Igaliku

Igaliku stands on the site of Garðar, the seat of the Norse bishop of Greenland from 1126, and the ruins of the cathedral, the bishop's farm and the great byre are in and around the present village. The trader Anders Olsen and his Greenlandic wife Tuperna, who founded the modern village in 1783, and the families who followed them built their houses of stone taken from those ruins, so the two are physically continuous. It sits at the head of a fjord between mountains and is unusually green.

History

Garðar, the religious heart of 12th-century Norse Greenland, lay here at the centre of the Eastern Settlement, and the area has been excavated by archaeologists since the 1830s. The modern village was founded as Igaliko in 1783 by the trader and colonial administrator Anders Olsen and his Greenlandic wife, Tuperna. In 2017 the ruins of Garðar and the farms around the village were inscribed on the UNESCO World Heritage List as part of Kujataa Greenland: Norse and Inuit Farming at the Edge of the Ice Cap (Wikipedia, Igaliku).

What's there

• The cathedral ruins - the remains of the Norse bishop's church at Gardar.
• The bishop's farm - the byre and outbuildings of the episcopal estate.
• The stone houses - the modern village built from the ruins' stone.
• The fjord setting - the green valley between mountains at the fjord head.

When to go

June to September is the season. Access involves a boat and then a crossing of the isthmus. Winter closes the route.

What to expect

Getting there involves a boat to Itilleq and then several kilometres over the isthmus. Facilities are a small hostel and a café. The Norse remains are foundations rather than standing walls.

Nearby

Qassiarsuk is northwest, and Qaqortoq is south.

Key facts