Skardsdal valley ski area of Siglufjordur in Iceland. Very, very nice but lacking too. PIC siglo.is
A ll is fair in love and war says the famous quote. Not really but this quote is also missing a fat crucial modern part. “All” is also fair in marketing it seems.
Team Total Iceland feels the need to bang the drums every time we come across some nonsense about this fair land of ours. Most often nonsense that cannot stem from anyone but marketing dept. of some parties that have profits as their guiding light of life.
Two claims, making quite the headway on social media, is that the ski area of the Northern town of Siglufjordur is A) the world´s best ski area you have never heard of, or B) the world´s best ski area you cannot pronounce.
On a scale of 1 to 10 we would give 6 for the area itself and 3 for services
It is neither.
Siglufjordur is a pretty nice town as far North as one can almost go in Iceland without getting wet. It is also quite hidden away from it all by high beautiful mountains. Without knowledge about the place or a map with directions few would even find the place. It gives some inkling about its remoteness that Siglufjordur is on Trollaskagi peninsula, Tröllaskagi in the local dialect, which means the peninsula of the trolls.
We all know trolls are huge, scary monsters that rob children and the innocent given the chance. But in this case the name got cast because of the height of the mountains here and the difficulty of getting around. Indeed, for a long, long while back in the day, Siglufjordur town could only be visited on a boat.
But back to the skiing part. Far from us to dismiss good skiing areas and Skardsdal ski area is really, really nice. But world class it is not. On a scale of 1 to 10 we would give 6 for the area itself and 3 for services. And we have skied in places really up there as world class.
There are four old lifts here and really only one maintained ski track. In nice, sunny weather, which is seldom, this place fills up with townspeople making it impossible to concentrate much on skiing since the hill is easily crowded. Even if you have the site to yourself the ride down is over in less than a minute for good skiers.
Thus, yes you should make your way here if you are not a serious skier but for anyone really serious this is not it. It is excellent for beginners and excellent if you find yourself in town with nothing to do. But making special travel plans to this place is a recipe for disappointment.
