Iceland review - 2016, Blaðsíða 60

58 ICELAND REVIEW
OPINION
them in time for dinner. They allow
access to areas that would otherwise be
much harder to reach. Not many people
have the time, or the stamina, to take a
couple of days to hike the same distance
that it takes a couple of hours to do in
a jeep.
ROAMING BY HORSE
It is not just travel by car through the
highlands which is under threat. Riding,
the transport of choice for travelers like
Anglo-American poet W.H. Auden, may
have to be restricted in some areas.
“There are very few places in Iceland
where it is pleasant to walk,” wrote
Auden in 1937. But conversely, there are
very few countries where you can travel
on horseback for days without restric-
tions, as you can in Iceland. The sense
of freedom this generates is enjoyed
by an increasing number of locals, and
has drawn a great number of visitors to
Iceland. It is one of the best ways of expe-
riencing nature. But the way we travel
on horses—it is common for a group
of 20 people to drive a herd of perhaps
60-80 horses for several days—does put a
strain on the land. Icelandic horses weigh
around 400 kilos (880 lbs) and each has
four feet shod with steel. There is a phys-
ical limit to what the land can withstand.
NATURAL RIGHTS
Long winter months mean that Icelandic
nature is sensitive: the few moments of
summer give vegetation in the highlands
only a fleeting chance to recover from
winter and grow before snow sets in
again. Many roads in the highlands only
open at the end of June or the beginning
of July each year and close again in early
fall. Unrestricted access to land is easy
when the number of tourists is small, and
when there is a small number of jeeps
traveling across the biggest wilderness
in Europe—or when there are just a few
people on horses traveling through open
land. But this is no longer so, and that is
why the new laws were a necessity.
Again, this raises the question of what
type of access we have to nature. Is it our
right to be able to access any part of the
country in a jeep or on a snowmobile, to
be able to do the modern tourist thing