Like last year's trip to La Reunion, this year's trip was to a pleasant but somewhat obscure (for Americans, at least) destination: The Faroe Islands.

At this point, most people usually ask me one or both of these questions:

1. Where exactly are the Faroes?
2. Good God, Rich, why?!

Hopefully my travelogue will give you some idea on the latter.

First, a bit about the Faroe Islands:

1. The Faroes are a series of 18 islands in the North Atlantic, formed approximately 60 million years ago by the same volcanic plume that has since moved on and formed Iceland. So essentially, they are a smaller, much older version of Iceland.

2. The Faroes are part of the Danish Monarchy, but, like Greenland, are a semi-autonomous country. Just on our way traveling there, we found that just asking "What country owns the Faroes?" is a bit of a hot-button issue (in general, Danish people claim it's part of Denmark, while the Faroes claim they are their own independent country. The truth is someplace in between).

3. What do they speak there? Faroese. Like Danish and Icelandic, it derives from Old Norse, but over the centuries it's had it's own evolution. It's most similar to Icelandic (in fact, very similar in writing), but pronounced almost completely differently.

4. How big are the Faroes? 45,000 people living on 540 square miles. The fjord nature of the islands means the furthest you can get from the ocean is 3 miles.

5. What do people do there? Mostly it's fish and sheep, with much of the former being aquaculture. Sheep are a decreasing part of the economy, but an important cultural cornerstone: every single inch of the Faroes has been granted as grazing rights to someone (including the cliffs and mountaintops), and wool, lamb, and mutton are important subsistence products. Tourism still hasn't really caught on there.

6. How do you get there? Two ways: flying into Vagar airport from Reykjavik, Edinburgh, Bergen, or Copenhagen, or taking the ferry from Copenhagen. Unless you really like rough North Atlantic waves, I don't recommend the latter. I ended up doing the former, mostly since I enjoy Iceland and it made for a nice, direct route.

So, why did I go there?

1. It's one of the least-visited Nordic areas, especially for English speakers, but I've been somewhat intrigued by it ever since Iceland, since it's much like Iceland but less touristy.

2. Faroese wool and knitting have been the rage for several years in the fiber arts community.

3. Hiking and scenery. As you'll see from my photos, the Faroes are a hiking wonderland of high cliffs, blue seas, and wonderful scenery as long as you aren't too attached to trees (You know how people say Iceland doesn't have trees (a fact which isn't true, btw)? That's much more true for the Faroes, which don't seem to have a single tree that's not in a town or in someone's garden)

4. Birds. The only thing that the Faroes has more than sheep is birds. Millions upon millions of them, especially Puffins and Oyster Catchers.

5. Culture. While it too has had its shifts, the Faroe Islands has done a generally good job of maintaining a good balance of modernism and traditional culture.

In short, it's like a different take on the same ingredients as Iceland (subarctic island, Nordic culture, ...), but smaller and more intense, without any of the volcanic stuff (the only thing left from the Faroe's volcanic history is some very steep cliffs of basalt and some rather rich soil).