Grundarfjörður Lighthouse
Around 1900 there were scarce waymarks by the shore of Iceland, but shortly after that they started to build lighthouses on islands and on anneses on the shore. Krossnes light house was built in 1926, but was half a century after the first light house came on Reykjanes. Grundarfjörður light house was built in 1942 and light was first turned on in september 1943.
There was no navigation light in the fjord mouth of Grundarfjörður up until that time, but it was welcomed by sailors when it was dark. In dark and bad weather the light was barely seen when sailors reached the mid fjord. I remember in the years before 1943, before the lighthouse was turned on, my mother always put a gas lamp in the house window facing the sea, when the weather was bad and she knew that the boats had not landed.
These lamps that were new on the market here and called Aladin gave a very bright light. The sailors said that this light was very visible when they had passed Búðatangi in the north hail or southerly storm. These small fishing boats that were less than 20 tons, with no navigation and small engines, cut the waves about 100 meters from land just by the cliffs by Búðir. The house stood some 10 meters from the sea shore. By now sailors and authorities had begun pointing out the necessity of having a lighthouse built for the infjord. In these years a core of settlement was forming where the town Grundarfjörður is now. In late summer of 1942, the lighthouse service ship Hermóður came to Grundarfjörður and anchored just off Búðir. The purpose of it´s journey was to bring a crew of workers, as well as building material for the light house.
Hnausar is a ridge of soil and rocks that some hundreds of years ago fell from the north-eastern part of Kirkjufell and slided towards the sea. In Hnausar there was habitation in the early days and some house ruins can be found there. The last habitant of Hnausar moved from there around 1900.
The building crew consisted of 4 or 5 exceptional men, in addition to the foreman, Sigurður Pétursson. He conducted the building of most light houses that were built on the islands and anneses from 1935 to 1958.
In the morning of the first day the crew began transporting the building material from the ship Hermóður, and carry it from the shore to the waterfront. It was finished in the afternoon. The morning after the crew began building a sleeping cabin on the waterfront. It was neat and welcoming. The manager of that house was a young woman called Helga, the daughter of Sigurður. She was an energetic hard working young woman, doing all the cooking and cleaning for the crew. This was an elite team, used to work under hard circumstances.
When the cabin building was finished, they began transporting the building material to the building site, but they had to cross rough terrain for almost 2 km. When that part was finished they began to dig to make the foundation, with shovels and notches, of course. Now they had to shove sand and gravel to bags on the shore to use for the concrete. It was transported in the same way as the other building material up to Hnausar. To make it a weebit easier 2 strong horses were borrowed from the neighbour farmer. They could carry weight that took 6 persons to carry, and it made things go much faster.
The crew had to build a platform to mix the concrete on, as there was no machine to do the job, or for that matter no machine for anything, as it was at that time. I used to watch the daily work of these elaborate men, only a 10 years old boy full of admiration and enthusiasm. More and more often I came to the cabin visiting Helga who took me as her baby brother, and gave me all kinds of goodies. I often think of these wonderful people and theyr stay at Búðir with warmth and gratitude, as did I at that time think that it should have taken them much longer time to build the lighthouse, than the actual time it took. When the final day came and our paths would be separated, these wonderful people gave me some precious farewell gifts, bringing joy and gratitude to a young boy. This was by far one of the best times of my life.
Especially I recall a state of the art flashlight and numerous batteries to go with it. They lasted for the next whole winter. Although I was scared of the dark in those days I felt that the nights were not nearly dark enough, because the light scared off any ghosts wherever I went.
The year after the gas lamp was installed in the lighthouse. As I recall it was Sigurjón Eiríksson lighthouse technician and lighthouse inspector who did that. It was interesting to observe the ship Hermóður sail around the fjord, measuring the depth by heralds and cuts, but the technician was inside the lighthouse fine tuning the light flashes. For intercommunications they used light signals with morse code from the ships´s light and a strong battery powered light from the lighthouse. No other communication devices were available.
After this technical work the lighthouse lamp was formally turned on, but it was in september in the year of 1943. Supervisor of the lighthouse was my brother Guðbjartur Cecilsson for as long as he lived, but he was supervisor from 1943 to 1994. I became the lighthouse supervisor after my dear brother died. The years after Grundarfjarðarviti was built, Hermóður came once a year with fully loaded gas canisters and took the empty ones. These gas canisters were very ridgid, heavy and thick, made to tolerate heavy blows to the rocks under rough circumstances. It took much effort to haul the canisters by hand from the sea up to the lighthouse. In the later years the gas canisters were brought to the harbour of Grundarfjörður and then transported with a tractor towards the lighthouse, where they were hauled by hand the rest of the way.
Grundarfjarðarviti is made of concrete. It is 3 meter high, 4 meters long and 2 meters wide. The roof is of concrete. The exterior surface had 6 horizontal stripes. The base line and 2 embedded stripes were covered with crushed obsidian, but the other 3 covered with crushed light coloured quartz. Grundarfjarðarviti as well as the other lighthouses in the country was owned by the state, under the supervision of the Lighthouse and Maritime Affairs Institution. It was handed over to the town of Grundarfjörður for possession, running and caretaking on the 1st of september 1983. The light was turned off around the millenium 2000 and it went to a private possession on the 20th of april 2001. The gas lamp was preserved and when my son Sævar finished the lighthouse refurbishment to it´s original state in 2023, the lamp was reinstalled. Sævar is the owner of the lighthouse.
Technical description of the lighthouse according to documents from the Lighthouse and Maritime Affairs Institution:
Location: 64°56´50“ n.latitude. 23°18´08“ w.longitude.
Light identity: white, red and green flash with 5 sec. interval. L=0,5 sek. + m 4,5 sec.
Light heigth 24m.
Light volume: t/e: Wh=286 ; Red=71 ; Grn=57cd Visual length optical: Wj=8,1cm ; Red=5,5cm ; Grn=5,2cm T=0,8
Visual length geometrical: 15cm
Building: 3m high concrete building, with white quartz stripes and black obsidian stripes.
Building year:1942-1943. Light turned on in september 1943.
Light body: Dioptic 375mm
Light device (lamp): K130 nr.B1690 from Beacon Works Lighthouse Engineers, Brentford, England
Burner: 1 pcs AGA 25 ltr.
Gas cannisters: 4 gas cannister stack. Usage per year 3 cannisters.
Multi coloured glass in a 5-stranded front window: 2 pcs red 38x37,5cm, 2 pcs green 38x37,5cm
Light angle:
Red fr. S 143°
Hvítt 143°-146° between Mávahnúksboði and Vesturboði
Green 146°-186° over Vesturboði and Melrakkaey
White 186°-191° between Melrakkaey and Flankasker
Red 191°-251° over Flankasker to Setberg
White 251°-326° over the ship lay in Grundarfjörður
Green L.V.326°
