The tiny Arctic island where travellers have found refuge since 1897

For centuries, this tiny Norwegian island sheltered fishermen from violent seas. Now one woman is using tourism to revive it – and offer travellers refuge from modern life.

The day before I travel to Støtt, a tiny Norwegian archipelago just north of the Arctic Circle, an artist tells me a local legend about fishermen caught in the grip of vicious winter storms. "Sometimes, everyone drowned," he says. "But sometimes, an island rose out of the mist, like magic, to save you."

For generations, Støtt was a refuge. Fishing boats blown off course in the Norwegian Sea could shelter here, while a trading post on Innerstøtt, the largest of Støtt's three inhabited islands, supplied fishermen heading north to the rich Arctic cod grounds of Lofoten. 

Today, that trading post is home to Støtt Brygge, a hotel run by Eva Ann Andersen, whose family has owned it since 1897. Andersen believes the island can offer a different kind of refuge now: not from violent seas, but from stress, overwork and modern urban life.

She knows something about that herself. Andersen grew up on Støtt before moving to Oslo in her twenties and building an international corporate career. In 2011, exhausted, she returned to the island to recover – and saw new potential in the place she'd left behind.

The story of islands rising out of the sea occupies my mind as I take the coastal ferry to Støtt, watching the island gradually appear from the rainclouds. To get here, I'd flown into Bodø, where a lone conveyor belt serves the airport and the ferry terminal sports posters asking passengers to report whale sightings. As the city disappears behind me, grey sea and low cloud heavy with drizzle takes over. Every so often, craggy rocks loom out of the mist.

After an hour, Støtt finally appears: low-lying granite, red cabins and tall cod-drying racks rising out of the spray. To the west, there's nothing between here and Greenland but open ocean.

It's hard to imagine now, but Støtt was once one of the busiest stopping points on Norway's northern fishing route. Today just a handful of people live here year-round.

After meeting me at the ferry, Andersen and I walk to the hotel, where passing fishermen and sailors once stopped to resupply. The hotel also encompasses a pair of classic red fishermen's cabins, a restored storehouse and a pale-yellow bakery building. We head upstairs to its small fishing museum, whose black-and-white photographs and weathered nets tell the story of the island's heyday, when fishermen would shelter here from storms, restock their boats and wait for calmer seas.

"Fishermen used to come up to fish for Arctic cod in Lofoten in winter," Andersen said, referencing the string of islands that lie like dark cut-outs on the horizon to the north. "The shop was an important place back then. Fishermen came here to buy fishing equipment, bread, sugar and flour – and to have a drink – before continuing their journeys north."

She points out a black-and-white photo of her grandfather standing in a wooden boat, ankle-deep in large silver fish; elsewhere an old film shows men in small wooden boats hauling in huge catches of herring. Downstairs in the restaurant, historical posters and ledgers line the walls while the old shop counter serves as the bar.

Later, in my room in the island's saffron-coloured former bakery, I'm charmed by the lace curtains and framed newspaper cuttings showing men mending nets on the floor of an old fishing hut, hand-rolled cigarettes squashed in the corner of their mouths. But the museum feel is mixed with more modern comforts: Lofoten Seaweed products in the bathroom and snow-white sheepskins scattered across the dove-grey bedroom floor.

Andersen has witnessed much of Støtt's decline. From the 1980s, innovation in the fishing industry brought larger, safer boats and trawlers, meaning fishermen no longer needed to stop at trading posts like Støtt en route. The small-scale fishing industry collapsed, and the island's population fell from around 120 people to just 25 permanent residents today.

"Nobody believed I would stay," she says of her decision to return in 2011. "But I carried hope when I came back."

In the afternoon, Andersen takes me on a bike tour around Støtt, cycling along quiet roads beside pretty holiday cottages and homes. There's only one shop, which sells the bare basics for holidaymakers to stock their cabins. To the north, the mountainous islands rise above the churning navy-blue sea.

We continue to a former German coastal fort, one of Støtt's most striking historical features. Once home to around 200 soldiers, the complex includes concrete bunkers and tunnels built into the hillside after the island was occupied in 1941, along with an underground hospital, ammunition stores and gun emplacements.

Andersen, however, is focused firmly on the future. As we ride, she tells me she hopes Støtt can once again become a refuge – this time for travellers looking to escape the pace of modern life. "A lot of people want this off-the-beaten-track feeling," she says. "It's about connection to land and meeting local people."

To appeal to those travellers, Andersen has expanded the hotel's activities to include kayaking trips, Arctic sauna sessions, RIB boat excursions to Svartisen glacier and dinner in one of the World War Two tunnels. She is also converting the island's old fish factory into luxury suites, hoping to attract more international visitors while creating year-round work for locals. 

We stop at the top of the bunker complex to take in the view, and as if on cue, a white-tailed sea eagle soars into view, then wheels back down into the valley where it emerged. I'm still awestruck as we head back to the hotel for lunch, where Andersen's daughter Benedicte joins us. Back from Oslo, where she's studying for the summer, she's in no doubt about why people love visiting Støtt.

"You can't beat the nature here. Oslo has so much stress, but here there is a Zen mode. You don't think about going to the gym, just going outside and seeing the mountains is enough," she says.

I later watch her leading a kayaking group through the turquoise water, past pale sandy beaches around the skerries close to shore. I walk along a quiet beach looking at shells and white coral in the sand. Mountains stand out like inkblots in the far distance, and the only noise beyond the splash of kayak paddles is the sound of birds on the wind.

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Bird watching is another big draw, particularly in spring when migratory birds arrive on the island. In winter, visitors come for the Northern Lights and stargazing. I'm here during the summer's midnight-Sun period when the Sun doesn't set. Late at night, I lie in my room late watching geese outside on the lawn and peaceful passing clouds.

The calm continues into the following morning. Over a classic Norwegian breakfast of marinated, pickled and paprika-sprinkled herring, Andersen tells me about her ambitions for Støtt.

"The greatest aim for me is to rebuild this island's society," she says. By creating more jobs and drawing visitors, Andersen hopes Støtt can give people a reason to stay – and perhaps encourage others to return. In an echo of the ever-popular Lofoten Islands to the north, she wants tourism to breathe new life into the archipelago, drawing artists and writers and stimulating a region that has been forgotten for too long.

For now, though, Støtt remains what it has always been: a place of refuge from the storms beyond its shores.

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