A Road Trip Guide to the Westfjords: Iceland's Quietest Corner

The Westfjords hang off the northwest of Iceland, attached to the rest of the country by an isthmus barely seven kilometres wide. They cover around a fifth of Iceland’s coastline and hold roughly seven thousand people. Fewer than one in ten visitors to Iceland ever goes there, which is precisely the argument for going.

This is the oldest part of Iceland geologically — up to 16 million years old, long since carved by ice into a hand of deep fjords and flat-topped mountains. There is no Ring Road here. The roads follow every fjord to its head and back out again, which is why a journey that looks like 40 kilometres on the map takes ninety minutes.

When to go

June to August, and realistically not much outside it. The mountain passes that hold the region together — Dynjandisheiði and Hrafnseyrarheiði in particular — close through the winter and often do not open reliably until late May or June. Many guesthouses, and the Baldur ferry schedule, run on a summer season.

Allow four to six days minimum. Three is enough to see one corner and spend the rest of the time driving.

Getting there and around

There are two approaches. Drive north from Reykjavík on Route 1 then west onto road 60, which takes around five hours to Ísafjörður. Or take the Baldur ferry across Breiðafjörður from Stykkishólmur on Snæfellsnes to Brjánslækur, calling at the island of Flatey. The ferry carries cars, saves several hours, and turns the outbound and return into a loop rather than a there-and-back.

Expect gravel. Substantial stretches of roads 60, 61, 62 and 63 remain unsurfaced, with steep switchbacks and blind bends above long drops. Take Gravel Protection on your rental, drive slowly, and do not plan on average speeds above about 50 km/h. A 4x4 is not strictly required in summer but the extra clearance is welcome.

The essential stops

• Dynjandi — the region’s icon and, for many, the finest waterfall in Iceland. Roughly 100 metres tall, it fans outwards as it falls in a series of tiers, with six smaller waterfalls stepping down below it. A ten-minute walk up past all of them.
• Látrabjarg — a bird cliff running about 14 kilometres and rising to over 400 metres, holding vast colonies of puffins, razorbills, guillemots and fulmars between May and August. The puffins here are famously unbothered by people. The cliff edge is overhanging turf that has collapsed under visitors, so lie down and stay well back.
• Rauðasandur — a long beach of red and gold sand backed by a lagoon, extraordinary against the black beaches of the rest of Iceland. The access road down is steep gravel.
• Ísafjörður — the regional capital, with around 2,600 people, a good restaurant scene, the Westfjords Heritage Museum and the departure point for boats into Hornstrandir.
• Hornstrandir Nature Reserve — the northernmost peninsula, uninhabited since the 1950s, with no roads and no facilities. Reached by boat from Ísafjörður or Bolungarvík. Arctic foxes are protected and unusually approachable here. Serious hiking territory; register a travel plan at safetravel.is.
• Hólmavík — home to the Museum of Icelandic Sorcery and Witchcraft, which documents the 17th-century witch trials in the Strandir region with a seriousness the subject deserves.
• Bolafjall — a viewing platform cantilevered off a 630-metre cliff above Bolungarvík, opened in 2022, looking out over the Arctic.
• Vigur — a small island in Ísafjarðardjúp reached by boat, with eider ducks, puffins and one of Iceland’s oldest windmills.

The hot pots

The Westfjords have the best free and near-free geothermal bathing in the country, largely because nobody has commercialised it.

Krossneslaug sits on the Strandir coast at the end of road 643, a concrete pool built right at the shoreline with nothing between you and the Arctic Ocean. Drangsnes has three small hot pots directly across the road from the sea, free and open to anyone. Reykjafjarðarlaug near Bíldudalur has a heated pool plus a natural stone pool above it. Pollurinn, above Tálknafjörður, is a set of hillside tubs looking down the fjord.

All of these run on trust. Leave a donation where a box exists, take everything away with you, and shower before getting in where facilities allow.

Practical notes

Fuel stations are sparse and some close in the evening — fill up in Ísafjörður, Patreksfjörður or Hólmavík rather than gambling. Mobile coverage drops out in the fjords and over the passes. Book accommodation ahead, because the total number of beds in the region is small and there is no fallback. Groceries are limited outside the larger towns, so stock up before you leave Route 1.

Most of all, plan fewer things per day than you would elsewhere in Iceland. The Westfjords punish an ambitious schedule and reward an unhurried one — the point is not to tick off sights but to spend a day driving a fjord road where you meet four cars, and to end it in a hot pot by the sea.