(Kingston, Ontario, Canada)

Akureyri is the “capital” of the northern part of Iceland and is, in fact, the second largest urban area in the country. However, its population is still less than 20,000!  Iceland is indeed a sparsely populated country, with just over 300,000 people altogether (most of whom are in the Reykjavik area).

Akureyri feels bigger (at least in summer), as it is a major transportation and administrative hub.  We spent 5 nights here in 2008: the main reason was to have a base for our day trips to the Lake Mývatn region (see this post, that post, and still another post), Grímsey and the Arctic Circle, and the fishing town of Húsavík.  There weren’t really any specific “must see” sites in Akureyri, but we ate a lot of meals here and enjoyed making it our home.

There were some surprises.  Even though Akureyri is almost at 66 degrees north, it had botanical gardens!  As there were very few trees left anywhere in Iceland, we really enjoyed getting some shade and seeing some plant variety here.   We also spent an evening watching what was presumably a professional soccer game.  The quality was uneven but the sparse crowd was very enthusiastic.

While we were in Akureyri, the 2008 Olympics were taking place.  I’ve never seen so much handball before…and I was quite surprised at the physicality of the game!  Iceland is handball-crazy and they participate in many international competitions.   Even so, it was remarkable how well they did in Beijing:  they won the Olympic silver medal!  Considering the size of the country, this has to rank as one of the greatest Olympic achievements.  They lost 28-23 in the gold medal match to France:  a country with 200 times the population of Iceland.

As in Reykjavik, relief from the then-extortionate costs of eating in Iceland was found in Akureyri’s Thai restaurants.  We also enjoyed some relatively inexpensive times at a café called the Bláa Kannan.  As the name suggests, it was very blue…and also very cozy.  Who would have expected to see a Parisian-style café in Akureyri?  Unfortunately, we were not able to find a cheap way to do our laundry in Akureyri:  at $50 (in 2008 dollars), it remains by far our most expensive laundering experience!

We went on a day-trip to Húsavík (see photo at the top of this post) just to experience a smaller town in northern Iceland.  It’s known among tourists mainly for whale-watching but, after our “unsettling” experience sailing to Grímsey, we confined our visit to the town itself. As with Akureyri, it may have been relatively small but it was certainly not narrow-minded.  We easily spent a couple of hours in one of the local museums.   Actually, we were impressed throughout Iceland with the level of literacy and linguistic proficiency.  Everybody seemed to be reading books!

While Iceland’s main attractions remain its natural wonders, even its smaller urban areas are enjoyable.  Stay tuned for the next post, where I’ll be taking a look at Reykjavik, Iceland’s edgy metropolis!