Vegaøyan – The Vega Archipelago

Eider ducks are treated like family on the Vega islands. Just south of the Arctic Circle, generations of fisher-farmers built special nesting houses for the birds and harvested their precious down — by the 9th century it supplied roughly a third of local income, with women doing much of the work. Across a 107,294-hectare seascape of fishing villages, quays and lighthouses, this frugal 1,500-year-old way of life earned UNESCO recognition in 2004.