KeflavÃk
Keflavík [c ʰ k ʰ ɛplavi ː ] (Eng. " Driftwood Bay " ) is a port city in southwest Iceland.
1994 Keflavik closed with the surrounding towns and Njarðvík Hafnir to the municipality Reykjanesbær with 14,172 inhabitants (as of 1 January 2009) together. Keflavík is with 8169 inhabitants, the largest city of the peninsula and Reykjanesskagi sixth largest city in the country.
History
The name of the city ( " Driftwood Bay " ) is to go back to the first settlers Ingólfur Arnarson; the slaves were in search of the house post their Lord only driftwood. In the 16th century, Keflavík was first mentioned as a British trading post and later evolved to the fishing location. The town remained an important trading post in 1949 and received a city charter. From 1951 to 2006 Keflavik location was stationed in Iceland Iceland Defense Force of the U.S. armed forces.
Economy and infrastructure
Next to the port and the former U.S. Air Force base of Leif Eriksson International Airport makes ( International Airport of Iceland ) Keflavík one of the most important places in Iceland.
Recently, giant data centers are built up of international IT companies. The reason for this is the power and cooling requirements of the servers. Both may Iceland and the Reykjanes Peninsula afford good. These so-called server farms are connected via fiber-optic lines with very large transmission capacity to the European continent, America and Asia and ask for the IT companies, the computing power available.
Attractions
Attractions offered by the harbor, here you can find still various historic buildings such as the red house of the Danish businessman Peter Duus from the 19th century ( Duushús ). Not far away is the fishing monument by the Icelandic artist Ásmundur Sveinsson.
The small bright church Keflavíkurkirkja of 1915 and the port area with the rather inconspicuous blue and white lighthouse Vatnsnesviti are worth seeing.
Njarðvík, the western neighboring town of Keflavík, which practically consists of two smaller towns, complete with its northern part almost seamlessly to the city area. The distance to the capital Reykjavík is about 40 kilometers.