Dalabyggð

Dalabyggð is a municipality located in western Iceland. Its main settlement is Búðardalur. Búðardalur is a service center for the area, including the regional tourist information center.

Búðardalur contains a supermarket and a petrol station, hair salons, a pub/restaurant, a coffee shop, a garage and a craft shop. Erpstaðir, a farm in the municipality sell buy milk products firsthand. There you have the opportunity to visit the animals on the farm. You can even stay there overnight in an old farmhouse, away from other tourists.

The village has a long history, dating from the time of the first settlements in Iceland. The name means “Camp Valley”, or more directly “dale of booths”; it is where settlers had temporary camps when coming to the area. In 1899, Búðardalur was officially granted the right of commerce. An old house from this time still exists.

The farm of Hvammur í Dölum, where the poet, historian, and politician Snorri Sturluson was born, belongs to the municipality of Dalabyggð. There is a thermal bath in Dalabyggð , Guðrúnarlaug, it is named after Guðrún Ósvífursdóttir from the Laxdæla saga.

At a short distance from the village is Eiríksstaðir, the homestead of Erik the Red, who was the first European to discover Greenland and whose son Leif Erikson, born at Eiríksstaðir, was the first European to discover America ahead of Columbus