Maggie's rescue on Nólsoy
It was something like 15 meters a second winds, high waves and 5 degrees in the air. We forgot to pack lunch and we finished filming an hour before the boat went back to Torshavn. There was nothing in the world we wanted more than a warm pub with warm food and cold beer. In this post we will tell you about the best pub on the Faroe Island, how we found it and where you can find it.
Check out the Let's Go Slow video from Nólsoy
Going from Torshavn to Nólsoy
This day started at the dock in Torshavn. At the port where the big boats come in. This industrial looking aria is also where the boat to Nólsoy dock. Nólsoy is a long narrow island, it sits perfectly between Torshavn and the horizon, protecting the capital from the large sea in the East. There is only one settlement on Nólsoy, and it is also called Nólsoy. There is about 40 people living there. Most of them combine a romantic county side life with city work, by taking the 20 min ferry ride every weekday.
The perfect view of Torshavn
The same ferry took us over to Nólsoy on this cold morning. The goal for our Nólsoy adventure was to walk up towards the highest point on the island. On a mountain called: Høgoyggj. The point is self is called: Eggjarklettur and is only 372 m high. The reason for walking up this path was to film a walking scene where you could see parts of Nólsoy, but also the view of Torshavn. The path up is lovely and if you follow it to the end you come to a beautiful lighthouse. This seams to be a popular tour among the Faroese, as we have met multiple Faroese people talking about precisely this tour. This day had the perfect light for filming. It was a thin layer of clouds, not to thick to make the light boring and no to bright to challenge the exposures. The light was perfect, but the wind was ice cold and penetrated all layers of clothing.
View of the town on Nólsoy.
Invisible wind
It is strange to film in strong winds on the Faroe Islands because in most other places you would be sheltered in between the vegetation. But on the Faroe Island the vegetation is mostly 10 cm tall (I know some Faroese people will argue this, because there are parks, trees and some bushes around, but for the most part we’re talking about grass, when we’re talking about vegetation). There is nothing to protect you against the strong Arctic winds and what is also strange and a bit frustrating is that the wind doesn’t really show on your footage ether. As you are struggling to keep your hat on, gear in the right place and camera steady the only thing your footage will show is a light, gentle breeze in the grass.
Cold filmmaker hand and DJI Osmo on location.
The warm and welcoming lights of Maggie's window
Despite the weather challenges we where actually very lucky with our timing going to Nólsoy, because the man owning the only pub on the island (Maggie's) where getting married and the wedding party was in Torshavn. Which meant that the otherwise busily little town where almost empty, something that suited filming for Faroetale perfectly. After a whole day of filming, both in the outfield and around town we where freezing and tired. Because of the wedding we did not believe Maggie's would be open, but walking up the road past the pub we got a happy surprise seeing warm welcoming light flowing out of Maggie's windows.
The view looking southeast walking up Maggie's to from the harbour
