The arrival at Akureyri is earned a thousand metres at a time. The ship ascends Eyjafjörður, Iceland's longest fjord, for nearly an hour: mountains with summits often snow-capped until summer frame still water where humpback whales sometimes play, and isolated farms punctuate the banks. At the end of this passage appears the capital of the North, 20,000 inhabitants, its houses tiered up the slope and its church standing at the top of a grand staircase. The dock lies five to ten minutes' walk from the centre: few Icelandic ports yield so readily.

A City on a Human Scale

Hafnarstræti Street, pedestrianised and lined with coloured houses, concentrates cafés, bookshops and wool boutiques. Climbing it, a detail makes everyone smile: Akureyri's traffic lights are heart-shaped, a legacy of a local optimism campaign born after the 2008 financial crisis. Akureyrarkirkja Church, a work by Guðjón Samúelsson, the architect of Reykjavik's great church, dominates the city from atop its staircase; its austere interior is lit by stained glass and a ceiling blue and star-studded. The climb takes a few minutes and the view over Eyjafjörður rewards the effort.

The World's Northernmost Botanical Garden

A few streets from the church, the botanical garden cultivates thousands of species less than 100 kilometres from the Arctic Circle, a feat made possible by the surprisingly mild microclimate of the fjord's depths. Himalayan blue poppies, Arctic plants and Icelandic flowers sit side by side in a tended valley, in free access. Locals come to read in the sun; cruise passengers catch their breath between excursions, a hot chocolate from the pavilion café in hand when the breeze picks up. It is one of the rare places in the world where you can botanise under the midnight sun.

Goðafoss: The Falls of the Gods

Forty-five kilometres east by road, the Skjálfandafljót River plunges in a wide horseshoe: Goðafoss, the "Falls of the Gods." Its name may derive from the year 1000, when the speaker of the Icelandic assembly, having decided in favour of Christianity, threw his pagan idols into the cascade. Trails lead to the edge of both banks, close enough to feel the spray. The excursion combines easily with the Mývatn Lake region, about 80 kilometres from Akureyri: pseudo-craters, lava fields in tormented forms, steaming mud pots and geothermal baths compose a distillation of volcanic Iceland. Allow half a day for all of it.

Whales and Hot Baths

The fjord itself warrants an outing: whale-watching excursions depart from the port to meet the humpback whales that frequent Eyjafjörður in summer, with an observation rate among the best in the country. On return, the geothermal lagoons in the area, including one in a forest overlooking the slopes, extend the port of call in the Icelandic way: in hot water, hair to the cool breeze.

Akureyri brings together in one port of call what drives travellers across Iceland: waterfalls, volcanoes, whales, steaming baths, and a genuine Nordic city where life runs its course. Descending toward open water at evening, you watch the mountains close behind the ship like a parenthesis, and northern Iceland suddenly seems vastly larger than what the maps show.