The Sprengisandur, Then and Now

by Pat Lloyd

Shortly after the RSF was formed, four intrepid members decided to make a crossing of the inland desert of Iceland called the Sprengisandur. In September 1958 they sailed from Scotland complete with a rubber dinghy to use in the crossing of fast flowing glacial rivers. The account of their adventures was recently reprinted in The Early Years. In August 2001 Fred and I also made a crossing of the Sprengisandur starting from the opposite direction, but being forty years older than those youthful lads we wimped out and took our bikes on the four wheel drive bus which makes the journey six days a week, three in each direction.

We left Myvatn at 8.30 and after a stop at Godafoss (so named when a Viking hurled his pagan gods into the waterfall after having been converted to Christianity), we turned onto the unsurfaced road up the Bardaloalur valley. The last house in the valley was Myri where a gate across the road had Sprengisandur on a board, this was the F26 mountain road. The bus laboured up a steep incline and shortly after turned left on to an even worse road to visit the Aldeylarfoss, a waterfall dropping into a deep canyon edged with basalt pillars. On returning to the main track we had several photo stops as we crossed terrain which became steadily denuded of any vegetation and with a number of small streams to ford. The ground was made up of dark grey gravel smoothed out by the snow that covers the land most of the year. We had passed a group of pony trekkers watering their horses at one of the streams and with a support vehicle to carry their supplies and fodder. We also came to signpost pointing along a track which our map showed us eventually went past the Askya volcanic area which we had visited on a bus trip from Myvatn.

After crossing two fords we came to the mountain hut of Hyidalur which was our lunch stop. This was very civilised with two wooden buildings containing bunks, showers and toilets and behind this a rather basic campsite. From here we had good views of the two glaciers, on the right was Hofsjokull and on the left part of the huge Vatnajokull.

So far the road surface had been better than some of the Scottish forestry estate roads but very tortuous as it wound round isolated boulders and seemed to take different routes for no apparent reason. We were fortunate with a clear sunny day but I should think that it would be easy to get lost in bad weather. We left the F26 at Kistuada and crossed over to the other side of a string of artificial lakes which the Hydro had made after damming the rivers. On the 1958 expedition the lads had to use the dinghy. It was strange to see so much water sitting amongst grey gravel with not a blade of grass at the edges. The water from these lakes feeds five power stations and once past the large Porisvatn we rejoined the F26 and reached tarmac where construction workers' huts showed that another power station was being built.

At Hrauney we stopped at a roadhouse which looked as if had previously been hydro workers' accommodation but was now a restaurant with beds. This is where we left the F26 and the Sprengisandur route which is now a surfaced road and joins the ring road near the coast. We were continuing on the F208 to where the bus terminated at the campsite at Landmannalaugar. It was now 7.30, a couple of hours later than scheduled due to all the photo stops. The place looked like a latter-day Klondike with tents scattered on every available spot on ground where we would never normally dream of putting a tent. It was wet and stony but we eventually found a place and managed to get the tent pegs to hold without having to use any of the rocks in wire cages (gabions) which were provided.

This was the only night I was cold as we were pitched on wet mud and at a high altitude. The evening light shining on the brightly coloured rocks which are a feature of the area made it worth while and when next morning came with brilliant sunshine we were glad we had come and decided that instead of catching the connecting bus to the coast we would ride there. Before we could leave the bikes needed cleaning, as travelling on hooks on the back of the bus had left them indescribably dirty; the dust had even penetrated under the saddle covers leaving a quarter inch of fine gravel.

Fred washed the bikes while I went and paid the rather expensive campsite fees at the large climbing hut with the block of toilets and showers which cater for the many holiday makers. Landmannalaugar is very popular with the Icelanders due to the thermal pools and many walking tracks.

Before rejoining the main track we had two fords to cross which fortunately had footbridges alongside and then we had a setback when we tried to change gear, as our Sturmey Archer levers were jammed solid with fine dust after yesterday on the bus. Fred managed to free them after applying a mixture of water and paraffin and we set off again joining the main track which was reasonably rideable. A deep flowing river luckily had a good bridge which led us to hope that the further seven fords shown on our map would also be bridged, but our luck was out. We had a beautiful ride round a small lake with the surrounding mountains still with patches of snow in the crevices. We cracked off the first ten miles in record time until we reached the first of the fords where we decided to have a stop at a nearby picnic table and don our fording equipment.

Before leaving home we had invested in two pairs of dry walkers as advertised in The Great Outdoors magazine and these proved invaluable. Once other cyclists had stopped laughing they wanted to know where we had bought them. They consisted of large green plastic bags with oblong reinforced feet and with ties round the ankles and below the knee. While we couldn't cycle in them they certainly kept our feet dry. None of the water came above knee level but it was straight off the glaciers and freezing cold and as the river beds were of very soft gravel we couldn't have ridden across without the wheels sinking in. At about 2.15 we came to a fairly grassy area where a party of horse riders were having a late lunch near a small ford which had a plank across. We didn't join them as the horses were attracting the flies but kept on and had our sandwiches on the other side of a rather longer ford. A group of Italian cyclists who had been at the camp site passed us as we walked up one of the steeper climbs but we caught them up shortly after as one of them had collected a puncture on the steep rocky descent where a track went off to the left. We consulted each other's maps and decided that we kept right as the other seemed to be where there was a detour to Eldgja where there was a waterfall and a canyon with lots of lava deposits. As we hadn't intended cycling to the coast we were rather short on supplies so as it was only 4 o'clock when we reached the turn off for the climbing hut and campsite where the Italian lads were aiming we decided to keep going.

Unfortunately once we had taken the decision to go on we found that the road grader had been busy and loosened the top layer of the track. This made it very hard work on the flat and impossible to ride uphill. Once we reached the first farm of Buland the road widened and we were able to avoid the worst parts and made better progress. We were leaving the mountains and moving into pasture land but it was still quite hilly and would be hard going in the other direction. We came to where the road divided and took the right fork as there was a sign for a campsite about 6km further on. We crossed the river by a plank bridge and found that the road grader had also come this way and no traffic had been to flatten the pebbles so when we came to a farmstay sign and as it was 8 o'clock with still 4km to go we turned aside and had a night of luxury. The people let us use their kitchen to cook our supper and provided us with breakfast so our supplies lasted out until we reached the shop at Kirkjubaejarklaustur. It had been a superb day's ride, the only regret being we hadn't taken longer over it.

The map we used was Islandskart Sudausturland 1:3000 obtained from Dick Phillips beforehand.