Packrafting in the Icelandic Highlands

A packraft is a tough, ultralight inflatable boat that rolls up small enough to carry in a rucksack — and in the Icelandic Highlands that changes everything.

It lets you walk into country no road reaches, then unpack and paddle out down glacial rivers that would otherwise be dead ends, linking hiking and boating into one continuous self-supported journey through pure wilderness.

Iceland's interior, with its braided meltwater rivers, black-sand plains and glacier-fed canyons, is one of the great packrafting arenas on earth: remote, roadless and staggeringly empty.

Moving through it under your own power, carrying everything you need and crossing terrain that stops everyone else, is about as close to genuine exploration as Europe offers. It is demanding and committing, and all the more rewarding for it.

A multi-day, fully self-supported wilderness trip alternating hiking with paddling: you carry the packraft, paddle, drysuit and all your camping kit on foot to a put-in, then run stretches of cold, often pushy glacial river before walking on.

The water is near-freezing, silty and powerful, with braided channels, standing waves and the real hazards of cold-water immersion far from help.

This is not a beginner activity — you need solid whitewater and wilderness skills, or an experienced partner, plus the judgement to read glacial rivers whose levels swing with the day's melt. Navigation, river crossings and self-rescue are all on you.

In return: total solitude, landscapes almost no one sees, and the deep satisfaction of a true point-to-point journey.

Go in high summer, July and August, when rivers are (relatively) most manageable and the highland weather is least hostile.

This is a trip for experienced packrafters and wilderness travellers only, or one to do with a specialist guide who knows Iceland's rivers — glacial flows are cold, silty and change fast with the melt, and rescue is far away.

You need a quality packraft, drysuit, PVC-appropriate whitewater kit, and full lightweight camping gear. Plan the route carefully around river levels and weather, leave detailed plans with someone, and carry a means of emergency communication. Practise self-rescue in cold water beforehand. Respect the fragile highland environment and leave no trace.

If you're new to packrafting, learn it somewhere gentler first.