carried out by the English company ‘Northern Exploration Company Ltd’. The head of the project was Ernest Mansfield. Of the buildings that were erected here (they were supposed to house 70 men), some have been moved to Ny-Ålesund where they are still in use. But some houses remain, partly deserted and partly in use as cabins for the researchers in Ny-Ålesund.
New London in Kongsfjorden, also called Camp Mansfield.
The appetite for investments in the early 20th century was sky high. The best of the technical devices of the time were installed, including railways, steam engines, marble cutting machines and cranes.
Nicely riveted processing plant from the early 20th century.Mobile crane manufactured by Taylor & Hubbard, Leicester.
The appetite for investments was continuously increasing throughout the First World War, and the share capital rose to over a million pounds. There were many people who made good money during WWI, and they needed something to spend their money on. The adventure in New London ended in the world’s first stock market bubble, which burst in 1920. Large amounts of money had been invested – without anybody knowing what the marble was actually worth.
Yes, marble can be very valuable, as blocks. But as gravel?
When the first small cargo of marble arrived in England, 1912, it turned out that the large, beautiful marble blocks had been transformed into marble gravel due to frost bursting. There was no value whatsoever in the marble from Kongsfjorden. However, this did not stop the investments! Expectations of quick returns overshadowed common sense. Mansfield was fired, and the growth continued. The value was NOK 18 million in 1919. The following year it was 0, and the plant was abandoned.
After so much history teaching, time was just right for a bath, and in New London the bathing conditions are chilly, but excellent!
Our bathing beach east of the old unloading facility, 78°58′ north.
Here we found just the perfect type of sand, and not too shallow, either.
Nice drive south towards Ny Ålesund! Arne and Kjerstin were tobatheornottobathe standins for Knut on this trip.
If we swam far? No, we did not swim across Kongsfjorden.
