This is not a computer game but the islands’ latest tourism initiative – a camera-wearing local who responds to commands from people anywhere in the world to show them round their isles

At the press of a button on my mobile phone the camera swings left and a breathless voice explains that we are looking at Tíndholmur, a jagged sliver of rock in the sea channel off the Faroese village of Bøur. I can press a button to go left or right, and up or down. Rather cruelly, the on-screen controls also allow me to make the guide “run” and, bizarrely, “jump” on the spot. I can’t resist as the camera pans down onto a black sand beach and the disembodied voice declares (even more breathlessly) that he really enjoys running on sand. The highlight of this atavistic performance is when an anonymous user makes the guide head for slippery rocks and an incoming wave swamps his legs and feet, prompting a shout of “Oh God, I didn’t see that coming.”

An hour passes quickly in the online company of Levi, my guide, a former player for the Faroe Islands’ national football team, who is still very fit. Though it’s fair to say that at the end of it I have seen rather too much of the half-dozen alleyways of Bøur, which is home to only about 70 people. However, as the camera is propelled up and down the quiet roads and in between turf-roofed houses, I am immersed in the sounds and sights of the Faroes, rugged hills, misty sea-scapes and colourful grazing sheep.

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Source: Gaurdian

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