Home > Trip Reports > May 28 - June 5 Troll Peninsula, Northern Iceland

May 28 - June 5 Troll Peninsula, Northern Iceland

6/28/16
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Posted by Chamois on 6/12/16 12:23pm
Well, inspired by a couple other TAY reports Scott and I decided to squeeze in some spring skiing in the north of Iceland a couple weeks ago.  We took the direct flight to Reykjavik and then drove north to Dalvik, where we based for 4 days to start.  Actually we were 16 km outside of town at Skied Lodge, a rustic B/B run by Miriam, a German who has been here for 16 years.  She gets quite a bit of Icelanders skiing in the winter but once spring comes they seem to turn their attention to other past-times.



So we were up the Svarfaoardlsa River valley and had a 10 minute drive to our first ski the next day.  We had to carry the skis for about 600 ft vertical €“ like us they had a warm spring this year.  We found some nice bowls but it was pretty foggy thanks to a marine layer so some travelling via GPS was in order.  The next day we scouted out some terrain in the nearby Skiddalsa Valley but got stuck at a creek crossing that was ragging, so we settled on a hike and got down to town to buy a good topo map from Jon at the library, who used to work for a fish company in Seattle!

So armed with better information we spend the next two days in bowls closer to Dalvik just climbers right of the ski area.  There€™s a couple huts up in this basin and it was here we came across some heli-skiers who were making runs off the steeper side slopes.  They took the left side and we stuck to the right.  After a couple runs we had the place to ourselves again.

We were both struck by the amount of great ski terrain here €“ and the lack of skiers.  Pretty awesome.

After our fourth day out of Skied we headed for Siglufjordur, further north.  You have to go through these long tunnels (8 km or so) but no one told us they are one lane!! So ever 200m or so there are pull-outs on the right side headed north and it€™s the north-bound traffic that is obliged to yield.  It didn€™t quite work our so well at one spot so we had to creep past a truck and trailer with a few inches to spare.  Whew!

The next day we headed up a basin near the tunnel entrance and drove our 4x4 Yaris through one snow patch and called it good.  So there was only a 100 m walk to the skin-up.  Again, we were amazed at the number of lines to choose from and the snow was great on north and west aspects €“ too sloppy on the south sides.  There was a bit of a freeze up overnight so that helped.  We skied up to the pass the second day for the view and holy cow!  No shortage of options here.  We were able to ski right to the car on a bridged stream along side the road. 

This was our only concern lower down, crossing some raging streams in process of melt out.  On our last day we saw another truck parked near us on the way down but didn€™t see the two skiers as they crossed the creek lower.  These were the only folks we saw touring in 6 days of sking.
We ended each day with a soak in the local municipal geo-thermal pool and €œhot-pots€ €“ every town has one.  It helped soothe the old guy muscles.  I€™m definitely going back.
Couple more photos


I love that last photo with the town visible across the water. Looks great!

Wow.  Here's to adventure.  If John Muir and Henry David Thoreau were 21st century skiers, well...Thanks for such inspiration.

Ah, good to see someone else getting after it in Iceland. So much potential, and such a nice place to be at that time of year. I'm so glad you guys had a good trip. The photos of skiing with fjords in the background are making me a bit nostalgic.

author=cascadekid link=topic=36647.msg149326#msg149326 date=1465940813]
Ah, good to see someone else getting after it in Iceland. So much potential, and such a nice place to be at that time of year. I'm so glad you guys had a good trip. The photos of skiing with fjords in the background are making me a bit nostalgic.



......and thanks again for the beta and inspiration.  We're old farts (60!!) but were just blown away at the expanse of the peaks and choice of lines -- all so close to town.  Cheers.

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Chamois
2016-06-12 19:23:05