CURVESCOUT / MOTORCYCLE RIDE
Ordered leg totals agree within rounding. Stop distances are approximate sums of rounded legs. Stops, delays, approach and any separate return travel add time. Basis: producer-declared routed record.
Reading history stays on this device. My road watch requires a separate selection; opening it does not subscribe this ride.
Distance and riding time are measured on the routed road. Check local closures and conditions before you ride.
1274 km round from Reykjavík - plan on about 18 h 55 of riding. It goes by way of Selfoss, Vik, Jokulsarlon and Hofn. The stored terrain estimate reaches about 850 m; a measured road-elevation profile is not available. It suits an unhurried touring pace.
Expect company on a summer weekend. Early is better than fast. For about 76 km this is Diamond Circle, a road with a name of its own and a reason for it.
Reykjavík is the sort of capital that you could walk across in an afternoon, and that is part of the charm. It sits on a windswept peninsula in the southwest of Iceland, with painted corrugated-iron houses, the great concrete spire of the Hallgrímskirkja church, and a harbour backed by the long snowy ridge of Esja across the bay. About two thirds of Icelanders live in this region, so by Icelandic standards it is a metropolis.
Read the complete Reykjavik write-up.
May refer to an earlier itinerary; verify against your selected route before riding.
Reykjavík is where the day begins. Next is Selfoss.
Selfoss lies on the Ölfusá, the biggest river in Iceland by volume, which comes down from the highlands in a wide grey-green sweep and passes right through the middle of the town. With around 6,500 people it is the largest settlement in South Iceland, a farm and service town on the Ring Road, and for riders heading east from Reykjavík it is the first place with every kind of shop, cafe and fuel station.
Read the complete Selfoss write-up.
May refer to an earlier itinerary; verify against your selected route before riding.
Selfoss comes up about 59 km into the recorded legs. Next is Vik.
Vík í Mýrdal is a tiny village on the south coast of Iceland with a red-roofed church on a hill, a long black beach below, and a reputation far larger than its size. A few hundred people live here, mostly in low houses below the cliffs, and the Atlantic crashes onto the sand in front of them with ceaseless force. Offshore, a group of tall basalt sea stacks called Reynisdrangar rises from the surf, and legend says they are trolls who were caught by the sun while trying to drag a ship to shore and turned to stone.
Read the complete Vik write-up.
May refer to an earlier itinerary; verify against your selected route before riding.
about 189 km into the recorded legs you reach Vik. Next is Jokulsarlon.
Jökulsárlón is a lagoon full of icebergs, and the first view of it can leave you simply standing by the bike. The ice comes from Breiðamerkurjökull, a tongue of the great Vatnajökull ice cap, which has been retreating for decades and leaving behind a deep, cold lake. The lagoon appeared in the 1930s and has grown steadily as the glacier melts back, and it is now one of the deepest lakes in Iceland, with the bottom lying a couple of hundred metres below the surface. Blocks of ice in shades of blue, white and black, striped with volcanic ash, float slowly toward a short channel where the tide carries them out to sea.
Read the complete Jokulsarlon write-up.
May refer to an earlier itinerary; verify against your selected route before riding.
Jokulsarlon, about halfway. Next is Hofn.
Höfn is a fishing town that has spent decades staring at a glacier, and the glacier has finally started to answer back. It sits at the mouth of the Hornafjörður on Iceland's southeast coast, a small town of fewer than two thousand people on a low peninsula, with the vast white dome of Vatnajökull, Europe's largest ice cap by volume, filling the northern horizon. On a clear day, the tongues of ice that spill down the mountains look close enough to walk to, and at sunset they glow pink and gold. The name simply means harbour.
Read the complete Hofn write-up.
May refer to an earlier itinerary; verify against your selected route before riding.
Höfn sits at 384 km, about halfway. Next is Egilsstadir.
Egilsstaðir is the capital of east Iceland in the way a village can be a capital: it has a population of about two thousand, an airport, a supermarket, a swimming pool and a good reputation. It sits on the flat shore of Lagarfljót, a long glacial lake that stretches south-west for about twenty-five kilometres and is said to be home to a monster. The Lagarfljót worm has been reported since the Middle Ages, and a few years back a farmer even filmed something floating in the water, which the locals prefer to leave unexplained. The lake is murky grey-green with glacier silt, so a monster would have no trouble hiding.
Read the complete Egilsstadir write-up.
May refer to an earlier itinerary; verify against your selected route before riding.
Egilsstaðir comes up about 633 km into the recorded legs. Next is Myvatn.
Mývatn means midge lake, and the name is honest, because in early summer clouds of small, harmless flies hang above the water and rise from the shore in a shimmering haze. They are the foundation of an ecosystem that feeds one of the richest populations of breeding ducks in Europe, and in June the lake is crowded with them. Bring a face cover in still weather, and keep your visor closed.
Read the complete Myvatn write-up.
May refer to an earlier itinerary; verify against your selected route before riding.
At least about 809 km into the recorded legs you reach Myvatn. Next is Akureyri.
Akureyri calls itself the capital of the north, and with a bit under eighteen thousand people it is the second city of Iceland by some margin. It lies at the head of Eyjafjörður, the longest fjord in the country, with steep snow-streaked mountains rising straight from the water on both sides. The air is sharper than in Reykjavik and the winters are colder and drier, and in summer the town has a gentler, greener feel than most of the island. The church, a tall concrete building designed by the architect Guðjón Samúelsson and completed in 1940, stands above the town at the top of a flight of steps, and its stained glass includes a window rescued from a church in Coventry after the war.
Read the complete Akureyri write-up.
May refer to an earlier itinerary; verify against your selected route before riding.
Akureyri, about halfway. Next is Blonduos.
Blonduos is a small town of about a thousand people on the north coast of Iceland, where the glacial river Blanda runs into Hunafloi Bay. It sits right on the Ring Road, Route 1, and is one of the few places of any size in the long, empty stretch between Borgarnes and Akureyri. The river is milky grey-green with silt from the Highlands, and it divides the town into an old and a new part.
Read the complete Blonduos write-up.
May refer to an earlier itinerary; verify against your selected route before riding.
Blonduos sits at 768 km, late in the day. Next is Borgarnes.
Borgarnes sits on a narrow peninsula pushing out into a wide, shallow fjord, and when the tide is out, the water turns into a shining flat of sand and mud with birds feeding in it. The town is small, about 1,800 people, and it is the main settlement of the Borgarfjordur district in west Iceland. It is a natural stopping point on the way north from Reykjavik, and most people use it for a quick coffee or fuel before heading on, which is a pity, because there is a good story here.
Read the complete Borgarnes write-up.
May refer to an earlier itinerary; verify against your selected route before riding.
Borgarnes comes up about 1199 km into the recorded legs. Next is Reykjavik.
Return visit. Read the place description above.
Read the complete Reykjavik write-up.
May refer to an earlier itinerary; verify against your selected route before riding.
Back at Reykjavik. That is the ride.
Reykjavík → Selfoss is 59 km of getting across. Ride it tidily and keep the enthusiasm for what comes after.
Selfoss → Vik is 130 km of getting across. Ride it tidily and keep the enthusiasm for what comes after.
Vík → Jokulsarlon is 193 km of getting across. Ride it tidily and keep the enthusiasm for what comes after.
Jökulsárlón → Hofn is 65 km of getting across. Ride it tidily and keep the enthusiasm for what comes after.
Höfn → Egilsstadir is 186 km of getting across. Ride it tidily and keep the enthusiasm for what comes after.
Egilsstaðir → Myvatn is 176 km of getting across. Ride it tidily and keep the enthusiasm for what comes after.
Mývatn → Akureyri is 76 km of getting across. Ride it tidily and keep the enthusiasm for what comes after.
Akureyri → Blonduos is 143 km of getting across. Ride it tidily and keep the enthusiasm for what comes after.
Blonduos → Borgarnes is 171 km of getting across. Ride it tidily and keep the enthusiasm for what comes after.
Borgarnes → Reykjavik is 76 km of rhythm rather than effort. Let it flow and let the view breathe.