Hálfdán Einarsson, the mailman in Bolungarvík, the West Fjords, was surprised to receive a postcard on Friday, which was addressed to a man who had moved from the village many years ago and had since passed away. It turned out that the postcard had been sent on October 1, 1986.
On bolungarvik.is, it was revealed that the postcard had been written by Guðný Anna Vilhelmsdóttir, who was 20 at the time, to her family in Bolungarvík. She had addressed it to her father, Vilhelm.
Guðný wrote the postcard in Madeira and posted it in Las Palmas, the Canaries, wanting to inform her family of her travels, in an age before cell phones and emails.
Hálfdán tracked Guðný down, who is still a globetrotter and currently resides in Abu Dhabi. She had just returned from the Seychelle Islands, where she celebrated her 50th birthday.
Guðný remembered her trip to Madeira and the Canaries well. In her postcard she wrote that Madeira was “without a doubt one of the most beautiful places in the world.” Nowadays, she usually prefers Facebook over postcards, she said.
It’s unclear why it took 30 years for Guðný’s postcard to be delivered, but it will now be sent to her mother Særún, who lives in Hafnarfjörður, outside Reykjavík.
