The Most Beautiful Place in the World

Norway’s Arctic Vestervika Beach Under a Midnight Sun

For a moment I envied the people on the sailboat, silhouetted against the midnight sun. But I quickly realized how silly the thought was. I was standing in what was probably — no, undoubtedly — the most beautiful place I’d ever been, my feet planted in warm Arctic sand, the surf rolling in between two Rocks of Gibraltar.

Norway’s Lofoten Islands are, at times, hard to comprehend. The place is astoundingly beautiful and dramatic. Certain views of its golden or white sand beaches and turquoise waters can easily double for the Caribbean, until you look up and see the towers of rock or feel the iciness of that water. It’s an archipelago risen nearly vertical from the deep blue of the North Atlantic, jutting far to the west of Norway’s eastward-curving Arctic mainland like a giant Viking’s finger pointing to westward voyages of the distant past.

The Lofoten Islands are a clichéd fairy-tale land in a country often described as a fairy tale, with its impossible fjord-side villages and waterfalls around every bend in the road.

This beach between the two Gibraltars can only be reached by foot. The trail started right off the doorstep of an old one-room schoolhouse turned vacation rental. The home faced east over a protected…