Mjoifjordur

Mjoifjordur is eighteen kilometres long and rarely more than a kilometre wide, with steep sides and a handful of permanent residents at Brekka. The road in climbs a pass and then descends in hairpins past Klifbrekkufossar, a fall that comes down in seven distinct tiers beside the track. At the outer end of the fjord is Dalatangi, where a lighthouse was put up in 1895 at the private expense of the Norwegian entrepreneur Otto Wathne - the first in the east of the country, seventeen years after the state built Iceland's first at Reykjanes; the present tower dates from 1908. The fjord also held one of the largest whaling stations in the world at Asknes in the early 1900s, run by Norwegians, and its foundations are still visible.

History

In the early 20th century the village was a Norwegian whaling station, and the fjord also had the Dalatangi light. The wooden church in the hamlet of Brekka, Mjóafjarðarkirkja, was built in 1892 with about 100 seats and a ridge turret (Wikipedia, Mjóifjörður).

Highlights

• A fjord barely a kilometre wide - eighteen long, with a few residents at Brekka.
• Klifbrekkufossar in seven tiers - beside the descending road.
• Dalatangi - the east's first lighthouse, built privately in 1895.
• Whaling station foundations - Asknes, once among the world's largest.

When to go

June to September; road 953 is shut by snow for much of the year. A full day.

What to expect

The road is a steep gravel pass with hairpins and no barriers, and it closes without much warning. There is no fuel, shop or reliable signal in the fjord. Services at Brekka are minimal and seasonal. Fog sits in the fjord often.

Nearby

Neskaupstadur is over the mountain; Seydisfjordur is north.