It is not so very often that one hears Faroese accents in Newcastle-upon-Tyne in northeast England. But the streets of the Tyneside city echoed to many voices from the remote North Atlantic islands yesterday afternoon as a friendly invasion of folk from the Faroes arrived to do their Christmas shopping. Smyril Line's cruise-ferry Norröna edged up the Tyne yesterday morning and berthed at Northumbrian Quay in North Shields.

hidden europe co-editor Nicky Gardner previewed the Faroese invasion in an article published in the regional newspaper Sunday Sun in early November. You can read that article online here.

The Norröna happens to be a ship we rather like and we follow her closely. The ship features in the current issue of hidden europe where we have an article describing a voyage to Iceland on the Norröna. That journey partly followed the route taken by William Morris on his first trip to Iceland in 1871, when Morris' ship picked a course between islands in the Faroes en route north. “Nothing I have ever seen has impressed me so much,” wrote Morris. We felt much the same as we sailed north through the Faroes on the Norröna a few weeks ago.

Susanne Kries
(hidden europe)