Flateyri: The Old Bookstore and the Avalanche Barrier Above Town

An Old Store on a Narrow Spit

Flateyri sits on a narrow spit of land in Önundarfjörður, about 21 km from Ísafjörður via the Vestfjarðagöng tunnel system (the Breiðadalur arm connects directly to the village). The drive takes roughly 25-30 minutes and is one of the easier day trips from Ísafjörður, since most of it runs through the tunnel rather than over an exposed mountain pass.

The main reason to stop is the Old Bookstore, Gamla bókabúðin, which claims the title of Iceland’s oldest original store. It was opened in 1914 by Jón Eyjólfsson and his wife Guðrún Arnbjarnardóttir in a house built in 1898, first selling food and household goods before books took over a corner of the shop. The interior has barely changed since: original shelving, ledgers of handwritten sales going back decades, and the family’s upstairs living quarters preserved much as they were left. The shop is still run by a descendant of the founders and doubles today as a secondhand bookshop and small guesthouse.

The Avalanche That Changed the Village

On 26 October 1995, an avalanche fell from the slope of Skollahvilft above Flateyri at around 4 a.m., destroying roughly 20 houses and killing 20 people. It remains one of Iceland’s deadliest natural disasters and permanently changed how the country plans for avalanche risk in inhabited fjords.

In the years afterward, large A-shaped earthen barriers were built into the mountainside directly above the village: two deflecting levees around 15-20 metres high and roughly 600 metres long, feeding into a catching dam about 10 metres high and 350 metres long. They’re visible from the village streets and from across the fjord, grass- and lupine-covered now but unmistakably engineered. A memorial to the victims stands near the base of the slope.

The barriers were tested for real in January 2020, when two avalanches released from Skollahvilft and a neighbouring gully on the same night. Both were diverted by the defences into the sea rather than into the town, though spray from the slides reached parts of the harbour area. No one in the village was killed.

Rest of the Village

Flateyri itself is small enough to see on foot in under an hour: a handful of streets, a wooden church, and the harbour where fishing has driven the local economy for generations. Vagninn, a well-known local restaurant in the village centre, is a reasonable stop for lunch or coffee before heading back through the tunnel.

• Getting there: About 21 km / 25-30 minutes’ drive from Ísafjörður via the Vestfjarðagöng tunnel (Breiðadalur arm)
• Time needed: 1.5-2 hours for the bookstore and a walk through the village, longer with lunch
• What to see: The Old Bookstore (Gamla bókabúðin), the avalanche memorial, and the barriers on the slope above town
• Timing: A daytime visit is easiest for viewing the barriers clearly against the mountainside; check the bookstore’s opening hours before making a special trip, as they vary by season
• Bring: A layer for wind off the fjord, even in summer, and a bit of cash or a card for the bookstore’s secondhand titles

Where to Stay

The Ísafjörður Inn is the natural base for this trip, since it sits in town on the same side of the tunnel system that leads directly out to Flateyri and the other Westfjords villages, meaning no backtracking over an extra pass to start the drive. Book direct on Ourhotels.is for the best rate.

Photo: Christian Bickel (Fingalo) via Wikimedia Commons, CC BY-SA 2.0 DE.