Lystigarðurinn, Akureyri's botanic garden

Lystigarðurinn is Akureyri's public park and botanic garden, on the hill above the town centre between Þórunnarstræti and Eyrarlandsvegur. It is open all year, and neither the garden's own pages nor Visit Akureyri list any admission charge. It suits a rest day in Akureyri, a gap between a late check-in and dinner, and anyone curious about what grows at 65.7° north. In winter it is a walk among bare trees and snow-covered beds, with the café as the warm end of it; in July it is the town's flower show.

The figures, read today on the garden's pages: the park opened in 1912 on land set aside in 1910 by the Akureyri Park Society, became a botanic garden in 1957 and is run by the municipality. It covers about 3.7 hectares at 40–50 m altitude and holds over 6,400 hardy perennial species; Visit Akureyri, the town's tourist office, gives about 3.6 hectares, 430 native species and 6,600 non-native taxa. From 1 June to 30 September the gates and toilets are open 9:00–22:00 on the opening-hours page, while the home page says 8:00–22:00. From 1 October to 31 May the gates stay open and the toilets are closed. The LYST café in the middle is open all year, 10:00–19:00 Sunday to Thursday and 10:00–23:00 on Friday and Saturday, and its toilets are for customers. The garden is described as fully accessible to people with mobility issues. Car parking is on Þórunnarstræti by the Menntaskólinn á Akureyri, per Visit Akureyri.

#The arithmetic

Akureyri is a sleep town on day 5 of the seven-day Ring Road, day 6 of the ten-day Ring Road, days 1 and 4 of the five-day North and Diamond Circle and day 7 of the Iceland and Faroe Islands ferry journey, so the garden is never a detour, only time. Visit Akureyri puts it 1.5 km from the centre; at 80 m/min that is about 20 minutes each way on foot. With an hour inside and a 10-minute buffer, about 110 minutes. By car it is 1.3 km and under 5 minutes by OSRM on OpenStreetMap, so about 80 minutes with the same hour and buffer.

#What goes wrong

Winter: the toilets are shut from October to May and the beds are under snow; the park rules ask visitors to keep to the ploughed paths. Closing: visitors must leave when the gates are locked in summer. Plants: some are thorny or poisonous, and the rules say to call staff or 112 after an accidental swallow. Nothing here is cancelled by weather, which makes it a fallback for a wet or windy day in town.

#Alternatives on the same road

On the eastern shore of Eyjafjörður, Forest Lagoon is the paid warm-water option for the same evening. North on Tröllaskagi, the Herring Era Museum in Siglufjörður is the indoor half-day. West in Skagafjörður, the Hofsós pool is the fjord-edge swim.