Backpacking Faroe Islands: A 3-Day Guide

Three days in the Faroe Islands is enough to trade the airport island for the capital and the green north of Streymoy and Eysturoy, and this route suits travelers who want a mix of town evenings and big-sky villages with only two beds to book. The pace is moderate. Buses cover most legs (route 300 from the airport to Tórshavn, 100 to Vestmanna, 400 toward Eysturoy, 201 to Gjógv and 202 to Tjørnuvík), but timetables in the outer villages are thin, so a rental car turns a stretched second day into an easy one.

Day 1: Tórshavn and Kirkjubø

Start in Tórshavn, 45 to 55 minutes from the airport by bus. Spend the morning at Listasavn Føroya, the national art museum set in a park at the edge of the center, where the canvases of Sámal Joensen-Mikines show the same grey-green islands you see out the window. A ten-minute walk away, the Nordic House in the Faroe Islands is a turf-roofed concert and culture building whose café is the best rainy-day refuge in town. After lunch take bus 101 (about 20 minutes) … read more 👉

Three days in the Faroe Islands is enough to trade the airport island for the capital and the green north of Streymoy and Eysturoy, and this route suits travelers who want a mix of town evenings and big-sky villages with only two beds to book. The pace is moderate. Buses cover most legs (route 300 from the airport to Tórshavn, 100 to Vestmanna, 400 toward Eysturoy, 201 to Gjógv and 202 to Tjørnuvík), but timetables in the outer villages are thin, so a rental car turns a stretched second day into an easy one.

Day 1: Tórshavn and Kirkjubø

Start in Tórshavn, 45 to 55 minutes from the airport by bus. Spend the morning at Listasavn Føroya, the national art museum set in a park at the edge of the center, where the canvases of Sámal Joensen-Mikines show the same grey-green islands you see out the window. A ten-minute walk away, the Nordic House in the Faroe Islands is a turf-roofed concert and culture building whose café is the best rainy-day refuge in town. After lunch take bus 101 (about 20 minutes) to Kirkjubø on the southern tip of Streymoy, the medieval bishop’s seat with the roofless walls of the Magnus Cathedral, the small whitewashed Saint Olav’s Church and a farmhouse worked by the same family for centuries. Sleep in the capital.

Day 2: Vestmanna Cliffs, Saksun and Tjørnuvík

Head northwest for the two-hour boat trip under the Vestmanna Cliffs, which rise to around 600 meters, with seabirds wheeling over ledges and narrow sea caves; tickets run about DKK 450 to 550 (US$65 to 80). Continue to Saksun, a few farms high above a tidal lagoon. At low tide you can walk Saksun Beach toward the fjord mouth, while at high tide the water covers the route, so check tide times before you set off. End the day at Tjørnuvík, the northernmost village on Streymoy, where Tjørnuvík Beach has black sand, surfers in thick wetsuits and a view across the sound to the sea stacks Risin and Kellingin. Cross the bridge to Eysturoy and sleep in Gjógv, about an hour away.

Day 3: Gjógv and Slættaratindur

Walk to the gorge that gives Gjógv its name before breakfast, a narrow sea-filled cleft used as a harbor, with a steep ramp where boats are winched out of the swell. Then drive about 15 minutes to the Eiðisskarð pass for Slættaratindur, at 880 meters the highest peak in the islands. The climb takes about an hour from the road, and on a clear day the summit view covers most of the archipelago. Afterward it is roughly 1 hour 15 minutes to Vágar Airport.

On the way out of Eysturoy, detour to Elduvík, a dozen houses on either side of a stream where it meets the fjord, with no shop, no café and very few visitors.