Baejarfoss

Snaefellsnes / Olafsvik, West Region (Vesturland), Iceland

About Baejarfoss


Hiking Distance: 1km round trip
Suggested Time: 20-40 minutes

Date first visited: 2007-06-23
Date last visited: 2007-06-23

Waterfall Latitude: 64.89318
Waterfall Longitude: -23.71964

Waterfall Safety and Common Sense

Baejarfoss (more accurately Bæjarfoss; pronounced “BYE-yar-foss”; meaning “Town Falls”) is situated right behind the charming town of Ólafsvík (probably known more for whale watching tours). This was a convenient waterfall for us as all we had to do was just walk from the Hotel Ólafsvík towards the back of town (though admittedly we were lazy and drove a short distance closer) and then up a fairly concealed trail where we were able to get fairly close to the falls.

On the late June evening that we visited the falls, we started walking to this waterfall at around 9:45pm and spent about 20 minutes to both walk to and photograph the falls. However, it still felt like it was like 6pm on a typical Summer’s day at home given the high lattitude that we were at on the north coast of the Snæfellsnes Peninsula. In fact, even though most of Iceland was beneath the Arctic Circle, technically speaking, we did get the midnight sun (I think the sun sank beneath the horizon some time after midnight) so that was something we took advantage of in trying to work off the calories gained from our dinner.

The walk involved a little bit of a scramble past some cattle guards towards a direct view of the falls you see at the top of the page. The rather hidden trailhead was between some 3-story apartment and someone’s house just behind a church.

On the walk back to the main part of town, we got gorgeous views of the vast Breiðarfjörður and Atlantic Ocean under the warm late evening glow of the sun.

Olafsvik_005_jx_06232007
Olafsvik_008_06232007


From Ólafsvík, I believe we walked uphill along Kirkjutun St. Since the falls was always visible behind town, it was essentially our compass, so to speak.

To get to Ólafsvík from Reykjavik, we drove 196km along the Ring Road, Route 54, then Route 574. Note that Route 54 followed the southern coast of the Snæfellsnes Peninsula while the Route 574 cut across the peninsula next to the eastern slope of the Mælifell volcano and the mountain containing the Snæfellsjökull glacier. This drive would take about 2.5 hours.

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Tagged with: snaefellsnes, olafsvik, west region, vesturland, iceland, waterfall, hellissandur, rif, breidarfjordur, atlantic



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