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 Iceland bicycle tour 1999: Part 2 Copyright 2002: René Maassen rene_maassen@zonnet.nl Nederlandse versie Part 1 (35 pics) - Part 2 (35 pics) - Part 3 (36 pics)
36) Two two-wheeled gypsy's with a great view from 500
meters above the fjords
37) The birds are very aggresive in June. It sometimes
looks like a scene from "....The Birds
[A.Hitchcock]. 38) Horses block the roads quite often 39) At 24:00 uur 's in the Westfjordens: sun at
midnight 40) Dayrip to Latrabjarg, the most western corner. A
perfect day. 41) Latrabjarg is only 350 KM far from Greenland 42) We look at nesting (puffins): we can almost touch
them! 43) Puffins are quite and funny, not shy at all. 44) A happy giant puffin in the tent, that evening. 45) At Thingvellir [pronounce 'Pingvellier"], the
European plate(R) and the Amerikan plate (L) grow away
from each other with 2 cm's per year [the political gap
grows a lot faster].
46) The location of Thingvellir
Iceland has the oldest still living democracy in the
world.
48) The geysur Strokkur shoots every 5 minuts 49) Jolanda at Gullfoss: the golden waterfal (but
today is's brown from the rain); Strokkur and Gullfoss
lay in the wet south west corner of Iceland.
50) In this micro village we store our 28 days of
dried food (!)on our bicycles and enter the central high
dessert of Island
51) Start of the highland survival expedition. In the
back lays for 28 days food. There's water in the front
bags. How strong is the lonely bicyclist? We had bought
the food in a supermarket in the capital Reykjavik during
our daytrip there and send it poste restante to ourselfs
in this micro village that has only a half empty and
expensive micro store, a dozen houses and a post office!
52) Landmannalaugur (Icelandic for 'hot earth') was
our first major stop
53) Nearby Landmannalaugur is water and so some
vegetation too 54) The salphur acid colours the mountains. Here is one of Icelads 3 crack lines (faults) and salphur steam is everywhere. I love that smell!
55) Landmannalaugur surroundings. The micro dots at
the right bottum, is us. 56) Landmannalaugur has the perfect natural bath. Here
a warm (!) and a cold river mix, and you can choose your
own spot between 20 and 40 Celicus. Rene waves at you
from 40 C. We spend hours and hours in the water while it
rains uninterupted. 57) Landmannalaugur 58) Two lonely riders continue through the black
dessert on tough Sprenisandur road. There are glaciers in
the back. 59) Black sand, whithe glaciers, black cyclists (no
water for washing) 60) Tent in the emptiness along 'Sprengisandur':
Icelands second-worst road.
61) We had to build this stone storm wall: heavy storm again today.
62) Junction to F910 towards Askja vulcano: Icelands worst road [farther on]. "Highway to hell" from AC-DC sound in my
head.
63) Here he still stands strong and proud........... 64) Demolished by the black sand. We make 25 kilometers per day in 10 long hours. Look at the sand-blasted signpost. 65) The Askja crater is 8 KM wide! It lays in the
centre of the black central dessert 66) Inside the crater are two more craters of the last
1964 eruption 67) This is "Viti" (Icelandic for Hell). It
is nice warm here and a powerful rotten eggs smell
dominates everything. 68) "Hell ain't a bad place to be" (AC-DC).
Rene swims two hours in Hell. It is nice and warm in
hell. There is a perfect swimming pool too. After two
weeks of dessert sand, it's perfect to be boiled in hell.
The salphur concentration is very, very high. I love the
smell of hell (jolanda thinks it stinks). A week later,
my skin still has a salphur smell.
69) It is still warm and dry weather, we go to
Kverkfjoll at Vatnajokull glacier (eastern Iceland has
many sunny and quite warm days in summer). 70) This is a soft road and is barely cycleable. It's
a hot day (yes, there are hot days too on Iceland)
Part 1 (35 pics) - Part 2 (35 pics) - Part 3 (36 pics)
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