it did all it could to beat me. The first hour was fine, asphalt and then a good, hard- packed dirt road with occasional patches of gravel. Then the first river appeared. I estimated it at about 45 feet wide and a
foot or more deep. The water just looked cold— very, very cold. Three of my companions went before me; one went down about a quarter of the way in, and he was much more experienced off-road than I. I was not feeling inspired or confident, but as there was really no other option, I went for it. Only when I looked at the Go-Pro foot- age later could I see that the riverbed was com- posed of baseball-size rocks covered with some sort of growth. The han- dlebars were all over the place and so was my lan- guage. I don’t know what I did right, or for that mat- ter, wrong, but I made it across. After that, my attitude went from “What
at the landscape, I could have been on the moon for all I knew, and I could see the road stretch out for miles and miles ahead of me as we rode into the hills. When the clouds descended and the mist came in, visibility went down to about 20
until heavy, wet snow began falling—so heavy and so wet that it stuck to my visor. The bike slid around under me as it tried
to find traction going uphill, the back wheel acting as if it was on a trampoline. When I could get the snow off my visor, I could occasionally see one or two bikes ahead of me. The temperature hovered around the freezing mark. I gave up on the hot shower dream and totally focused on navigating that goat path. After eight hours of
Seljalandsfoss waterfalls captured by drone.
am I doing here?” to “Bring it on!” which is exactly what FU-26 did. Eight or more streams/rivers awaited us. The road went from dirt to rock to sand to mud and back again as we climbed into the highlands of Iceland. The vistas were jaw-droppingly beautiful, truly epic in their scope. Looking
feet. I told myself I didn’t really need to see where I was going, as I could follow the tire tracks from the bikes in front of me. Then the rain started, washing away the tire tracks and fogging my glasses. It was about 38 degrees, and I had no idea where I was. I started to wonder when it would end. I kept going, dreaming of a hot shower. I was doing okay (“fine” was on the back burner)
being mostly on the pegs, my calves burned. The road started to descend. A long, steep hill lay before me, the mud of the road surface glistening in the rain. I could either ride down the hill or slide down the hill. I prayed for the former but was realis- tic about the latter. My predicament became more apparent as I went around
a corner and found a rider down with what turned out to be two broken ribs and a bro- ken collarbone. Along with two other rid- ers, I helped get the bike off him and into the follow van. I slithered on at a snail’s pace through the rutted landscape until I saw an asphalt road in the distance. It’s amazing what a piece of tarmac can do to lift one’s spirits.
Page 1 |
Page 2 |
Page 3 |
Page 4 |
Page 5 |
Page 6 |
Page 7 |
Page 8 |
Page 9 |
Page 10 |
Page 11 |
Page 12 |
Page 13 |
Page 14 |
Page 15 |
Page 16 |
Page 17 |
Page 18 |
Page 19 |
Page 20 |
Page 21 |
Page 22 |
Page 23 |
Page 24 |
Page 25 |
Page 26 |
Page 27 |
Page 28 |
Page 29 |
Page 30 |
Page 31 |
Page 32 |
Page 33 |
Page 34 |
Page 35 |
Page 36 |
Page 37 |
Page 38 |
Page 39 |
Page 40 |
Page 41 |
Page 42 |
Page 43 |
Page 44 |
Page 45 |
Page 46 |
Page 47 |
Page 48 |
Page 49 |
Page 50 |
Page 51 |
Page 52 |
Page 53 |
Page 54 |
Page 55 |
Page 56 |
Page 57 |
Page 58 |
Page 59 |
Page 60 |
Page 61 |
Page 62 |
Page 63 |
Page 64 |
Page 65 |
Page 66 |
Page 67 |
Page 68 |
Page 69 |
Page 70 |
Page 71 |
Page 72 |
Page 73 |
Page 74 |
Page 75 |
Page 76 |
Page 77 |
Page 78 |
Page 79 |
Page 80 |
Page 81 |
Page 82 |
Page 83 |
Page 84 |
Page 85 |
Page 86 |
Page 87 |
Page 88 |
Page 89 |
Page 90 |
Page 91 |
Page 92 |
Page 93 |
Page 94 |
Page 95 |
Page 96 |
Page 97 |
Page 98 |
Page 99 |
Page 100 |
Page 101 |
Page 102 |
Page 103 |
Page 104 |
Page 105 |
Page 106 |
Page 107 |
Page 108 |
Page 109 |
Page 110 |
Page 111 |
Page 112 |
Page 113 |
Page 114 |
Page 115 |
Page 116