Two Icelanders kayaked past Hornstrandir before German adventurer

Two Icelanders had kayaked off Hornstrandir before German adventurer Michael Neumann made the trip this summer, despite a claim that he was the first, mbl.is reports.

Swedish tent maker Hilleberg, which describes itself as one of the world’s best-known producers of tents for demanding conditions, promoted Neumann’s journey in a Facebook post this week. The company said he and his team used Hilleberg tents on the trip and described their achievement as unprecedented.

However, Guðni Páll Viktorsson completed a kayak journey around Iceland in 2013, becoming the first Icelander to do so, and Veiga Grétarsdóttir completed the journey in 2019, travelling counterclockwise. Both kayaked off Hornstrandir as part of their routes around the country.

Hilleberg’s post described Neumann’s journey as a “circumnavigation” of Hornstrandir. Several Icelanders have challenged that wording, noting that it generally means going all the way around something. Hornstrandir and the Westfjords are part of Iceland, making it impossible to kayak all the way around Hornstrandir. One of the four photos in the post shows Neumann and a companion carrying their kayaks, raising the possibility that they crossed between fjords, such as from Furufjörður to Hrafnsfjörður.

Even setting aside the wording, Neumann and his team were not the first to kayak off Hornstrandir, though the journey remains a considerable achievement.