August 5th adventure to island of Borðoy

I went to the highlighted island yesterday. All the pics will be one post above this one!

After a freezing rainy day in the capital city of Tórshavn, during much of which we had language instruction, some classmates/friends decided to go up to Klaksvík on the island of Borðoy to see some music at the Summer Festival. I was particularly interested in seeing Hanus G. Johansen, an iconic Faroese folk singer - I think he is in his later 50s or maybe 60s - he's like a Faroese Bob Dylan/Leonard Cohen - a powerful voice like Cohen, singing mostly in Faroese, he is popular with young people here as well. Check out his myspace here. Good lovesong by him on youtube

We had to take a bus for about 1.5 hours, crossing under the ocean a couple times to go from Streymoy, to Eysturoy, and finally to Borðoy. Borð is the Faroese word for 'table', so maybe this means like 'table island'? - but it is VERY steep and mountainous, so that's weird. Maybe it's flat on top...

We got to the second largest town in the Faroes, Klaksvík, walked around randomly for some time taking pictures, then bought our way into the festival grounds. We saw some good karaoke (young people singing coldplay/heard it through the grapevine, and some others) then watched the great Hanus G. as many people sang along. We then saw one of the main acts for the earlier part of the night, the Danish rock band D-A-D (disneyland after dark) - they were very strange but put on a pretty cool, spectacle-like rock show with lots of energy. We also saw some others like Robert McBirnie but couldn't stay for one of the coolest young Faroese bands, Orka (who make their own instruments and use drills and saws and so on in their compositions) because they didn't start until like 2AM! Same with Jens Marni who we had to miss, unfortunately.

The Faroes have often been called 'the land of maybe' by various writers over the years - one reason for this is the unpredictable nature of the weather - fast moving HEAVY fog and rain may unexpectedly roll in at any time and force you to change your plans. This is what happened to us!

There were supposed to be special night buses until 1:30AM - but because of the rain they ended up cancelling the bus and we were suddenly stranded in Klaksvík in the middle of the night. It would've been pretty cold to sleep on the ground there or even to wait for another 3+ hours to get what was supposed to be the next bus. So we paid dearly for an 1.5 hr ride back to Tórshavn in a taxi. But it was worth it to have a warm bed - also, the taxi driver was extremely friendly and talkative - he told us LOTS of old stories about the Faroes and had a story about nearly every small town we passed through. I wonder if everyone of a certain age here is this knowledgeable about the islands?

Also check out this sweet Faroese rock/pop band, Grandma's Basement - if you like the Hellacopters or Tokyo Police Club you might dig them - they're very upbeat and cool! http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=GJVpTUhPAbQ&feature=related