- Remove Quarns and mills filter Quarns and mills
- Remove Bømlo filter Bømlo
- Remove Civil servant dwellings and manors filter Civil servant dwellings and manors
- Remove Trading posts and guesthouses filter Trading posts and guesthouses
- Remove Austrheim filter Austrheim
- Remove Wetland filter Wetland
- Remove Osterøy filter Osterøy
- Remove Maritime environments filter Maritime environments
- Remove Churches filter Churches
- Remove Mines filter Mines
- Remove Farm sites filter Farm sites
![Brandasund Sound, Bømlo](https://www.grind.no/sites/default/files/styles/medium/public/bilder/sted/1/kvh_218-1_brandasundfly218.jpg?itok=pjloM95Z)
Brandasund
On Gisøya Island, on the west side of Brandasund Sound, there is a very privileged trading post and traveller's Inn from the 1600s, with the North Sea as its nearest neighbour. In 1991 a road was built over Bømlo out to these islands, but for thousands of years the sheltered harbour here was a main stopping place along the outer coast. During the great herring period of the 1700s and 1800s, Brandasund was a centre for the herring fisheries on the Sørafeltet fishing grounds. Today, the area belongs to the municipality of Bømlo.
![The lobster park in Espevær](https://www.grind.no/sites/default/files/styles/medium/public/bilder/sted/232/bomlo_39.jpg?itok=QWK2IaA7)
![Espevær around 1915, at “Biekronå”.](https://www.grind.no/sites/default/files/styles/medium/public/bilder/sted/1/kvh_204-1.jpg?itok=Nv-R-Syf)
Espevær- the Trading Post
In the sea west of Bømlo lies Espevær, half an hour’s rowing trip across the sound from Vespestadvågen. This is a well-run and well-maintained local community, established on the back of the rich herring fisheries in the 1850s. It is fishermen, skippers and the tradesmen who have made their mark on the culture in Espevær, with their contacts to the south towards Haugesund and across the North Sea to the British Isles.
![The rectory at Finnes](https://www.grind.no/sites/default/files/styles/medium/public/bilder/sted/190/kvh_203_finnas_1_150.jpg?itok=MjLf1y2s)
![The longhouse at Førland](https://www.grind.no/sites/default/files/styles/medium/public/bilder/sted/232/kvh_304-2.jpg?itok=ZjuFC_Ry)
![Hamre church, Osterøy](https://www.grind.no/sites/default/files/styles/medium/public/bilder/sted/232/kvh_325-2_-hamre_kirke.jpg?itok=vm3U9puE)
Hamre Church
Hamre Church has, by all accounts been one of the four main churches in Horda County in the Middle Ages. Hamre was a main church for the whole of Hordaland. Timber remains in the present church show that there was a stave church here in medieval times.
![Havrå and the arable fields up to the enclosed meadow.](https://www.grind.no/sites/default/files/styles/medium/public/bilder/sted/1/kvh_323-1_-havraatunet.jpg?itok=fiE6Ax_w)
Havrå
In the sunny, steep fjord landscape along Sørfjorden on the east side of Osterøy is the farm Havrå. The small “hamlet” is one of the few undisturbed farming communities that gives us the impression of the large communal yards in West Norway in the 1700s, with houses built close together and strips of arable land.
![Herlandsnesjane](https://www.grind.no/sites/default/files/styles/medium/public/bilder/sted/232/ost_19.jpg?itok=ziqPLTch)
Herlandsnesjane
Herlandsnesjane, a four-kilometre long peninsula in Lake Storavatnet in the middle of Osterøy, is well known among botanists. Here lies an unusually large and diverse bog.
![Hiskholmen around 1900](https://www.grind.no/sites/default/files/styles/medium/public/bilder/sted/232/kvh_204-3.jpg?itok=auLrXoCL)
![The extended farm dwelling at Hopland](https://www.grind.no/sites/default/files/styles/medium/public/bilder/sted/1/kvh_304-1.jpg?itok=ird44EKf)
Hopland
The farmhouses at holding No. 15 at Hopland are built together to form a long, continuous building, with dwelling house, hayshed and cowshed built in one row. There have been many such joined structures in the coastal communities, but today there are few remaining. If we travel to the other side of the North Sea, to the Faeroes, Shetland and the Orkney Islands, we find corresponding features in the older building traditions. We find ourselves in a large North Atlantic cultural area.