The highland interior is not a shortcut across the Ring Road. The Icelandic Road and Coastal Administration (Vegagerðin, also called the IRCA) describes it as land above 500 meters, much of it uninhabitable, and it says mountain roads are open only part of the year. Visit Iceland’s driving article says the same thing in plainer words: F-roads lead into the interior, open for a short time in summer, and need a four-wheel-drive with ground clearance if you mean to cross rivers.
What the road administration means by F
On the IRCA’s roads page, classification F is for trails, and F1, F2, and F3 apply only to country roads. F1 is described as traversable for general traffic in summer: often just a track about 4 meters wide, with large lakes and rivers bridged, and often closed in winter by snow and in the thaw by mud. F2 is for four-wheel-drive vehicles, powerful passenger vehicles, and jeeps, with lakes and small rivers unbridged. F3 is only for large, well-equipped four-wheel-drive vehicles or superjeeps, and may be uneven, rocky, and full of puddles. Those three sentences are the official split. A listing that simply says “4x4” does not say which of the three you are on.
The highland page adds a plainer definition: a mountain road is usually called an F-road when it is exceptionally uneven, rough, or steep, or when there is at least one unbridged river to ford. It says some roads have lost the F label after they were improved. Kjölur, route 35, is the example it gives. It also says Sprengisandur, F26, does not fully open until early July, sometimes later, and then only for large four-wheel-drive vehicles and superjeeps. Travelers with little river experience are told to read river-crossing guidance and to practice on smaller rivers first. The IRCA asks people not to drive in before the roads have thawed, because that traffic damages the surface. Opening dates are published on a spring and summer map and on umferdin.is. An estimated opening date is not the same thing as an open road.
The country in the middle
The IRCA says accurate measurements are hard, and cites the Natural Science Institute of Iceland for a figure of roughly 40 percent of the island, 42,700 square kilometers, as highland interior. It names five large glaciers wholly or partly in that interior: Vatnajökull, Langjökull, Hofsjökull, Mýrdalsjökull, and Eyjafjallajökull. It calls Snæfell the tallest mountain in Iceland that is not covered by a glacier, and it names Herðubreið and Hekla. Þórisvatn is called the largest freshwater lake. Þjórsá, the longest river, is said to run about 230 kilometers from Hofsjökull to the Atlantic. Ódáðahraun, north of Vatnajökull, is called Iceland’s largest volcanic desert, about 4,000 square kilometers, containing the Askja calderas. Much of the interior is inside Vatnajökull National Park, which Visit Iceland says covers 13 percent of the country.
Visit Iceland’s weather article says highland ground above about 200 to 400 meters is usually snow-covered from September into May or longer, which is why those roads are impassable in winter. Its summer article says the highlands are a summer opening, not a year-round option. Its getting-around article says a proper SUV and an insurance policy that covers F-roads are what the interior requires, and that no insurance covers everything. Read the rental agreement. This website does not sell the waiver.
Off the track
Both Visit Iceland and the IRCA say off-road driving is forbidden. The IRCA cites the Nature Conservation Act, No. 60/2013, and says unauthorized off-road driving can mean prosecution, fines, or imprisonment. F-roads and gravel roads are the tracks. Leaving them is the offense. The vegetation, the road administration says, does not recover on a tourist’s schedule.
SafeTravel’s own highland page did not load when this guide was written, so the driving rules here are the road administration’s and Visit Iceland’s, not a paraphrase of a page this site failed to read. If you go, the live map is umferdin.is, the morning you leave, not a sentence on this page.
Sources
- Vegagerðin, Roads
- Vegagerðin, The Icelandic highland interior
- Vegagerðin traffic information
- Visit Iceland, Driving in Iceland
- Visit Iceland, Weather and climate
- Visit Iceland, Summer
- Visit Iceland, Getting around
- Visit Iceland, Vatnajökull National Park