Iceland review - 2002, Qupperneq 12

VITAL SIGNS
By KRISTA MAHR Photos PÁLL STEFÁNSSON
Loved and feared, Fjallabaksleid is a
stunning and desolate route running through
Iceland’s south-central Highlands. You can’t
buy water along the way, but you can kneel
down to drink from your pick of glacial
rivers. On this road, it’s you and the land.
DAY 1: outskirts of the south-central Highlands, Iceland
Roberto Oldino’s red beanie is pulled low over his forehead. His eyes shift between
photographer Páll Stefánsson and myself, evidently conjuring up an inoffensive tactic
to break it to us that there is no way in hell he’s going to take our advice. His travelling
companion stands stiffly with her parka hood up, bracing herself against the sharp
wind that blows across this lava field. It is 1 PM on July 30, and it’s cold.
The two Italian travellers have stopped to eat at the entrance to route F225, one leg
of Iceland’s famous Fjallabaksleid, the ‘Road Behind the Mountains’. They’ve rented a
small Suzuki 4x4 to drive around the paved ‘Ring Road’ for ten days. So why not take
a detour here? Their car should make it.
“No, no, no,” Roberto shakes his head emphatically. “We’re turning around.” He
waves his hand away from the black volcanic rock stretching out behind him, where the
suggestion of a dirt road disappears over a barren horizon.
This northern route of the Fjallabak road has a reputation both for its beauty and its
difficulty. We’re standing next to a yellow traffic sign trumpeting unbridged rivers
ahead: the silhouette of a truck hovers at a treacherous angle in preparation to cross a
free-flowing river. The northern Fjallabak route (there’s also one to the south that hugs
the rim of Iceland’s second largest glacier, Mýrdalsjökull) follows mountain roads – the
‘F’ preceding the number indicates fjall, or ‘mountain’. According to Iceland’s Public
Roads Administration, mountain roads mean three things: they are 300 m above sea
level, they may not be passable except by larger vehicles, and they don’t stay open dur-
ing the winter because nobody actually lives where they lead. Which means one more
thing: isolation.
Only the lonely
But isolation is one of Iceland’s national pastimes. Even if Roberto won’t be talked into
it, we can’t be the only life on this three-day drive east along F225 and south on F208.
The Fjallabak roads are only open from mid-June until the first snows in early fall.
F225 is 47 km of well-packed dirt that heads east, north of the volcano Hekla, for
Iceland’s southern Highlands’ Shangri-La, Landmannalaugar. Though you can also get
to this popular hot-springs destination by taking the shorter, northern section of F208,
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