The Self-Proclaimed Northermost Town in the World.
The 10,000 people living in Hammerfest are further from the equator than most will ever go. Beyond 70 degrees north, the town lies on the northern coast of Northern Norway, deep within the Arctic Circle. From May the night sky is not seen for three months, a welcome relief from the months of darkness and ice the stormy winter brings.
Many people of Hammerfest are proud of their claim as the world’s northernmost town, yet despite Hammerfest’s remoteness and extreme location it is not even in the top 10 of most northern communities; Hammerfest sits hundreds of miles south of the most northerly towns, with the top spot contested between most of the countries surrounding the Arctic. The argument of the most northerly town is fought less over geographic location, and more over the precise definition of what a town is.
