Hotels and guesthouses are certainly more comfortable but, as far as we're concerned, camping is the best way to see Iceland. This country is all about the nature, and there are some incredible places to pitch a tent. Many of the campsites we visited during our trip to the Westfjords were highlights in their own right, and Breiðavík might have been best of all.
Without exaggeration, I think waterfalls might outnumber people in the Westfjords. Fed by the massive ice blocks which dominate the highland interior, and coursing down the mountains toward the shore, there seems to be another waterfall around every corner. Some are trickles, some mighty cascades, but the most impressive we saw throughout our time in the peninsula was easily Dynjandi.
The Latrabjarg Cliffs are about five hours from Ísafjörður by car, but the drive takes most people a lot longer thanks to the abundance of entertaining stops along the way. We needed all day to amble along Route 60, stopping off in five villages before ending at the beach of Breiðavík.
It's hard to imagine what life must have been like in tiny Suðureyri prior to 2001 and the completion of the tunnel connecting it to Ísafjörður. Today it's just a twenty-minute drive, but before the tunnel, Suðureyri was connected to the outside world only by boat.
Nothing is so important to Iceland's cultural identity as its sagas. Transposed onto vellum leaf by anonymous scribes in the 13th and 14th centuries, these are the blood-soaked stories of the country's settlement. Today, the best collection can be found in the Þjóðmenningarhúsið, or the Culture House.
