August 26: "Yes!!!"
The final lap. We got up lazily and prepared for an easy last day of only 15 km to the campsite at the Youth Hostel in Reykjavik. Pedaling was a breeze but not the cycling, having to roll on a 4 lane highway in light fog with cars passing us at the same on our left of course but also on our right when they took the exit lanes! At the brink of a nervous breakdown, we were mighty happy to arrive at the campsite. In exhilaration too at having successfully come to the end of our long journey.
In short:
Total distance: 1543 km in 23 days of cycling
Total cycling time: 104 hours 20 minutes
Overall average speed:14,8 km/h
Tent set up, sandwiches
eaten, off we go on our luggage free tandem to find a car rental relying on
an old map of the city. But Avis and Budget had moved since our edition of
this map. Thus we had to accept cycling extra km as if we hadn't pedalled
enough already! We nonetheless found Budget who agreed to exchange our bicycle
for a cute little white VW Polo for 24 hours. We took down our tent (that
had got an extra bit of drying in the sun) and on our way towards Geysir where
we arrived at 9 PM. What fun to be able to roll on the same n° 1 road
that we had taken 4 weeks ago without worrying about the very strong cross
wind. And we had the feeling of seeing much of the landscape for the first
time, having been more concentrated on the traffic and gear changing problems
the first day than the beauty of the surroundings. At Geysir (the place that
gave it's name to these natural phenomenon), we were amazed to see the earth
playing with water like us with bubble gum and then spitting towards the clouds
an enormous steaming spume (25 m high) approximately every fifteen minutes.
And being late in the evening, we had the show almost to ourselves whereas
usually there are several busloads of tourists vying for the best spot to
take a picture. We planted our tent in the camp ground just beside this astonishing
display of natural power and fell asleep with the rumblings of the boiling
ground and the mighty spittles of "Strokkur", the name of this geyser.
How moved I was to feel the ground alive and trembling around me.
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Our few
last meters under our own steam
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On the way
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to Geysir
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