Journey 02 · Faroe Islands
Sixteen Kinds of Grey
Eight days in the Faroes
Published 19 Jun 2026 · Travelled 8–16 May 2026
- 9 moments
- 9 days
- 228 km
- Spring
- Faroe Islands
- 23mm · f/5.6 · 1/125
- 62.2486° N, 7.1836° W
- Saksun
- 06:30
- 6°C, low cloud, drizzle
I got there at half past six because a man at the guesthouse said the road fills by nine, and he was right. The lagoon had the tide out of it and the turf roofs were still holding last night's rain. Nothing moved except the cloud coming down the far side of the valley.
- 23mm · f/2 · 1/160
- 62.2200° N, 6.9000° W
- The road above Skálafjørður
- 11:15
- 7°C, rain, then more rain
I want to be honest about the ratio. For every picture of a waterfall going off a cliff into the sea there were four hours of this: sitting in a parked car above a fjord with the engine off, waiting for the far side to come back.
the heater on 3, always on 3
- 23mm · f/8 · 1/320
- 62.1053° N, 7.4406° W
- 23mm · f/8 · 1/320
- 62.1053° N, 7.4406° W
- Gásadalur
- 20:10
- 8°C, brief clearing
The waterfall drops off the edge of the village straight into the Atlantic, which is the sort of thing that sounds invented until you are standing above it. The cloud lifted for about a quarter of an hour. I shot the wide one first and then walked out along the cliff and shot back down the coast, and by the time I reached the car it had closed again.
04 · The ferry and the tunnel list
- 23mm · f/8 · 1/500
- 62.3417° N, 6.8083° W
- Kallur, Kalsoy
- 14:50
- 5°C, cloud lifting
Two hours up from Trøllanes with the cloud sitting on the ridge the whole way, so I climbed with no idea whether there would be anything at the top. Then it thinned. The lighthouse is small and white and completely ridiculous on that spine of rock, and I understood immediately why everybody photographs it.
- 23mm · f/4 · 1/400
- 62.2892° N, 7.1400° W
- Above Tjørnuvík
- 09:20
- 6°C, overcast, dry for once
Faroese sheep are not shy. These four came up the slope to look at me, stopped at about four metres, and stayed there the whole time I was setting up, which is not how any animal at home behaves. The one on the right had a wool tag in exactly the blue of the fjord behind it.
- 23mm · f/1.4 · 1/60
- 62.0079° N, 6.7690° W
- Tórshavn
- 16:05
By the fourth day I had stopped pretending meals happened at times. This was fish soup and a coffee in a café off the main street in Tórshavn, eaten with wet socks on, at the hour when the light gives up. The waitress asked if I wanted more bread and then brought it before I answered.
Overheard · Klaksvík ferry slip · 09:05
"It is not bad weather." — "It is raining sideways." — "Yes. That is the weather. Bad weather is when you cannot go out, and you can go out." He was about seventy and wearing a jumper, no coat.
- Tinganes, Tórshavn
- 21:30
- 7°C, dry, briefly
- Last frame
The old quarter of Tórshavn is black tarred timber and red window frames and grass on the roofs, on a spit of rock between two harbours, and the government still works out of it. I walked around it twice waiting for the tour group to leave, then found the light was better with them in it anyway. They left. I took it empty.
- 23mm · f/2.8 · 1/80
- 62.0079° N, 6.7681° W
The route
9 stops
Journey completed
Nine days, nine stories
- Distance walked
- 43 km
- Frames exposed
- 1180
- Subsea tunnels
- 5
- Days with no rain at all
- 0
- Hours of usable light per day
- about 3
- Favourite moment
- Saksun with the tide out and nobody else on the road
- Best food
- Fish soup in a Tórshavn café at four in the afternoon, when it stopped being lunch
