Volcanoes, skyr and the Panama Papers: a 2016 Iceland retrospective

Photo: Iceland Monitor/Ómar Óskarsson

As the new year begins, Iceland Monitor takes a look back over 2016 and some of its most popular news stories for each month. Which is your favourite?

JANUARY – Icelandic skyr hits UK shops

McDonald's closed in Iceland in 2009. Six years later, the last burger still shows no signs of decomposition and is now exhibited at Bus Hostel in Skógarhlíð.

Photo: Helgi Bjarnason

FEBRUARY – Sleep in a transparent bubble under the stars in an Icelandic forest

A light-hearted guide at how to fit in with the 101 Reykjavik in-crowd and avoid sticking out like a sore thumb – or worse, a tourist – at any of the cool hangouts downtown.

Photo: Róbert Sveinn Róbertsson

MARCH – Access to Sólheimasandur US Navy plane wreck barred

The Ásatrú Society in Iceland conducted a special pagan ceremony for the solar eclipse at the site of their new temple, the first to be built in Europe for a thousand years.

Photo: Jónas Erlendsson

APRIL – Iceland PM: “I will not resign”

A look at #freethenipple day in Iceland, where women – including an MP – went braless or topless to show their support.

Photo: Iceland Monitor/Sigurður Bogi Sævarsson

MAY – Clothing advice for an Icelandic summer

Artist Marco Evaristti poured five litres of red fruit dye into the active Strokkur geyser without permission, an act not appreciated artistically by enraged Icelanders.

Photo: Iceland Monitor/Ófeigur Lýðsson

JUNE – Iceland’s Hekla volcano “ready to blow”

Six defendants were jailed in the Kaupþing market manipulation case, the biggest case of this type in Iceland’s history.

Photo: Iceland Monitor/Helgi Bjarnason

JULY – Support Iceland in Euro 2016 with your own Icelandic name!

Archaeologists digging in central Reykjavik were looking for traces of a farm cottage built in 1799 – and found a Viking hut from some 900 years earlier.

Photo: AFP

AUGUST – Katla eruption: not if, but when...

A charming home for sale on the waterfront at beautiful Hvalfjörður. The building is by Alark architects and offers spectacular views.

Katla.

Katla. Photo: Iceland Monitor/Rax

SEPTEMBER – Reykjavik to switch off street lights for Northern Lights

Football history made in Reykjavik as the Iceland men’s football team qualify for the UEFA European Championship for the very first time.

Photo: Iceland Monitor/Golli

OCTOBER – Icelandic MP holds new-born baby to breast during debate

At its peak, flood water flows reached 3,000 m3/s, over double the previous record for a comparable river flood in Skaftá.

Photo: Iceland Monitor/Rósa Braga

NOVEMBER – GUIDE: Relocating to and working in Iceland

A video showing the moment when a black chunk of glacial ice breaks off from Svínafellsjökull glacier in South Iceland and rolls in the water.

Photo: Iceland Monitor/Ásdís Ásgeirsdóttir

DECEMBER – A cursed island for sale

Anyone up for buying an island and braving the famous curse??

Mbl.is/ Sigurður Bogi Sævarsson

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