No 491 – Katie-Jane Endurance – 600km Iceland Traverse

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This is a 30 minute extract from our world premier and the first video interview we’ve done on The Outdoors Station. After 15 years of producing audio podcasts for the self powered traveller who better to begin our new video series with than Katie Jane Endurance and her 2018 Iceland Traverse.

Katie undertook the 600km South to North Iceland Traverse in June 2019 as self supported lightweight hiking adventure. It wasn’t a race or a speed challenge, but more a trip into the remote wilds of Iceland to experience the remote wilderness this lava encrusted lunar landscape could offer the long distance hiker.

In total it took her 15 days to cover the 600kms where she covered more than a marathon a day carrying everything she needed in a 23kg pack.

Her base weight was just 10.6kg with the rest of the pack made up of food and fuel.

In this video you’ll get to hear why she went south to north instead of the more popular reverse, some of the people she met along the way, the weather conditions, the bird attacks, her daily routine and a fabulous service run by the Iceland Search and Rescue.

The route started in the south near Vik, the route took her on the Laugavegur Trail, via the Vatnajökull National Park to the village of Reykjahlíð with only 300 inhabitants and situated on the shores of Lake Mývatn. Then to Kópasker a small village of only 120 inhabitants in the municipality of Norðurþing, situated on the eastern shore of Öxarfjörður before finishing at the Hraunhafnartangi Lighthouse. The northernmost lighthouse in Iceland which is located about 800 meters south of the Arctic Circle.

The full video can be seen here;