Distance: 11-12 kilometres. Route: Sandá in Svarfaðardalur valley Sandárdalur Sandskarð Hvarfdalur the main road in the Fljót area.
Maximum elevation: 950 metres. Hiking time: 6-8 hours.
Sandskarð route was taken when travelling between the innermost farms in Svarfaðardalur valley and the Fljót area. You ascend from where the farm Sandá used to be up quite a steep slope up into the valley, which is called by two names as is common here in these parts Sandárdalur valley on the side of the valley where we are hiking and Göngustaðadalur valley on the north side. When you get up into the valley, you have the Skjöldur mountain on your left and Gimbrarhnjúkur mountain on your right, but the hike into the valley is quite uneventful and monotonous as it is often covered with snow most of the year. There are no steep slopes on the way into the valley, but the walk is still on an upward angle. The slope leading up to the pass is steep and quite long and the pass itself is narrow and its ridge is thin. It is quite a steep descent down from the pass to the west and you descend into a basin or a dell close to the bottom of Hvarfdalur valley. Now you walk a little to the north-west down the basin and then down along the river which flows there along the bottom of a canyon, then out from Hvarfdalur mostly along well passable land north of the main road to the south of Lágheiði heath.