route advice
 

I'm off to Iceland on the 5th sep, travelling from the UK to Denmark to catch the ferry and landing on the east coast of Iceland on the 8th. I'll be doing a loop of the ring road, then want to travel inland into the highlands. I'm thinking about doing the f26 and f910 south to north direction.

Is this practical because I'm travelling alone on my BMW gsa1150 motorcycle, and will I encounter any swollen rivers in mid sept?

I'm a relatively experienced rider having done UK to Capetown and a few other bits.

Any advice welcome :)

quick reply as I am still travelling home, now.

I did almost all of the F roads last few weeks ago when I was out there, on a fully laden BMW G650GS fitted with TKC 80s. I managed them all without any great problems except a couple of routes in the south where the river fording was too deep for the bike and I hd to find an alternative route....too deep is like 3 foot for me.

Tyres pressures kept at normal to protect the rims from the numerous horror inducing impacts against the wheels from rocks on the road.

will post more indepth when i get back in a few days, any questions just ask.

Hey that's fantastic! I can't wait to go! Where abouts in the country are you?

Just back from Iceland. Only had a week and didn't do the highland routes but there're lots of great roads to be done. F208, F225 and F917 are particularly fun. We also did the F35 Kjalvegur and enjoyed the F939 short-cut.

Several guys we met did the F26 without too much difficulty although reported lots of sand but two very experienced German guys had to turn back from the F910 around Askja last week as the water was too high.

Have fun! You must visit Landmannalaugar:

http://wildmania.smugmug.com/Motorcy...P1140842-L.jpg

topo map for garmin units

Two useful websites:

Weather

Roads

As Wildman stated about the river fording to Askja on the F910, the conditions can wildly vary.

I did that route in the morning and had three crossings, the second one of which was the more interesting one. This was quite deep with a pronounced dip in the middle......so after pacing across it a few times on foot,which is never pleasent in cold water ...but essential. I found a crossing towards the right of the gap( heading to Askja ) this was still over knee height on me but the water was flowing at a manageable rate.

The middle part of the river was to mid thigh or higher, and there were sizeable grapefruit sized rocks spread all over the crossing.

I just sat down on the bike and used my legs to paddle across rather than risk standing up and it going all wrong,especially being loaded up and alone....what was impassable to another rider, will sometimes depend on the time of the day and any rain recently etc.

Other routes to the south were totally beyond me on my bike setup, too deep and too risky...but I did speak to an Austrian rider on a 640KTM who managed to cross.

And what about fuel availability on the f roads? Im thinking of the askja area