Farsund is a municipality and a town southwest of Agder county. Farsund is a coastal municipality with the North Sea in the south and west, and borders Kvinesdal in the northwest and Lyngdal in the southeast. The municipality has 9,695 inhabitants (2019). Today's municipality was established in 1965, when the city municipality of Farsund was merged with the neighboring municipalities Lista, Herad and Spind, and the new municipality was named after the city.
Geography
Farsund is located between Rosfjorden in the east
and Fedafjorden in the west. Between these fjords lies a landscape
consisting of peninsulas, islands, fjords and straits. Listalandet
forms the western part of the municipality.
The
Lyngdalsfjord, together with the Uppstafjord and the side fjord
Drangsfjorden, is a central landscape element. The fjord empties
through a narrow but navigable strait, and here lies the town of
Farsund. Sellegrodsfjorden, Helvikfjorden and Framvaren form a
waterway north from Farsund. In the heart of Framvaren, there is
only one property, Listeid, which separates from Eidsfjorden. Here
it is possible to transport boats over, and so the small boat people
can avoid sailing on the outside of the weather-hardened Listaland.
This is a business with historical roots that probably goes far back
in time.
Spindfjorden is located east of Farsund, centrally
in the old Spind municipality. Outside this fjord there is a large
archipelago, and Langøy is one of many beautiful islands. The
municipality also has about a mile of sandy beaches on the
Listahalvøya.
The highest point in Farsund municipality is
Lyfjellet, 487 m high.
Geology
The western part of Agder
belongs to the Svekonorvegian bedrock shield. It consists of two
main geological formations of Proterozoic rocks formed during the
Gothic and later Sveconorvegian mountain range ancestors, with a
strong metamorphosis below the latter. A substrate of 1450–1600
million years old slate, quartzite, marble and amphibolite with some
hornblende gneiss, and on top of this acidic surface structures of
both granite and granodiorite (respectively 1000–1250 million years
old, and in places 1480–1550 million years old). The youngest
Sveconorvegian formations are witnessed by larger formations of
granite. The Caledonian mountain range fold did not reach down here.
The faults go both in the southwest-northeast direction and in the
south-north direction.
Nature conservation
Lista - one of
the southernmost points in Norway - has special significance for
migratory birds. Lista wetland system is a Ramsar site consisting of
a total of ten separate nature reserves. The area includes shallow
coves along the coast, dune landscapes, bogs and swamps and shallow
and nutrient-rich lakes. The area has a special vegetation, among
other things in connection with the dunes facing the sea. The areas
have had the status of Ramsar site since 1996.