The former World Champion chess player Bobby Fischer is buried in a small remote Icelandic cemetery
P oor old Bobby Fischer! Finally in his resting place away from seemingly endless controversies and troubles all his life only to become a tourist attraction after death.
You probably know the story if you know who Bobby Fischer was. The great Cold War world chess champion was hardly Mister Popular in his lifetime and seldom made life easy for himself.
After house arrest in Japan and arrest warrant waiting in the U.S. the politicians of Iceland came to his rescue and issued an Icelandic passport in record time due to the fact that Fischer became World champion in Reykjavik in 1973 after dueling with Boris Spassky of the then Soviet Union.
But the new-found freedom in Iceland proved short-lived for the chess maestro and after three years living in Iceland he passed away in January 2008.
Bobby, Robert James Fischer, was buried in a small little known cemetery outside of the small town of Selfoss, or Arborg on maps, in the South of Iceland. But relative remoteness did not stop his fans in the least. Nowadays you will be lucky to find yourself alone in the small and remote Laugardaelir church cemetery. There are even special tours available from the capital Reykjavik.
Team Total Iceland does not recommend disturbing the dead but in case you are dying to see the dead follow the map.
You can also visit a fairly recent small museum dedicated to Fischer and his amazing chess record in Selfoss. The Fischer center will not amaze anyone but if you have time to kill and happen to be in Selfoss…
View Bobby Fischers´s final resting place in Iceland in a larger map
