KJALARNESKOLLAFJÖRÐUR &

Looking over to Reykjavík, Hallgrímskirkja can be seen on the left and Keilir mountain on Reykjanes in the middle of the picture. In front of the mountain, the contours of Landakot Hospital and Landakot Church can be seen.

At the foot

of Esja, there is a promontory, named Kjalarnes, with about 1,400 inhabitants. This beautiful promontory, north of Kollafjörður and south of Hvalfjörður, belongs to the capital, Reykjavík, although Mosfellsbær, with its dense population, lies in between. In Kjalarnes, in the settlement of the first settler, Ingólfur Arnarson, the first regional parliament in Iceland, Kjalarnesþing, was founded, the precursor to Alþingi in Þingvellir. The assembly was then moved to Elliðavatn, but was still called Kjalarnesþing. From Kjalarnes there is n beautiful view, south to the capital at Seltjarnarnes, and all the way to Reykjanes over the Kollafjörður in Faxaflói. The village in Kjarnes is called Grundarhverfi, it's about a 25-minute drive from there to the centre of Reykjavík.

More than 700 people live in Grundarhverfi in Kjalarnes, close to the sea, nature and the capital. Kjalarnes is the northernmost part of the capital.

Brautarholtskirkja, the westernmost part of Kjarnes wth Esja in the background. The church is a replacement of the first church in Iceland that the settler Örlykur Hrappson built on Esjuberg just before 900. The current church was built in 1857 by Eyjólfur Þorvarðsson, from Bakki on Kjalarnes.