River crossings and volcanic ash…

After yesterdays fairly relaxed day, we were up early for what was to turn out a big day. Before we left camp I got speaking to a chap who was hitch-hiking round Iceland anti-clockwise, Pete, was from Newcastle but with a very distinctive Yorkshire accent, he was taking two weeks then I believe heading home. Pete really has no other significance to the trip until a very bizarre encounter at the end, so I’ll leave it at that, and if you continue to follow this blog you’ll find out then….

Anyway, it’s Monday and we set off away from Husavik along the coast, we take in the odd trail here and there then stop off up a small track that all of us can barely get on…

….but again, pictures don’t do justice to this small piece of land…

There was a huge drop down to the water and the bay stretching out towards another piece of land..

We then headed back on the road and found another small trail,  the tenere was like an old granny at a roller disco for the first time, wobbling about, skiting all over the place, to be honest, I wasn’t enjoying this at all, but thankfully it wasn’t a long trail. At this point the weather seemed to close in quickly and we found ourselves at a one horse filling station for some fuel and a bite to eat…

..it was bloody miserable at this point, grey and chilly. Fed and watered back out on to the road again but back on ourselves, we hadn’t went a mile and turned up, what I would suggest as the single most terrifying experience of the whole trip. Picture giant marbles, on a base smaller marbles and you might, just might, get how shitty this part was. After about 100 yards I’m as tense as drug courier going through a Malaysian customs office, and undoubtedly more nervous. It was, quite frankly, fucking horrendous and I’m thinking, surely tae fuck we don’t have a hunner miles of this. The only bonus I could see was it was in a straight line or I’d have been getting lapped by the rest of the guys, I was miles back. Then finally, after what seemed like at least 60 miles, though was probably only about 4 or 5, I can see the guys had stopped and the surface had changed…hallyfuckingluya !!!

The surface had changed to a fairly simple and basic hard packed trail which looked like it had been bulldozed in to undulating moor land. We headed off again, but in my usual stupid manner, I was farting about with my shades and hung them on the clutch cable, thinking they’d be just fine….wrong, they fell off after about 100 yards and I had to stop and go back for them, which left me miles behind…AGAIN FFS. Not to worry, the surface was decent and I just soldiered on, then as if by magic, the landscape changed again, now, I was on the surface of the moon…

It’s like this for miles and miles…

..after a bit I can see the guys had stopped again, just at some signs, they were on tarmac again, this was the sign they were at…

We then turned down and headed to some more waterfalls, Dettifoss was the name this time, and these were massive falls, huge in size..

 

 

..and again, the terrain was different..

After a while at Dettifoss we were back on the road, but it wasn’t long before we had turned off again to another trail, it was from this point onwards, that the day was to unfold as the biggest day of the trip. I was bringing up the rear….struggling to stay in touch but just enough, can see the troops ahead of me so just battled away, cause I was still far from comfortable. The group were snaking their way in what seemed like miles in to the distance, it made for fantastic viewing from the back, if only I could enjoy it, rather than battling to stay in touch. After a while, I finally came to what I had been building myself up for, for the past 6 months….RIVER CROSSINGS. When I got there, I can see everyone was across…haha..shit, nae pressure then. I can see big John pointing my preferred route out and giving me the open throttle sign…well I hope that’s what it was 😉 so in I popped, quietly confident, afterall, this is what I came for…pissed it, twas easy peasy….seems however, that wasn’t the case for an earlier group who were also on the other side..

The German lady on the left had tipped over in the crossing and drowned her bike, apparently they had no clue how to solve this, me too, but thankfully for them, some of our lot did, and eventually got it sorted and we went on our way..

The next couple of hours was taken up but what seemed like dozens of different surfaces for riding on, the best for me was the lava track, it just rolled and rolled and twisted and turned with tons of grip…then we came to another river crossing, this was to prove far more problematic.

They have park ranger out there who, I guess, patrol the vast areas of it all, making sure folk are ok, one of such like there, and had cordoned off one of the crossing as it was too deep, but suggested we can check for ourselves, it was decided, it was. So we went over to the other… let the fun begin..

Tim, our leader was first in, all the way to the shallow part then fell over…oops, but safe, then Mark, then bold ole me…got about 20 feet and sunk my back wheel and it was just trenching, got a push from Mark …but I had to dismount hastily before I fell in and eventually made it across..while on board…

..during tactical dismount..

The shenanigans was only just starting….

This crossing was starting to be a fair challenge…this is Graham having picked his bike up after falling over in the river…

This is him and others walking it to dry land..

 

…and unfortunately, this is him and others trying to get the water out of it..

…however, he did and managed to get it going again…thankfully.

Some others..

What to me was most significant about all of this, was our guides just getting their phones and cameras out to film it all. Now maybe this is par for the course, and yes, I also took some pics, but I got stuck in helping others, the geordies seemed to be helping everyone, while our guides filmed ???? May be it’s just me, but I’d have thought they might have helped at this stage ??

After we were all sorted, we got going and again, the surface was changing, this time it was like shell grip, amazing golden firm, fine type gravel, with loads of grip..

Although, this wasn’t to last, meet volcanic ash….this was just a bloody pantomime…it really was a hit or miss if you stayed upright. First of all I beached myself at the side, then not long after, I was down….also, I wasn’t alone…

It was turning in to keystone kops stuff. The pic above is Phil being helped up, the bike down alone is John’s bike, who also went down, but rather than struggle alone with his, helped Phil out first of all…we eventually got to a junction and had a brief chat about whether we’d go to Askja, 13km away to a volcano .

The reason for the chat was it was an out and back trip, decision made, we were going….

This really was out in the sticks..

It was interesting but fuck me, it was stressful getting there and back, think I went down at least another twice..back at the junction..

Our destination was to be Modrudalur (sp?) 87km away on the F910….thats at least another 20- 30km in this staggering volcanic ash….it was challenging to say the least. After what seemed like forever, we can finally see some civilisation in the distance, we are now 12 hours in to our day and 215 miles later, of which was approx 175 off road. This had been epic in the true sense of the word, a proper full day adventure riding, I was beat, I think most were to be honest…and this was home for the night, a quite fantastic  site.. 

This was midnight…

This picture I can’t take credit for as it’s Tims but what a cracker..this was in sight of our camp..

…and that was our Monday, other than the £12 bowl of soup I had that day, it really was full value and full on.

The following day some of the guys had decided they would prefer a rest day, and as it turned out, it was much needed, I was fecked, had hardly slept the whole trip so far and it was starting to tell on me. So we had a fairly easy day on the Tuesday, not before two or three of the guys had ran out of fuel, however, we all eventually made it to the fuel station and back on the road. An easy day was had and just a few pics were taken on route to out place for the night Myvatn (sp?)

Myvatn was a loverly place with the busiest campsite we’d had, so once set up we headed down to a pub for a few beers and some grub..and that was both Monday and Tuesday, one absolute epic day and one recovery day, which was good, as the Sprengisandur was up next….