UKC

Will my Dawes Super galaxy be up to the gravelly roads of the interior or do you think mountain bike? Finding conflicting info on some websites.
Anyone been recently?

In reply to Jack Gillespie:

You should be fine, the gravel roads on Iceland are well maintained mostly and there is no real need for a mountain bike, unless you're looking for an excuse to buy one, in which case it is totally necessary to be on the very very safe side.

In reply to Jack Gillespie:

Take this with a pinch of salt as I have no idea about bikes...but it depends which interior roads you are talking about. We only did one (in a 4WD campervan), the F35/Kjölur, which was relatively tame...but I wouldn't have fancied it on a road bike - a lot of up and down, loose gravel, unexpected fords etc. I've heard that some of the others can be pretty wild...they don't drive around in those big fcuk off 4WD Tonka toys for nothing!

In reply to Jack Gillespie: The majority of tourers we met in a month at Skaftafell were riding the ring road/ golden triangle and tended to be on hybrids. Some of the interior roads I saw subsequently were very rough and would have needed big tyres and low gears, so it depends on your intentions.

In reply to Jack Gillespie: I have driven the F35/Kjölur two years ago just after it opened for the season and also done quite a bit of cycle touring in other countries.
Going south, the first half was rather smooth. It would be fine with something like 28mm tires. I was seriously considering asking some of the cyclist we overtook in the car to swap with me for a while.
The southern half (after the hot springs and campground which name I cannot remember right now) had much looser and bigger gravel and quite steep hills. I'd rather have had something like at least 40mm tires there. Not sure if a Galaxy will accomodate these.

Of course conditions will also vary from year to year and throughout the season as they tend to plane the roads, too.

Enjoy Iceland, absolutely stunning country.
Mike

In reply to Jack Gillespie:

On the main highway you'd be fine. On gravel I would definitely go for fat tyres and maybe front suspension.

I speak from bitter experience of riding round Iceland in the 80s when only 100km of the highway was surfaced. My tourer suffered badly from pinch punctures and vibration induced damage - as did I!

In reply to miho:


Hveravellir - what an oasis that was after 3 nights in the van without a shower! Even in June it was pretty cold at night.


We did it from south to north, so the southern bit was the "tricky" bit...but it meant that by contrast the northern bit was pretty tedious!