“And where is that?” was probably the most common response people had when we told them we were going to the Faroe Islands. Located about halfway between Iceland and Scotland, Eric has been interested in the Faroes since the mid-2010s, when he first saw photos of some of the amazing waterfalls, grass-covered roofs, and green hillsides. In January he noticed SAS had a reasonable price on premium economy tickets out of Chicago, and we quickly pieced together a week-long trip via Copenhagen booked-ended with family time in the Chicago suburbs.

General notes

• Sheep are everywhere! Not often in the middle of the road but on the shoulders and wandering the hills.
• No puffins in late August. :(
• We didn’t have many interactions with locals and overall it is very quiet.
• Most towns have a public bathroom, sometimes a portable one. All the ones I used were remarkably clean with a sink, soap, and sometimes a heater!
• Grocery stores were well stocked and not as expensive as we feared. We only ate one meal out (pizza for lunch) in six days and self-catered the rest, for about $100 total spend at grocery stores.
• We bought all of our alcohol at duty-free when we landed. 3L of boxed rosé and a six-pack of local cider was ~$40.
• Gas is expensive ($1.77/L or $6.70/gallon) but the islands aren’t large. We only used about 3/4 of tank and visited 5 islands – staying centrally in Hvalvík helped.
• There are more tunnels than expected. I knew about those with tolls, but we passed through several other free tunnels as well – some with a light to control one-way traffic because they were so narrow!
• Some roads are very narrow but pull-outs are common and we didn’t have any trouble getting around people. Overall, the roads are in excellent shape and traffic was light.
• Weather varies a lot in terms of sun and wind but not temp. It was 50-55F for the whole week.

Map of our daily drives

Flights

ORD > CPN

We had SAS lounge access with our SAS Plus tickets and even though the lounge was bursting with people, we managed to find two seats to enjoy a glass of wine and snacks before boarding. Boarded with Group 2 and settled in for the 8 hour flight. A quirk of SAS is that they want you to order all your drinks for the flight at once, so I ordered a cava for now, a red wine for dinner, and a whiskey for later (much later, we drank it in the Faroes!)

The beef stew was fine, if a little sweet, but the quinoa salad with feta and pomegranate seeds was nice. We weren’t super hungry and I didn’t want to overeat right before trying to sleep. Landed a few minutes early which made the tight 75 minute layover just fine, even with a 25 minute walk to the connecting gate and passport control.

CPN > FAE

I noticed some signage about carry-on bags so when I asked about possibly checking our bags at the gate if needed, the woman scolded us on having to combine our backpacks and rollaboards into one item (which wasn’t in their actual ticket terms), then told us we couldn’t check a bag for free because Atlantic Airways is a different airline than SAS. When we asked about how to check the bags she informed us we couldn’t check a bag anyway because she had no way of charging us at the gate. I made a show of condensing everything and then she didn’t even check when people were boarding the plane. eye roll

The flight itself was unmemorable, food for purchase, etc. but we did have the middle seat open on a 3×3 layout which was nice. On approach our first look at the Faroes was stunning!

FAE > CPN

On the way home we were on SAS metal the entire way. The automatic machines weren’t working for our flight at the Faroes ariport (the app wouldn’t give us boarding passes for this leg after check-in either) but I was able to get our boarding cards printed at the counter. We were in Group 2 but they just announced the flight was boarding and everyone was scanned through to walk out to the plane. No issues with our two carry-ons and plenty of overhead bin space. We were able to sit at the front of the plane but the 3×3 layout and a full flight meant we had a stranger between us. Because we were SAS Plus we got a meal and drinks, veal deli meat with potato salad, surprisingly tasty.

We were able to hang out in the SAS lounge for a while in Copenhagen before heading to the gate to stand in line for the mandatory US security questions. At least I didn’t get selected for a special screening this time!

CPN > ORD

When we checked in for this flight all the window seats on the 2x3x2 were gone in SAS Plus so I grabbed us two aisle seats in the middle near the front. We had a woman between us (her husband was in the middle seat in front of her) so I wonder if they were a last minute upgrade? The food was better on this leg, salmon lasagna or a chicken dish before landing. Neither of us slept at all but it was a smooth flight and I got a lot of reading done.