Where to stay in Moldjord
Moldjord keeps its few beds close to the river and the church at the heart of Beiarn Municipality. The centre around Beiarn kirke and the Beiarn bygdetun holds what rooms the village offers, within easy reach of the municipal services and the bank of the Beiar River. Stay here for the valley itself.
Travellers come to walk and fish the Beiar River, to follow the inland reaches of Beiarn that climb away from the village toward the high ground, and to use Moldjord as a quiet base in the eastern part of Nordland. The museum tells the valley's story. Rooms are scarce in a place of this size, so a traveller does well to arrange a bed in good time, especially through the long light of the northern summer when the river and the valley draw their visitors up from the coast and the Beiar Fjord.
About Moldjord
What is Moldjord known for?
Moldjord is the seat of Beiarn Municipality. It is the small administrative village where the affairs of this inland kommune in Nordland are gathered, standing on the bank of the Beiar River a short way upstream from the water's mouth at the Beiar Fjord. Beiarn kirke serves the whole municipality from here.
The Beiarn bygdetun, the local heritage museum, keeps the working memory of the valley close by the river.
What are the main landmarks in Moldjord?
The village's marks gather by the river. Beiarn kirke stands as the main church of Beiarn Municipality, serving the whole valley from the centre of Moldjord, while the Beiarn bygdetun preserves the old buildings and tools of the inland community a short walk away. The river is a landmark in its own right.
The Beiar River runs past the village toward its mouth at the Beiar Fjord, and the heritage museum reads its working life back across the generations of the Beiarn valley.
What is the history of Moldjord?
The valley shaped the village. Moldjord grew where the Beiar River runs down toward its mouth at the Beiar Fjord, on a stretch of inland ground in the eastern part of Nordland where farms and fishing along the river drew a small community together over the generations. The land held them in the valley.
Beiarn kirke was raised as the chief church of the surrounding parish, and in time Moldjord became the natural gathering point for the wider district, the place where the affairs of the kommune were settled and where the roads up the valley met. The settlement took the role of administrative centre of Beiarn Municipality, drawing the municipal services to its riverside core. To hold the memory of the older life, the community founded the Beiarn bygdetun, a heritage museum that gathers the buildings, tools and ways of the valley's farming and fishing past.
The river still runs through it all.
Where is Moldjord?
Moldjord lies in northern Norway (Nord-Norge), in the eastern part of Nordland, set inland along the Beiar River. The village sits on the river a short way above its mouth at the Beiar Fjord, where the valley of Beiarn cuts back from the coast between high ground on either side and the water threads down through the farmland toward the sea. The valley closes in around it.
Beiarn kirke marks the centre, and the inland reaches of the kommune climb away from the village toward the mountains that ring the head of the Beiar valley.
What is the climate of Moldjord?
Moldjord holds the cool inland weather of the Beiar valley, set back from the open coast in the eastern part of Nordland. Winters run long and snowbound in this northern valley, the high ground around Beiarn holding the cold and the snow well into the season, while the short, bright summers bring the long northern daylight down over the Beiar River and the farmland along its banks. The valley feels the seasons sharply.
Sheltered from the milder air of the Beiar Fjord by the run of the valley inland, the village keeps a firmer winter than the coast a few kilometres away.
How do you get to Moldjord?
Most travellers reach Moldjord by road. The village lies inland up the Beiar valley in the eastern part of Nordland, so drivers come in on the route that follows the Beiar River from the coast around the Beiar Fjord, threading up the valley to the riverside centre. The road is the way in.
There is no railway to the valley, and visitors arriving from further afield in northern Norway make the last stretch by car or local bus along the river, leaving the coast behind for the inland reaches of Beiarn Municipality.