It's 10 P.M. in June in Iceland's Hornstrandir Nature Reserve, and I am crawling in a blustery wind toward the edge of a 1,500-foot cliff. Ahead, a steely, sunlit sea unfurls to the horizon. Behind, the treeless landscape affords a view of snowy peaks, a river still to ford, and my tent, a painfully long walk away. 

Not for the first time this trip, I wonder: What am I doing here?

"All great and precious things are lonely." -- John Steinbeck, East of Eden

Less than one latitudinal degree south of the Arctic Circle, and isolated by a wall of glacier-capped mountains, Hornstrandir is the peninsula Europe forgot. Erik the Red, father of Leif Eriksson, was among the first in a 1,000-year line of settlers who survived here on herring and seabird eggs. Life was hard even by Icelandic standards, and in 1952 the region's last permanent resident moved away. Save for a few summer homes and ranger outposts, Hornstrandir has for 60 years been returning to nature. I arrived by boat three days ago to wander 200 of the wildest square miles left in Europe. 

I've ascended from blue-black fjords to mountains where moss swallowed my footprints, tried to forget Iceland's troll myths in valleys white with fog, and been accompanied for hours by an arctic fox with a bark like a human laugh. More than any place I've been before, Hornstrandir reminds me of why I love hiking solo--and of the eerie lonesomeness that often makes me glad to return home. The ruins dotting the landscape--an old village, a cemetery, and a few restored buildings among wildflowers--drive home the point that I'm alone in a place that no longer belongs to humans. 

Now I cling to the grass at cliff's edge, longing for hamburgers, beer, to watch the World Cup. Just one peek at what's over the edge, I tell myself, and I'll hang up my explorer boots forever. I urge my nervous nose over the abyss, where egg hunters once rappelled. 

There is only a terrifying blue drop and a sudden profusion of white. It takes me a moment to realize I am looking down on the wings of tens of thousands of guillemots, fulmars, and kittiwakes--so many birds they seem to bloom from the sea. I forget the burgers, and any fear of heights.