Off the road in Iceland

Author: By Dick Lehr, Globe Staff

Date: SUNDAY, August 31, 1997

Page: M1

Section: Travel

The road disappears into the Markarfljot, a glacier-fed river running deep and wide. The end of the line for the ordinary rented car touring the countryside.

No matter. Sitting high in the driver's seat of her big-wheeled jeep, guide Sigrun Nikulasdottir surveys the swift-moving waters. Then she shifts into four-wheel drive and the vehicle plunges forward. Painted a fire-engine red, the Land Rover rumbles through the churning ford, bounces along its rocky bed, and emerges on the other side.

The ford crossings are repeated several more times, as the Land Rover takes us deeper into the interior, into a valley that runs between two ice-blue glaciers, and reveals the other-worldly landscapes of this enchanting country, sights that would have been unviewable save for the ``super jeep.''

Iceland is becoming an increasingly trendy and popular vacation destination, especially since Icelandair resumed direct flights from Boston last year (and the flying time is only about 4.5 hours). Even so, many still ask: Why Iceland?

The answer is simple. ``There's freedom in the air,'' says one Icelander, living now in the Boston area.

During our five-day stay this summer, we found she was right, and the way we tasted that freedom was to get out into the rugged countryside, a landscape that sometimes reminded us of parts of the western United States, with green valleys running through mountain ranges, but more often resembles a Mars-scape, with volcanoes, craters and caves, and few trees.

To add to the mystery, there is virtually no darkness in the summer months, only hours of daylight in so many different gradations, ranging from the bright light of midday to the softer and shadowy light of midnight.

Many of Iceland's back roads are unpaved, gravelly, and unpassable to cars, so that in recent years, in response to the growing numbers of tourists, companies have sprouted up offering guided tours in big-wheeled jeeps and buses.

Our guide, the 29-year-old Nikulasdottir, is one in this expanding group of entrepeneurs. This year, she and Arni Birgisson and several other associates created IceLandRovers, a collection of six Land Rovers, all painted red and beefed-up to handle off-road trips of one day or longer.

``The trips are custom made,'' explains Nikulasdottir, ``and can be as tame or as wild as you want.'' She and Birgisson live in Reykjavik but are often heading off to climb rocks, cross glaciers, or fish at a remote lake. We quickly found that the Icelandic sensibility is an appealing mix of the outdoors and artistic, and in this couple we got both, for besides her work as a licensed guide, Nikulasdottir is a ceramist, and Birgisson, 26, works for the country's national civil defense, Almannavarnir Rikisins. The other partners in their touring business include expert divers, ice and rock climbers, cross-country skiers, ``and if we can do it, we'll find people who can.

``You get more than a driver,'' says Nikulasdottir. ``The idea was to put all this experience into one group, and we wanted to emphasize the many possible outdoor experiences.'' In other words, the jeep trips range from sightseeing to glacier crossing, hiking to horseback riding, cave-touring to river-rafting. The peak season runs from June through October, but the group offers trips year round.

In some instances, says Nikulasdottir, foreign companies have flown in a group of executives, rented a half-dozen or more super jeeps and then headed off for an off-road tour. Hours later, the group rendezvousedwith a caterer, so that this run in the wild culminates with gourmet dining.

Our own daytrip was a mix of hiking and sightseeing. To be sure, some of the sights could be reached by car, but others could not. Driving inland along the river Markarfljot, we stopped for a picnic lunch at the base of a stunning waterfall, Seljalandsfoss, with its water bursting forth from rock cliffs, spraying a fine mist. Driving further inland for nearly an hour, crossing fords along the way, two glaciers come into view, and it was here that we began to get a sense of the fast and ever-changing landscape, dominated by glaciers and volanoes.

We stopped again in order to hike past a remote campground and to explore caves and view the twisted rock formations that are created by cooled lava. One giant cave is called the Elves Church, where the legendary elves marry and where some Icelanders have gone to wed as well.

It's the contorted landscape and formations that give rise to the many stories about trolls and elves. Icelanders relish their Viking lore and their sagas, and they have a way of looking at the side of a cliff or up into a passing puff of white clouds and picking out something, finding in them the shape of a face or animal -- a kind of magical way of seeing their surroundings that delights kids.

Heading back toward Reykjavik in a roundabout way, Nikulasdottir made sure that we saw some of the island's more popular sights, including the hot springs of the Geysir area, where the most active one shoots water and steam into the sky every few minutes, and to the Gullfoss (Golden Falls), which many consider the country's most stunning waterfall and where, if there's sun, there's always a rainbow arching across the water cascading down into a gorge. The long day on the road ended with dinner of fresh trout and haddock at a gracious hotel near Lake Thingvallavatn, a wide and ice-cold lake that is clear and 350 feet deep.

We stayed in Reykjavik, where more than a third of the country's 260,000 people live. It's an airy place that has more of a small-town than urban feel to it. Most of the building materials have to be imported, which accounts for the sheets of corrugated steel used to construct many of the homes, often brightly painted. Downtown, or the Old Centre, is easy to navigate, best enjoyed on foot. There is virtually no crime to speak of, and Icelanders are friendly and casual. Art studios and galleries and coffeehouses are scattered along side streets, and the city features a highly-regarded symphony, a ballet company, choruses and several art museums, the National Theatre, and the National Gallery.

The city also features the other reason (the main reason, if you're a kid) to explain, why Iceland? Its outdoor public pools may be the best in the world, the water so clean and refreshing and geothermally heated, a huge draw for my two sons. Reykjavik has the world's largest geothermal heating system, with plentiful hot spring water, warmed by fissures in the Earth's crust, pumped into the city to fill the pools and satisfy its entire hot water and home-heating needs. There are a number of pools throughout the city, and each day we tried a different one. In fact, each pool is more like a series of connecting pools -- one for laps, one for play, one shallow enough for non-swimmers. The water is that abundant. There is usually a water slide, as well as separate steam baths and Jacuzzis (one pool complex actually had five Jacuzzis, with each one hotter than the one before). The heated pools are open all year, and for many Icelanders a pool stop is part of daily life. Business often gets conducted in swimsuits while in Jacuzzis.

Icelanders, we found, possess a distinct passion for places -- usually remote and outdoor places well beyond Rejkyavik. It might be a place their family has long gone to, or a place recently discovered on one of their own treks, but the place assumes a special meaning, a place that must be revisited, with a soulful and rejuvenating purpose.

We were taken to one such place, a remote mountain region in the southern highlands known as Veidivotn. It's nearly a five-hour drive from the city, and to reach this large cluster of blue lakes, which are in fact volcanic craters filled with pristine groundwater, we had to drive for more than an hour across a flat desert of black volcanic dust and rubble, barren of life, and then across two fords.

Small huts are available to rent near one of the lakes, Tjaldvatn, and from that home base anglers and hikers depart to explore the seemingly endless string of lakes. We surely began to acquire the special meaning of this particular place the one night we were there, when, in the soft sunlight of 10 p.m., we stood fly-casting for trout. It was cool and clear and the only sound was the song of the loon swimming nearby, steep hills, still snowy, in the background. It was the kind of reflective moment, so full of calm, where you can't help but make a pledge to return.

Information about IceLandRovers and other four-wheel-drive super-jeep excursions are available through travel agencies. In Iceland, IceLandRovers can be reached by telephone at 567-1720 and by facsimile at 567-5713. For general information, write to the Iceland Tourist Board, 655 Third Ave., New York, NY 10017. Telephone (212) 949-2333; fax (212) 983-5260. For plane information, call Icelandair, at (800) 223-5500.