Hornstrandir Traverse: Hesteyri to Hornvík

Hornstrandir Nature Reserve, Westfjords · Iceland

Challenging5 daysEurope~£380 est.

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Overview

The Westfjords' abandoned peninsula is Iceland with the volume turned down and the wildness turned up. Hornstrandir lost its last permanent residents in the 1950s; today there are no roads, no shops, no phone signal — just derelict farmsteads, whale bones on black beaches, and Arctic foxes so unhunted they trot up to inspect your bootlaces. The traverse from the ghost settlement at Hesteyri crosses low passes between fjords to Hornvík bay, beneath Hornbjarg: a 534m sea cliff shaped like a breaking wave, screaming with guillemots and puffins all summer. Everything here is ferry-fed. Boats from Ísafjörður drop and collect hikers on a published summer schedule, and a missed pickup means days of waiting — so you build a buffer day in, and you treat the captain's weather word as law. Fog can erase the passes, river mouths shift, and camping is only permitted at designated sites, all gloriously basic. The season is short and precise: mid-June to mid-August, when the boats run and the snow has gone. Stage from Ísafjörður (flights from Reykjavík), hire camping gas in town, and carry every meal. Around £380 including ferries and campsites.