Eighteen reasons
to leave the main street.

Reykjavík is a rather unusual capital.

You can walk through much of the old center in an afternoon. The sea is never far away. The weather changes its mind constantly. And there's a good chance you'll end up somewhere with an excellent cinnamon bun.

It doesn't look like a city keeping many secrets.

But Iceland has always been very good at telling stories.

Some are preserved in medieval sagas. Others live in street names, old houses, statues, and places most visitors walk past without a second thought.

There's a woman whose name appears in the earliest story of Reykjavík, but whose life remains almost entirely unknown. A sculptor whose mermaid disappeared in a rather dramatic fashion. And a group of women who helped bring an entire country to a standstill for a day.

Then there are the older stories.

A seeress who speaks of the beginning and end of the world. A woman whose grave became tangled in local tradition. And a ghost who, according to one account, had unfinished business with a judge.

Icelandic history doesn't always make a neat distinction between what happened, what people believed, and what they continued telling each other for generations.

That's part of its fascination.

You'll find these stories in places that don't immediately announce themselves as important.

By a pond. On a quiet residential street. Near the harbour. Beside a sculpture that might look completely ordinary until you learn why it's there.

The women you'll encounter were artists, workers, political pioneers, storytellers, and figures from centuries-old traditions.

They don't all belong to the same kind of history.

But they share the same city, where the everyday and the extraordinary have a habit of sitting surprisingly close together.

There are eighteen stories to explore in and around Reykjavík.

Some will take you somewhere familiar.

Others might lead you a little further than you expected.

Check the weather before you go.

And don't be too surprised if the strangest story of the day turns out to be true.

You don't need to know what happens before you go. You only need somewhere worth walking toward.

JUNO PORTALS is designed primarily for women traveling alone.

That doesn't mean every experience has to be solitary. It means the product starts from a simple reality: sometimes you're already here, the day is yours, and you'd like a reason to go somewhere you might otherwise have passed.

Read the access note for the portal you choose. Some places are further out than they look on the map, and some are private or working places you only see from outside.

THE TOWN UNDER THE TOWN depends on opening hours.

Prices and hours change. Check them on the day.

Curiosity gets you there. Your judgment always comes first.