SAMAYA x MAUD RONDOT
AUTONOMOUS THRU-HIKE IN THE HEART OF ICELAND
In May 2023, during the snowmelt season, Maud Rondot and her friend Pauline flew to Iceland to complete a 75 km thru-hike, entirely self-supported. Upon their return to France, Maud shared with us the variety of landscapes and terrain covered, the beauty of the vast surrounding nature, and the challenges they overcame to finish the trek.
What inspired you to embark on this adventure?
Maud Rondot: Pauline and I are in love with Iceland. It was our third time there, and we really wanted to explore part of the country on foot to experience it on a more human scale and truly appreciate landscapes that are incomparable. There is no other island where you find glaciers and volcanoes at the same time. It's quite insane. We decided to do the Laugavegur trek, one of the most beautiful in the world, with mountains that are geologically very unique, resulting in highly varied landscapes with incredible, multicolored hues. We opted for the reverse route of what is commonly done, which has a bit more elevation gain. We started from the sea, at Skógar, to reach the mountains of Landmannalaugar. We completed the 75 km trek in 5 days.
Can you tell us how your trek unfolded and the stages you completed?
MR: At first, it was very strange because we didn't cross paths with anyone. It was almost eerie. For the first stage, we climbed to Fimmvörðuháls, a high-altitude mountain hut where everything was frozen and visibility was zero due to heavy fog. We had to navigate between snow patches and frozen lakes, surrounded by cold and wind, making it quite a dangerous area. The second stage was at Thorsmork, an incredible leg between two glaciers. It was quite surreal because we started in a green landscape with waterfalls and black rock before arriving in a snowy landscape, sometimes covered with black sand. We were also surprised to cross wide plains filled with lupines, which give the mountains a bluish tint.
The diversity of the landscapes is striking throughout your trek. Were the intensity and difficulty of the stages just as striking?
MR: Yes, indeed. For our third stage, we knew we were getting into the "tough stuff," the wildest section between Skógar and Thorsmork. We felt a bit uncertain about this stage because we had read that it’s sometimes impassable. We crossed some pretty daunting rivers with strong currents while carrying 20kg packs to accommodate our camera gear and food. But in the end, it went very well. The rest of the trek led us into areas with black contrasts, green moss, and quite hostile, rocky terrain. We had no problems with our little Samaya INSPIRE2, which is super fast to pitch and held up just as well on that rocky ground as it did in the grass of Thorsmork. On the penultimate stage, we even saw some magnificent snow bridges. We finished the trek by doing the last two stages in one go.
