A walk along frozen Lake Toftavatn and to the top of Húsklond

After three days of perfect weather in November on the Faroe Islands, I felt like my luck had to be up soon. But we continued getting lucky with sunny days and a few moments of snow, making it all the more magical. Solveig and I wanted to take advantage of every sunlight moment in this incredible winter weather, so on my fourth day there, we were off on a new adventure together.

We wanted to go to the north part of Eysturoy to climb Slætteratindur, the highest mountain in the country, as the sky was as clear as can be. We figured that the view from the highest point in the country would be mesmerizing on a day like this.

But the day didn’t quite turn out as we had planned, but instead lead us to another beautiful adventure.

Petur Sigurð offered to drive us, as he was going to Runavík, a large village on the southern part of Eysturoy, and didn’t mind taking us to Eðisskarð, where the hike begins. But first he had to go to the doctor in Kollafjørður, so Solveig and I started walking along the road, waiting for him to pick us up again. We didn’t expect it to take long, but before we knew of it, we had walked to the other end of the village – and this is the longest village on the Faroe Islands stretching 8,5 kilometres -, and it had already been an hour.

Vestmanna on a clear winter morning

Kollafjørður

We decided to walk back to see what had happened, and just as we walked into the “center” of Kollafjørður again, Peter Sigurð came driving towards us. The doctor had just been extremely slow, and unfortunately that meant that we wouldn’t be able to make it to the top of Slætteratindur and back before it would get dark at 3.30 PM.

Instead we decided to go with Petur Sigurð to Runavík, and he took us to Lake Toftavatn, which is one of my favourite places in the country. The area is very different from the rest of the country with a lush landscape full of small bushes. It’s a unique place that looks like something you’d find in Western Jutland or Iceland, but certainly not on the Faroe Islands. But with a backdrop of snowcapped mountains, it’s a perfect mixture of both worlds.

When we arrived at the lake, our mouths dropped and we sat there in awe. The lake was frozen! It looked so beautiful, like a magical winter wonderland.

I’ve been to the lake twice before, and I loved it both times, but I’ve never seen it look so beautiful. Right there was when I decided that winter was my favourite season to see the Faroe Islands. It’s just so spectacular with the snowcapped mountains, frozen lakes and occasional snow storms.

We spent the next hour walking around the lake, taking hundreds and hundreds of photos of the magical landscape. I couldn’t believe my eyes, it was so unlike anything I’d ever seen before. I’ve seen frozen lakes before, but not in stunning landscape like this. This is truly one of my favourite places in the Faroe Islands, maybe even in the world.

One thing I hadn’t done before at Lake Toftavatn was to climb the mountain behind it. I’d always wanted to, and since the weather was so perfect, we figured it was a great time to do it. The mountain is called Húsklond and is only 129 meters high, although it’s slightly steep to climb.

The view from the top is just as breathtaking as the lake, giving us a view of the fjord Skálafjørður, the long peninsula Raktangi south of Strendur and over to the island of Streymoy and the village of Kollafjørður, where we’d been earlier that day.

Since the weather was so great, we decided to eat our lunch on top of the mountain with a view of the villages of Toftir and Nes and the sun setting over Streymoy’s mountains, and we were joined by three sheep that were curious about our food.

After lunch, we headed back down the mountain and walked along the north side of the frozen lake and into the village of Runavík.

As soon as we reached Runavík, a snow storm blew in over the mountains and onto the streets, soon covering them and us in white. At that moment, I was glad that we didn’t get to go to Slætteratindur, as we would’ve been stuck up on the mountain in the snow storm!

The best way to get down a mountain!

We went shopping in a charity store for some wool sweaters and then hitchhiked back to Vestmanna. We had three different cars, and believe it or not, the last one was Petur Sigurð, on his way home from visiting friends in Runavík! What’s the chance of that happening? haha!

Another great day in the Faroe Islands was over. We saw something new and amazing. Again, I was positively surprised by this beautiful country. Even after 7 visits, I’m not fed up yet (and I probably never will be). I just love it so much.