Hanstholm is a small town and a former island, now elevated area in Thisted municipality of Region Nordjylland, located in northern Denmark.

The ferry MV Norröna of Smyril Line operated a weekly summer service to the Faroe Islands and Iceland from Hanstholm until 2010.

As Hansted's population grew from a couple of hundred to several thousand people during the 20th century, some urban planning was applied.

It seems to have been modelled in the same way as other growing Danish towns in the 1960s, which basically means that you can drive through the city without noticing the size of it.

In the year 120 B.C., teutons inhabited the area, but left in a large exodus, together with the Cimbri, towards the south, where they encountered the Romans.

In the years 800 to 1050, Hanstholm and the area around it were islands, and nearby was the gathering point for the Vikings for their invasions of England and France.

Numerous attempts to stop the sand drift finally succeeded in the 19th century by the planting of trees and lyme grass.

South of Hanstholm, a unique dune landscape of approximately 4,000 hectares has become a wildlife reservation, named Hansted Reservat.

During the Second World War, the citizens of Hansted were removed and Europe's biggest fortress was built by the Germans in this area.

naval guns were installed, that could shoot almost half the distance to Norway, in order to block allied entry into the Kattegat and thus the Baltic Sea.

Only a few bunkers lying in the way of road constructions have later been blown up using a special method of filling them with water before the explosion.

However, this was delayed by numerous incidents, including the low grants in the 1930s, and even though the Germans had plans to use the harbour as part of their strategy when they occupied Denmark in the Second World War, they stopped all construction in June 1943, removed all machines and blew up the buildings on the beach.

Fjord Line ferries sailed from Hanstholm until autumn 2008 to Western Norway (Egersund, Haugesund and Bergen).

But in the autumn of 2010, after almost 20 years of regular ferry service to and from the Faroe Islands and Iceland, the shipping company Smyril Line unexpectedly chose to stop all of its operations to and from Hanstholm.