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Baldur ferry, Breiðafjörður

Baldur in dry dock: the Westfjords loop until late November

Ferjuleiðir has Baldur in dry dock in Hafnarfjörður until late November 2026. Day 1 of the Westfjords ledger becomes 389 km by road; Flatey is a passenger boat.

If you are driving to the southern Westfjords before late November 2026, there is no car ferry across Breiðafjörður. Route 60 by road is the way: Reykjavík to Brjánslækur is 333 km (OSRM over OpenStreetMap, computed 1 November 2026) against the ledger's 175 km to Stykkishólmur and 2 h 10 min on Baldur. The six-day Westfjords loop on this site is written for June to September, so the ledger as published does not break; what breaks is anyone's plan to improvise it now, and the ferry row of the ledger is the reason its note says "check ferja.is for the day's departure".

What the operator says

Ferjuleiðir's site, read on 1 November 2026, carries a banner on the front page: "Ferry Baldur not running temporarily". The sailing-schedule page has the detail. Baldur is in dry dock in Hafnarfjörður and "is expected to remain in dry dock until late November". "Baldur's regular sailing schedule is not in effect while Baldur is in dry dock." No return date is given beyond "late November", and the page promises that "further departure times will be published here as soon as they are confirmed".

Flatey, the inhabited island Baldur calls at mid-crossing, is served meanwhile by Sjöfn, a passenger boat brought round from Ísafjörður, from 30 October to 20 November 2026 on Tuesdays, Fridays and Sundays. The published Stykkishólmur departures are Friday 30 October 17:00, Sunday 1 November 13:00, Tuesday 3 November 15:00, Friday 6 November 15:00, Sunday 8 November 15:00, Tuesday 10 November 16:00, Friday 13 November 16:30, Sunday 15 November 13:00, Tuesday 17 November 15:00 and Friday 20 November 15:00, with the boat leaving Flatey about 1 hour 10 minutes after each. Passengers must be booked in advance, and the boat does not wait on the island: it leaves once loading is done, so a Flatey visit is an overnight stay, not a day trip, and it is on foot.

What it does to Day 1

The ledger's Day 1 is Reykjavík to Patreksfjörður: 175 km of road to Stykkishólmur, 130 minutes afloat, then 56 km over Kleifaheiði, which it counts as 230 km and 3 hours at the wheel plus the crossing, 5 h 10 min of travel in all. Without the ship the day is Route 1 to Borgarnes, Route 60 by Búðardalur, the Gilsfjörður causeway and the passes to Brjánslækur, then the same 56 km: 389 km and about five hours of driving at the ledger's speeds. The travel time is almost the same. The difference is that all of it is at the wheel, over passes that umferdin.is lists among the first to close, in a month that has about six and a half hours of daylight on the 15th in Reykjavík (computed; see the daylight post). That is not a day this site would write into a November ledger, which is why the November ledger does not exist.

Dynjandisheiði and Route 612 to Látrabjarg, the two gravel sections that make the loop a loop, are not winter-serviced in any case; Vegagerðin's September 2025 note on Dynjandisheiði put the end of its rebuilding at September 2026. So the ferry's absence takes nothing from the summer loop and little from a winter trip, which should have been Ísafjörður by air anyway.

What to do with the dates

Book nothing on the ferry for November until ferja.is shows a timetable again. When Baldur returns, the operator describes the service as daily and year-round, and the day's departure time is on the schedule page; the ledger's Day 1 note will be re-checked then and the "until late November" line removed. If you are reading this after that date and the note is still there, the re-check is overdue and we would like to hear about it.

Sources

The ledgers this post refers to

  1. Iceland Westfjords loop in 6 days

    Reykjavík to Stykkishólmur, the Baldur ferry to Brjánslækur, Látrabjarg, Dynjandi, Ísafjörður and home by Hólmavík: about 1,020 km, 14.5 hours and one crossing.

    6 days · Iceland
    1,020 km · 14 h 35 driving · 2 h 10 ferry
    Checked 1 Nov 2026