Distance: 63.06 miles
Time: 5:14:03
Average Speed: 12.0 mph
Elevation Gain: 5,309 feet
Today started badly, when I was woken at 5:50 am, with rain bouncing off the roof of the tent, most unfortunate when I’d left 100% of my cycling base layers drying outside. Luckily, I’d left them hanging in a tree and the tree had sheltered them well.
After the morning’s false start, I slept right through until 9:40, and with the persistent drizzle continuing, maybe I wouldn’t be going anywhere soon.
Leaving the campsite under a deluge, I hotfooted it along to Sumarlina cafe, just along the road. With pizza their speciality, ordering was easy, the only decision was what size.
Layering up, I struck out into the rain, only for the rain to stop, immediately after I began. I started to head inland, a tunnel consumed my thoughts. A 6 kilometre tunnel, could anything be any worse?
With trepidation, I climbed up the 5 miles to the entrance, well, here goes nothing… The road rose gently as I made my way inside, but soon it flattened off and I settled in for the ride.
I guessed that the tunnel, could go one of two ways, and when I saw it disappear ahead, I knew it could be great. And it was, 3.5 km of flying descent on a good surface. This really hadn’t been worth worrying about at all.
Emerging into the relatively bland Reydarfjordur, and pleased I hadn’t pushed on this far last night, I quickly found the escape road, a 10 mile climb into the hinterland.
Reaching a high plateau at 370 metres, I started to feel rain approaching from the side, but the wind whisked me along at such a rate, that it had no chance to catch me, and as I flew down the other side – at up to 40 mph – I felt like that was the rain bypassed for the rest of the day.
But, after a leisurely dinner at the diner in Egilsstadir, it had caught back up, and as I cycled 30 miles along one side, and then another, of a low mountain range, persistent drizzle was my constant companion, rain clouds appearing like ghostly apparitions overhead.
Then, when I was suitably soaked, after a long 10 mile climb up the valley, as if by magic, the rain stopped and there was Skjoldolfsstadir Guest House and campground. At 10:50, luckily, reception was still open, I needed a beer.
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