Iceland Traverse 2025

Published July 2025

During the summer of 2025, we set out on an expedition to cross Iceland on foot completely self-supported. This route took us through lava deserts, glacial rivers, mossy valleys, and brutally remote landscapes. We carried everything on our backs and avoided any paid accommodation or resupply points. The idea came to life just a few weeks earlier. During our research we found little to no information about how to do it and if it was even possible. The thought of a difficult expedition, almost no one else had done, was enough for us to book a one-way ticket and start our journey. In this blog we cover everything from preparation, planning, gear and breakdown from start to finish of the Iceland crossing. By this we hope to inspire others to go out and try to beat our time.

Planning of the route

Crossing the country from shore to shore is probably the biggest challenge for hikers when coming to Iceland. When choosing a path there are numerous different aspects to think about and possible routes to choose from. The first one connects the two extreme points and starts in Rifstangi, which is the most northern point on the mainland and goes down over the highlands all the way to Kötlutangi, the southernmost point. The length of this route is approximately 560km and mostly follow F-roads (Jeep roads that cross the highland) and hiking trails.

Another option, and the one we opted for, goes from the north coast to south coast starting in Akureyri and finishing down south by Skógar. This option is approximately 350 - 400 km depending on exact starting / finishing point and choice of route along the way. This is probably the fastest and most recommended way of crossing the country of Iceland. Akureyri is the biggest town up north and is accessible from Reykjavik by bus. We opted to hitch hike which also worked out great. The longest and most challenging way crossing Iceland is from west to east. The recommended time is 3-4 weeks and since we don't have any experience about this, go to Andrew Skurkas web page, who's done it himself.

Whichever route you take, doing a hike like this might not be the most enjoyable challenge for most people. Mostly because of the all year round cold rainy weather, loneliness and long straight gravel roads. But for the small percentage of hikers who love the idea of doing something not a lot of others dare attempt, this is the perfect challenge.

When planning this, our biggest concern was that the infamous rivers on the highlands would be impossible to cross on foot. We were recommended by locals to contact the search and rescue teams and the huts out on the highlands to get information about the conditions, and to let them know of our planned expedition and estimated time of arrival at the end. This is for safety reasons, in case something would have happened and we would be in need of rescue. To be short, the office on google maps in Reykjavik didn’t exist and no one answered our phone calls. But if you are gonna try this yourself, please give it another go.

Our gear

When doing a long self-supported hike your gear is crucial for your success and comfort. Exact gear is very personal so we're not gonna give you our whole packing list but we can give you our style and standouts that worked for us. We always opt for the fast and light style where we use trailrunners and keep our bags as light as possible. We keep the tempo high and like to be able to jog the downhills and for that a light well packed bag is crucial. The weather on Iceland can get rough very fast. We had days where we dripped in sweat wearing shorts and t-shirts and one hour later we were freezing with multiple layers on. This means that you need to pack and be prepared for all temperatures and we’re sorry to tell you but if you're doing this, it's definitely gonna rain. We wouldn't recommend you to pack “stupid light” and cut down on warm pieces just to save a few grams, even if the weather forecast looks good.

We kept our windbreakers, rain clothes, gloves and buff easily accessible since we had to take them on and off constantly. We packed our bags pretty much like for a normal mountain hiking trip. We made sure to have a good and comfortable sleeping system which in our case was an inflatable sleeping pad and a warm quilt. We obviously brought the essentials like a down jacket, good baselayers to sleep in and good waterproof gear to keep us dry. We did also bring our Garmin Inreach, which is also recommended in case of emergency. The mobile service on the Highlands is often non-existent, so a satelite phone can be a real life-saver. The Inreach can also be good for sending messages to your worried loved ones at home. We both had 55 liter packs and ended up with a base weight of around 6 kilos. The real weight came when adding all our food and snacks, which we will get into later.

This is what we ended up wearing most of the time.

Food and water

Food:
Planning food and water for an expedition like this is crucial. The hardest part for us was figuring out how long the crossing would take. There isn’t much detailed information about the hike, especially on the highlands, and we didn’t know how long or fast our days would be.
From experience, we know we could handle long days and predicted a time of 10-14 days. This big gap came from local advice: we might need to take big detours to avoid deep river crossings, which could add days. To stay safe we packed 15-days of food - a heavy load, but it gave us peace of mind. Our food consisted of freeze dried meals, some homemade dried meals, and plenty of snacks. In the end, we surprised ourselves and finished the crossing in just under 8 days, leaving us with so much extra food that we ended up selling some to a slightly underprepared Swiss hiker we met on the trail.

The resupply plan that failed:
Initially, we didn’t want to carry everything from start to finish. Our plan was to send a resupply package to a mountain hut in the middle of Iceland - Nyidalur - inspired by an old blog we’d read.
Therefore we prepared a huge package with half of our food and contacted every expedition company in Iceland. All of them replied with the same answer: “We have stopped delivering packages to the highlands.”
Suddenly we were left with two options:
1: Carry everything ourself
2: Cancel the expedition and go home
The choice was obvious, we repacked all of the food into our bags. To summarise, 15 days of food is not exactly fast and light.



Water:
The water turned out to be trickier than expected. Coming from hiking in the Swedish and Norwegian mountains, we were used to fresh streams everywhere. When we asked the locals in Reykjavik about the water situation, they told us: “There are fresh streams everywhere, even on the highlands”
But looking at the map and seeing the words “Icelandic dessert” we weren't entirely convinced.

Our setup:
We brought a Katadyn BeFree water filter and Xinix purification drops, and made sure we had the capacity to carry 3-4 liters each in case of long dry stretches. This setup ended up being a real life-saver, because the highlands were much drier than expected at some parts. We did come across big glacial streams in some areas, but there were also stretches of 30+ kilometers without any reliable water. On the highlands, we often had to refill from small lakes, where the filter and drops came in handy.

Lessons learned:
If you plan to do this hike:
* Plan your water carefully
* Always check the map for next refill
* Carry at least 2 liters to reach the next potential source

When we finally reached the more mountainous areas in the south, the situation improved.

Navigation

We like to have different options for navigation when in the wild to be able to keep moving, if maybe our phones and powerbanks run out of battery. We had downloaded the entire area offline in the Topo-gps and Garmin explore apps, which is what we ended up using most of the time. We also created a gpx file that could be sent to a Garmin fenix watch that we had. A classic compass and paper map is also always good and reliable, so we brought one covering pretty much the whole country. But to be honest, Iceland and its highland is pretty easily navigated if you're going straight through it, since you can just point the compass south and walk in a straight line.

The hike itself

Our days were long and we managed to keep a good pace. Starting our days at 7.30 and finishing at about 8-9 in the evening, we managed to put in 50-60 kilometers a day. Here comes a short summary of our days:

Day 1: We had set up camp pretty much in Akureyri and started walking down an asphalt road for like 6 hours, this is not recommended. When we later reached the mountains close to Akureyri, nature got beautiful. We also met our biggest enemy for the first time, the Icelandic flies (way worse than mosquitoes). A good 57 km in the legs.

Day 2: Starting in a beautiful valley in the mountains, we worked our way up and reached the infamous highlands. Cool views of endless stone dessert were paired with winds from the glaciers nearby and a feeling of being on another planet. We quickly realised this is a pretty inhospitable place and maybe why crossing it on foot isn't too popular.

Day 3: Long gravel roads, stone desert, rain and some bigger river crossings. A good description of the Icelandic highlands. We were really happy to be moving though.

Day 4: More highlands, which kind of looks the same everywhere. Some really cold hands and 60 km in a straight line down the stone desert. We were really happy to eat lots of chocolate and candy in our tent before going to sleep.

Day 5: Clothes had been constantly wet from day 1 and our feet were feeling it a bit. We kept moving forward over the highlands.

Day 6: At last made it out of the highland and down to Laugavegor, a popular hiking area and trail down south. This is a very beautiful place and really something extraordinary. We almost completely forget how our legs felt when looking at the views in front of us. This is where wild camping starts being forbidden and you're referred to specific campsites (we wild camped).

Day 7: Having pretty much not seen anyone for a while we were shocked by all the people here on the Laugavegur trail. Hundreds of people, who often looked like it was their first time outside a city, came wandering down the trail wearing rain ponchos and expedition down jackets even if the sun was out and we wore a t-shirt. The views were some of the most beautiful we had seen though. By the end of this day our legs were screaming for help and we clocked in about 55 km over the mountains.

Day 8: The last day was shorter and we were both happy to be close to the end but also sad to leave this beautiful place. Just a short push over the last mountain and we could see the south coast. We walked/ran down and well at the end point we felt pretty happy with our adventure. This moment was quickly ruined by a super annoying British guy, who came to brag about his mega 30 km hike he had accomplished.

Highlights and challenges

So why would we recommend you to do this yourself? Well, we wouldn't really. But jokes aside, Iceland is a very beautiful place and what better way to explore it, than to walk over the entire country. The mountains up north are beautiful, the highlands make you feel both alive and like you're on another planet and the mountains down south are stunning. The hot springs, volcanoes and geysers in the southern part are popular to visit and are definitely worth it. But so are the fjord-like valleys and mountains up north.

So what challenges did we face? Well first of all, doing as many kilometers as we did on the stone covered ground on the highlands were pretty rough on our feet. Our legs also got pretty beat up towards the end. On Iceland the cold glacier and sea-winds combined with rain can also be a challenge. The rivers weren't too big of a problem for us, but we do believe it could be if the floods were higher during a different time of the year. The water was maybe the most unexpected problem but it worked out well with some water-planning and carrying a bit more than usual.

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