Although there are a lot of tunnels to connect the many islands in Faroe Islands, there are a few that need ferry rides, including Kalsoy., which is where w are going today!
There are very limited ferries every day to and from Kalsoy. There are 3 in the morning to Kalsoy and 3 in the afternoon from Kalsoy back to the main islands. You could choose to go onto the ferry on foot or by car, but the ferry does not have a lot of space for many cars (see the picture below), meaning if you are not the first 10 cars, they might not have space for you. Gotta get there early! There is no public transportation on Kalsoy, so it would be super inconvenient or almost impossible to get around the island on foot. To be safe, we decided to take the first ferry of the day. The ferry to Kalsoy is in Klaksvik on the Borðoy island, which is about an hour from Torshavn and the ferry will bring us to Syðradalur on Kalsoy.
As you can imagine, most people do not get on the first ferry of the day, so we pretty much have the whole place to ourselves. The are 4 villages on Kalsoy, Syðradalur (where the port is for the ferry), Húsar, Mikladalur and Trøllanes. We decided to go to the opposite end of the island first and worked our way back to where the ferry is. The furthest village is Trøllanes, which is where the Kallur lighthouse is located as well. The Kallur lighthouse is the highlight of the island as well as the main reason that we came here.
The trail head starts with the red gate, and there are so many sheep on the way to keep you company! One thing I noticed is that the sheep in Faroe Islands are cuter and have more variety than Iceland.
It took us ~ 1.5 hour to get to the lighthouse. The first ferry back is not till 3pm, so we were really taking our time to enjoy the tranquility and the scenery. The end of the trail could be a little treacherous as the trail is quite narrow, so be careful!
On the way back, we stopped by the two villages in the middle. There are not many “attractions” but it was nice walking around different part of the island, especially when beauty is just anywhere and everywhere! In Mikladalur , there is an statue of a “seal woman” and an interesting story behind it. It is called the “Legend of Kópakonan”, which is one of the best-known folktales in the Faroe Islands.
Short version of the story:
Seals were believed to be former humans and once a year, they were allowed to come on land, take off their “skins” and be human for one night. A young farmer from the village wanted to see if this story is true, and therefore went to the beach on that day. He saw the seals arriving and transforming into humans. He laid eyes on the seal woman, and stole her “skin” to keep her from going back to the ocean. He locked the “skin” up and she was then forced to stay with him until one day, he forgot his key in the house and when he returned, she’s gone. She went back to the ocean and reunited with her husband and children. One day, she sent this young farmer a message that he should not hunt the seals in a particular cave as they are her husband and children, but he did not listen and killed them. She later came back as a troll and told them she will be seeking revenge on the men in this village. Even today, it happens from time to time that men from this village drown at sea or fall from the tops of cliffs.
We were literally done exploring by 1pm and there are absolutely no cafés or anything that we could hang out in, so we went to the port early to make sure we can get onto the first ferry back, especially when we have another ferry to catch this evening!
