As a local to Iceland and a keen outdoor enthusiast, I have plenty of favorite places, always changing with the seasons. Writing this in winter, with short days and stormy weather, long days and multi-day trips are not quite on the table, but come late February, with the ski season slowly starting, my Eldorado would be the Troll peninsula, or Tröllaskagi in Icelandic. This is located in the north of Iceland, with the little fishing town of Dalvík as a central hub. My ski game is ski-touring where I would walk up on skis, convert my skis and boots at the summit to down hill mode, and ski the untracked powder, often all the way down to the Atlantic Ocean.

On a typical ski touring day with family and friends, we would get up at 7 in the morning, usually staying in a self-catering house. This gives us time to make a big breakfast, check the latest forecasts and any new reports on snow conditions and possible avalanche issues. By around 9 and 10 am, everyone is set to go, and we take a short drive to the days objective.

Arctic Sun Chasers

A great thing about skiing in Tröllaskagi is that the objectives are not too big, with the highest summits rising around 1000m. This gives you a chance to break the day up – often dropping part ways down a couple of times before skiing back to the car. By doing this it lets you follow the sun, do some exploration, and have a bigger adventure than if you were to only do one big objective with a single up and a single down. The total assents range from 1200m to over 2000m on a perfect day.

Most days will end either in the hot-tub at our accommodation or in the hot-tubs of the local public swimming pool. After a quick stop at the grocery store, we would grab a few beers, cook and enjoy a large well deserved meal, then just hit the daily repeat button as many times as we can.

Love it!