Following The Weather North: Holiday Weekend In And Around Húsavík

When Verslunarmannahelgi, aka Merchant’s Weekend, aka the last public holiday before Christmas, rolled around in the beginning of August, I did what most Icelanders do that weekend: followed the weather and got the hell out of town. While the capital was drowning in nonstop rain, I spent six hours in the car, accompanied by good music and a double rainbow that followed me from Blönduós north to Húsavík.

This is the camping weekend of the year, so no other options were even considered. I packed my tent, an inflatable mat (seriously, if you still don’t have one, run to Útilíf as fast as you can; it’s easily in my top three things that improve quality of life), and a bunch of pillows from the house. If you have space, they make a huge difference for both the sleep quality and the overall tent ambience.

Now, where to camp? There’s a campground right in Húsavík, but just by looking at it, I knew I wanted something else. The “official” Húsavík campground sits right next to the road, and with tents and trailers cramped together, it wasn’t clear where the parking lot ended and the campsite began. Luckily, if you drive past Húsavík for about 20 minutes, you’ll stumble upon perhaps the most picturesque campsite in Iceland. Type “Camping 66.12 NORTH” into Google Maps and save it for your next trip. I’d like to keep it a secret, but, honestly, it’s huge — plenty of space for everyone.

All about that horizon

Picture this: it’s scorching 18°C (If you’re reading this from somewhere warmer and just rolled your eyes… just shut up — can you let us enjoy what we have for a minute?!), and you’re setting up your tent with a view of the wide, calm ocean, until two tiny, mysterious islands pop up on the horizon. In a bit, you’ll be making veggie burgers on your camping stove and watching kids play with a giant bird-shaped kite.
“After years of circumnavigating Iceland, I have a confession to make — until this trip, I’d never been to Húsavík.”

The rule at this campsite is that tents and trailers must be at least four metres apart — a decent distance for privacy, but still close enough for a little people-watching: here’s a group of girls trying to pitch a tent, probably for the first time ever, their white Dacia Duster giving them away as newbie tourists; a bunch of senior citizens heading back to their trailer for a quick game of cards before bed; a couple with a giant pack of cat food feeding their cat — I’ve never seen a cat camping before, and also being so chill about it, like it has done it at least a dozen times this summer only; someone sitting on a bale of hay as their friend takes a photo, the bales spread around the campsite like giant marshmallows; fellow campers lining up their chairs to watch the sunset peeking brightly from the clouds, Reykjavík’s former mayor Dagur B. Eggertsson doing the same.

It doesn’t matter that in a few hours you’ll be awakened by the wind shaking your tent and have to put on extra layers — right now, you’re just soaking in the view and the day, almost feeling summer drift away.

While I like to romanticise the view and obsess a little too much about what I eat on my trips, this campsite checks all of the practical boxes, too. There’s a fully equipped kitchen with pots, a toaster, a microwave, and other essentials, and a bathroom area with gender-separate toilets and showers, and plenty of plugs to charge your devices. For an extra fee, you can even do laundry and dry it on-site. The prices are very reasonable, and even pleasantly surprising: 2.000 ISK per person for the first night, and just 1.000 ISK per person for each additional night.

Bjarni, who runs the place, deserves a separate shout-out. Wearing a neon yellow vest, he seemed to be at the campsite 24/7, greeting cars and helping them navigate the area. When I was heading out for the day after the first night and told him I’d like to stay an extra one, he smiled and said, “Just pay when you come back. Otherwise, I’m likely to charge you twice.”

Photo by Atli Freyr Steinsson

Northern pints

After years of circumnavigating Iceland, I have a confession to make — until this trip, I’d never been to Húsavík. Perhaps it’s the town’s location off the Ring Road that never makes it seem “on the way,” or maybe its reputation following the infamous Netflix movie Eurovision Song Contest: The Story of Fire Saga, which gave rise to thematic establishments popping up around town — there’s a Eurovision exhibition and a Jaja Ding Dong bar. Somehow, it never made it to the top of my list. The town doesn’t even have a decent ice cream shop (any), but it is a picturesque little place.

Home to fewer than 3,000 residents, Húsavík is dotted with a few hundred houses overlooking Skjálfandi Bay. Other than the Eurovision-themed attractions, some of the town’s most famous landmarks include Húsavíkurkirkja, built at the onset of the last century, the local brewery and taproom Húsavík Öl, and the GeoSea baths.

The taproom welcomes me with a terrace full of beer-sipping locals (and I swear, a sweet grandma-on-holiday lady must have spent her entire weekend there — she was out on the terrace every time I walked or drove by). Inside, the space is tiny, but it feels surprisingly metropolitan if you consider that further north is just the ocean, a few uninhabited islands, the Arctic Circle, and, they say, on a bright day, if you’re lucky, you can see all the way to the shores of Greenland. I settle for a fruity yet bitter New England IPA, while my companion opts for a non-alcoholic beer. Their 0 percent selection could easily compete with any big brewery or bar in the capital — in fact, have you ever seen a non-drinker offered seven beers to choose from?

Horizon slips into the water

We check the opening times for GeoSea and find out that during summer (until August 31), it doesn’t close until midnight, which quickly sorts out our sunset plans. We arrive at the baths around 22:00 only to find out that many other people had exactly the same idea. For more than an hour, I squeeze between an American family, who in addition to having a gazillion of their own kids, try to make friends with all other kids present at the pool.

“How do you say ‘nice to meet you’ in Icelandic?” asks the mom of the group. The kid patiently teaches her, but when she tries to repeat, the words come out as “Blah-blah-florp!” I hear conversations like this one after another, and the woman’s high-pitched laughter still echoes in my ears as I type this today.

Other than the rush-hour chaos of peak tourist season, GeoSea is amazing. The infinity pool looks like an extension of the cliffside — from a distance you can’t tell where the pool ends and the horizon begins. The temperature of the heated seawater varies from one end to the other, there are plenty of sitting places, and even a bar — though you do have to climb out to get a drink. Its only other amenity is a steam room, but honestly, that feels like enough. This is a bath you come to for the view. Sitting in the water, watching the sun sink into the bay, I can’t help but think: I’ll be back in the dead of winter, when no one else thinks it’s even remotely a good idea.

Hot cocoa and whale tail

But Húsavík isn’t just about soaking in hot water. It proudly calls itself the whale watching capital of Iceland, and it’s simply impossible not to notice the number of whale watching tours on offer. The signs invite you on an adventure, and brochures found at a gas station offer you discounts to museums and restaurants if you book a tour. I’ve seen whales twice in my life — once on a boat between islands in Greenland, where we encountered a pod of humpback whales, and another time when a humpback whale swam into the harbour in Hafnarfjörður, and nothing seemed like a better idea than to go check it out in the middle of the workday. Both were amazing and humbling experiences, but I’d never before thought of going on an organised whale watching tour. I’m not sure whether it was FOMO or the lack of other activities nearby, but this time, I was curious to see what an actual whale watching trip entails.

So, on the Monday of the long weekend, before driving all the way to Reykjavík, I joined the “Húsavík Original Whale Watching” tour by North Sailing. They actually offer a lot of other options — from silent whale watching on an electric boat to tours that combine puffin and whale watching, and even sailing expeditions to Greenland. I chose the one that suited me best time-wise, departing at 9:00 and lasting about three hours, but the included hot chocolate and cinnamon rolls served at the end of the trip were equally enticing.

Once I step on board the traditional oak ship Sæborg, I’m immediately ordered to change into a waterproof suit handed out by our guides. I’m one of those people who are always cold, so getting an extra layer — even on a beautiful day like this — is much appreciated. In the middle of summer, these tours are very popular, so it’s no wonder our boat fills to the brim with fellow whale watchers. As we depart from the harbour, I spot at least four similar boats, tilting under the weight of passengers, all cameras pointed in the same direction.

The guide tells us to imagine the boat as a clock, and whenever we see a whale, he’ll say “one o’clock,” or “six o’clock” — apparently, it’s easier to teach a bunch of mostly confused tourists to read the clock rather than try to explain to them where north or east is. “Or just look wherever everyone else is looking,” he adds, with a tired sigh.

Luckily, the spot I chose, almost at the nose of the ship, was where “one o’clock” had been called out frequently during the trip. First, we saw puffins fishing, literally with their mouths full of small fish. Then a dolphin popped up on the side, and a few minutes later, a whole pod of them appeared, acrobatically jumping out of the water. They chased the ship, circled around it, and continued jumping, playfully interacting with their dolphin buddies.

Then, for a while, nothing happened. We followed another ship that had reportedly spotted a whale, and as we patiently waited for it to reappear, our guide told us stories about the area and the local wildlife — like the fact that blue whales, the largest animals on the planet, swim into the bay during summer. He also showed us the keratin plates that baleen whales (which include humpbacks and blue whales) use to filter food. Eww, not for me. I prefer using teeth.

“A humpback is diving now. They can dive for about 40 minutes, and, unfortunately, we don’t have time to wait,” the guide said, as the captain diverted the ship to another spot before we set off back.

We spotted a humpback’s tail a few more times, but it wasn’t quite enough to count as a success. The dolphins disappeared and reappeared, their tiny black fins breaking the surface — if you didn’t know better, you might have imagined they were sharks.

Photo by Atli Freyr Steinsson

It was a nice day out on the boat. Before we headed back, one thing caught my eye: the textured, velvety mountain in front — with its sculpted ridges and a lone cabin. The guide said a local family owns the cabin and keeps it open in case hikers need shelter. To get there, you either need a boat or a 20-kilometre hike through completely secluded terrain. This hike goes straight onto my wishlist. Maybe next Verslunarmannahelgi?

The whale watching tour was provided by North Sailing. Check out their tours and expeditions at northsailing.is to book the next adventure.