Grafarvogur Is Not Iceland’s Black Widow Capital — It’s Garðabær

Since the discovery of a Northern Black Widow spider in a bunch of grapes last week, Grafarvogur has become known in some quarters as the “Black Widow Capital of Iceland.”

But now, a surprising twist to the story has drawn this characterisation into question. In fact, as the Grapevine reported way back in 2019, a black widow was also discovered in a similar bunch of grapes bought in Garðabær. And even further back into the cobwebbed archives in 2017, Morgunblaðið reported another exotic spider was found in a box of blueberries — once again in Garðabær.

Although the latter instance was only a noble false widow — a less venomous spider whose bite only causes localised pain from 1-12 hours — that’s still 2-1 by our count.

So if any area of Greater Reykjavík deserves the title of Poisonous Spider Capital Of Iceland — it might just be Garðabær.

Are you from Grafarvogur or Garðabær? Do you live in fear of deadly arachnids? Let us know at grapevine@grapevine.is.

In the meantime, good luck out there. We hope you survive all this spider chaos. We will continue to bring you all the latest exotic spider news until the Grapevine office is overwhelmed by the oncoming swarm of bitey eight-legged freaks.