As part of the promotion of Atlantic Airways and the Faroe Islands in France, Travelguys went with influential media colleagues to the Faroe Islands, at the invitation of the Faroe Islands airline, Atlantic Airways and GroupExpression.
Find the program of the series of articles which will be dedicated to Atlantic Airways:
| Review# | Type | Post |
| 1 | Discovery | Atlantic Airways: the Atlantic ambition |
| 2 | Flight | Paris-Faroe Islands on Atlantic Airways: an excellent introduction to the Faroe Islands |
| 3 | Flight | Torshavn-Klaksvik-Kirkja-Klaksvik: put yourself in the shoes of James Bond |
| 4 | Flight | Faroe Islands-Paris on Atlantic Airways |
Atlantic Airways, is indeed international routes linking Vagar to the rest of Europe, but also two Augusta Westland 139 helicopters that perform inter-island transfers. We couldn’t resist the pleasure of a few minutes of helicopter flightto explore the sublime landscapes of the archipelago!
Let’s go to the heliport of Torshavn (the “capital” of the Faroe Islands) in the early morning.
The verification of the booking is done in a small wooden shed by our guide. We are then invited for a safety demonstration.
We find here and there some documentation on the helicopter flights of the airline, which inevitably attract the eye of an avgeek…
Opening the leaflet, one can notice the flight schedules and the fixed price range. A trip between Kirkja and Vagar, two points on opposite sides of the country, will cost you 48 euros. It’s not that expensive!
We also discover thatthe flights are not daily. In fact, they are on Monday, Wednesday, Friday and Sunday. This leaves a pretty cool schedule for the pilots… Here is the program of the day. We will fly with the crew to Torshavn-Klaksvik-Svinoy-Kirkja-Hattarvik-Klaksvik, for a flight time of about 40 minutes.
We notice the equipment allowing to tag the destinations, without knowing what it is used for.
We watch the safety demonstrations with perfect attention. For the rest, we will rely on the pilots. You will also notice the presence of the coffee machine that makes you feel like in the best business lounges in the world.
This poster will catch our attention. Not that the Travelguys are traveling with rodents, though.
We head outside the cabin to see our helicopter arrive. So he comes from Vagar (where the international airport is located). It’s a bit windy but not enough to discourage us.
Once the plane has landed, we can head for the boarding gate. Obviously, no seat is assigned: first come, first served. So we were advised to jostle for the window seats… I get one on the right side of the third row.
Here we go for Klaksvik!
The landscapes are sublime both on the sea side and on the land side.
The arrival at Klaksvik is done by following these beautiful cliffs.
The city of Klaksvik,second largest of the archipelago after Torshavn. The total number of souls is an overwhelming 5,000.
The heliport can be seen not far away.
LinkedIn influencers would be thrilled to see that at the Faroese heliports, employees can bring their four-legged companion, who just wants to play with the customers…
Our final destination is indeed Klaksvik, but Atlantic Airways has planned for us a complete loop over the archipelago (serving the islands of Svinoy, Kirkja and Hattarvik),so we stay on board. We will only get off the helicopter at the next landing in Klaksvik (which is anyway the terminus).
Some passengers are not as lucky and I have to let them off the helicopter.
Here we go for 3 other heliports: Svinoy, Kirkja and Hattarvik, before closing the loop on Klaksvik.
We can see some pieces of blue sky which will be about the only ones seen during this stay.
It is possible to follow the route on Flightradar. This shows the described loop from and to Klaksvik.
Svinoy is an island already less hospitable than the others. There are no road access points (unlike Klasvik, now connected to Torshavn). There were 31 souls living in Svinoy in 2020.
Unsurprisingly, the stop is only of short duration. We thus leave some seconds later towards Kirkja, the oriental point of the archipelago.
The arrival in Kirkja is not much more inspiring. In this village live 30 inhabitants. All as isolated as in Svinoy. We leave on time. If you miss your helicopter, there is still the next flight two days later, the boat if you find one, or your arms to swim.
We will be announced besides not to stop us in Hattarvik due to bad weather conditions. A bus will bring the few souls to their destination from Kirkja. We thus leave again towards Klaksvik directly.
It’s not long.
We stop in Klaksvik. It’s lunch time for the pilots, who will come and exchange a few words with us, surely intrigued to see visitors. They will leave in the afternoon towards Vagar to complete their loop.
Helicopters remain a safe and quick way to open up the islands in the case of scattered archipelagos with small populations. If only the most adventurous travelers will want to use a helicopter to reach one of the hard-to-reach islands, it remainsa superbly avgeek activity knowing that the aircraft is operated by a regular airline.
