The meeting point at our Snow dogs Kennel Vallholt. Vallholt farm is located 445 km. from Reykjavík. But it is only 5 km away from road nr 1. You turn on road 847 and drive on it for about 5km then it is the first building you see. Just park below the dog fences. 

We recommend having accommodation close by the Kennel the night before departure (the closer the better not more than 150 km away). It is difficult to know exactly how the weather will be on the planned day, the weather can be great here and good conditions but it can be impossible to pass the highland road from Egilsstaðir or Skagafjörður. 

If we have little snow and have to use plan C or D we contact our customers about 2 days in advance and let them know the new meeting point. Usually we only have to use plan C or D in May. 

We only host small group tours at Snow Dogs.  Our tours operate with a minimum of two guests and a maximum of 12 guests. Usually, the groups are 4 to 8 guests. The sledges are for 2 to 4 guests but if there are children we have up to 5 guests on the sled. Note every group has a private sled and a private guide while dogsledding. 

We can take bigger groups on private tours. Then the guests take turns going on the dog sled. 

In summer we can only take 4 passengers at a time. 2 carts with 2 passengers each. 

Sometimes plans change, we understand, and we try to be flexible and move your departure if it is possible but our main concern is the wellbeing of our dogs so sometimes it is not possible. And then you need to cancel the tour. 

Cancelations: Just be sure to give us at least 24 hours’ notice  if you need to cancel your tour and we’ll give you a full refund.  Unfortunately, we cannot provide refunds within 24 hours of your departure time.

We offer pick-up for our tours in Akureyri, Húsavík and my Lake Mývatn for up to 8 guests. The price is the same for the pick up, it does not matter if there is one person or 8. 

You can book it when you book the tour and then let us know the exact location by E-mail and we will set the exact pick-up time. 

If you did not book the pick up when you booked the tour you can contact us by E-mail and we will arrange it for you. Note that it has to be done at least one day before departure. 

You’ll find a full list of ‘What to Bring’ on each of our tour booking pages.

You will be provided with all necessary equipment on our tours.  We’ll provide you with coveralls, googles, gloves and hats if needed. We also have a few wellingtons and thick socks (just a few pairs so you might get a big one if a lot of guests are arriving with bad shoes). 

We do not offer rental equipment, but we do offer Snow dogs gloves, beanie and bandanas for sale. 

Absolutely! But it is more expensive.   If we have availability we can offer you a private tour so there will be no one else dogsledding with you. Note that all our sledges are private sledges with a private guide in our normal dog sledding and cart ride tours. 

The dogs can go for a run in bad weather. We provide googles, warm coveralls and more if you need to go out in bad weather. 

In general if the road to our Kennel is open, we can go dogsledding. If our road is not suitable for inexperienced drivers or normal 4x4 cars we pick people up from the start of our road (road 847). But if the roads are impassable, we cancel the tour and refund 100%. If our experienced guides who have lived in this region for more than a decade up to most of their lives evaluate that the weather is not good we cancel the tour.  We try to be flexible when the weather is bad so if customers have flexibility, we move them to another date/time if possible. 

Note that if you are located more than 2-hour drive away from the kennel the night before the tour we do not refund the tour if the weather and snow conditions are good here. 

In summer we sometimes have too good weather so we have to cancel the tour because it is to hot for the dogs to go out running. 

We have a minimum of 2 persons per sled and all our sledges are private sledges so solo travelers must book 2 persons. We advise people to let us know and book a child (that does not exist) with them because it is cheaper. 

We strongly recommend you to buy travel insurance in your home country that covers your cost  if you have to cancel your trip on short notice. Travel insurance of this kind is usually not expensive and a good idea when you travel outside of your home country.

All our guides are fluent in English. All our guides are Icelanders living in the area, so our first language is Icelandic. Then it is different between guides whether they speak more languages or not. Some of us are fluent in Norwegian or Danish. Some of us talk a little bit in German, a little bit less in Spanish and Dutch. And then some of us understand a few words in French and Italian.

If you do not speak English we do our best to provide you with a guide that you can understand and can understand you. 

We only have pure breed Siberian Huskies at our Kennel and we are a registered FCI Breeder. We also breed most of our dogs ourselves. Before we breed the dogs we have their eyes checked and their hips x-rayed to meet the requirements of the FCI.

Since we breed most of our dogs ourselves than most of our dogs are related. To avoid inbreeding we import dogs from other Kennels to improve our breeding.

We do not have weight restrictions on our Dog sledding tour and our Kennel visits. But we must know if we are expecting a heavy sled on our dog sledding tour. Please let us know if there are one or more guests on the tour that are more than 100 kg and also if many of the guests are close to 100 kg. One guest on each sled must have physical fitness to be able to stand up rather fast, go to the back of the sled and stand on the break. 

We have a weight restriction on our cart rides. We cannot have guests that are more than 100kg or the combined weight of the customers cannot be greater than 180kg. One guest on each cart must have physical fitness to be able to stand up rather fast, go to the back of the cart and hold the break. 

YES YOU CAN!!!

The dogs love people (some times a little bit to much). They enjoy love, cuddle and belly rubs, but ofcourse they have bounderies everybody has to respect.   Note that the dogs also love to run and some of them get very excited when they are about to "take off" and are just focising on that and not their visitors. 

They run once or twice a day. We never push them close to their limits, with good track and weather conditions they should be able to run close to 100km a day, our dogs rarely run farther than 16km a day.  The young ones and the older ones only run once a day, but the middle-aged ones can run two times a day in the winter. 

The dogs only run once a day in the summer. The dogs always have one day off at the weekend and most weeks they get two days off.

The dogs love their work. To realize that all you must do is to watch them on the sled, doing what they were born to do. Being working huskies, we believe our dogs have the best of both worlds. They receive plenty of attention and love from our family, guides and guests and get the chance to work in the climate and environment they were intended for.

Our winter dog sledding track is usually between 6 and 8 km. Sometimes if the conditions are really easy and fast, we make the trail a little bit longer. Our speed is usually close to 15 km/h. But if we have a lot of deep fresh snow we are slower but if the track is easy we are faster.

Our summer track is between 3 and 5 km. And we usually choose the track depending on how warm it is outside. If it is cold outside the track is longer. Our speed is usually close to 15 km/h.

Our Cart rides and dog sledding tours are not suitable for pregnant women.

Our Kennel visit is safe for pregnant women.

Yes you can, all ages are welcome for our Kennel visits, but we have a age limit of 4 years for our dog sledding tours and 10 years for our cart rides. 

Note that for our dog sledding tours it is much better that the children are not very afraid of dogs and are used to being outside doing things like hiking in the forest, walking on the beach. We have had children that have never felt wind on their face and with all the equipment required to keep them warm and comfortable it becomes overwhelming and in general not a super great tour for them, and that means not so super great tour for everyone…

Children under the age of 18 must be accompanied by a parent or tutor due to insurance policies. 

Yes, if they are accompanied by a physically healthy person, we need a guest on the sled/cart that can stand up rather fast walk to the back of the sled/cart and hold the brakes if the musher must go and fix something with the dogs. 

All participants must be able to sit with their knees and hips bent.

Guests do not have to be fit but it is recommended to be able to walk about 500m.  We need  one guest on every sled/cart that can stand up rather fast, walk to the back of the sled/cart and hold the brakes if the musher must go and fix something with the dogs.

On private tours you can bring drones. But you need the concendt of the other participants if you are on a normal tour. 

Note we do not take any responcebility for the drone.