Around Reykjavik

We got the bike put together and decided to take a ride around Reykjavik and then ride out to where we start our route around the Golden Circle.  Another beautiful day here – a bit chilly with a cool wind but the locals say this is the best weather ever.  Tomorrow it is supposed to rain.  Oh well.

We walked down to town kind of early and wandered a bit.  It is a very pretty town.  Here's some shots.

Pond in the middle of town.

Residential neighborhood.  Lots of public art.

The church.

The we found an open bakery.  It is open only 2 days a week and we got some bread and a few really yummy pastries.

Reykjavik's best bakery

The we got on the bike and rode west out to the lighthouse on the point of land that juts out from the west coast.  Tons of seabirds and the tide was out so the salt air, tidelands smell was wonderful.  Fresh air is a delight!

Lighthouse

Low tide

This area is pretty sheltered, but on the other side of the point is open ocean

Heading back to Reykjavik

The old harbour in town

Next we headed out to see if we could find the route out of town.  Reykjavik is a bit tricky to navigate so we wanted a head start on tomorrow’s journey.  We were glad we did, as we got lost a bunch of times.  After about 35 km we bumped into a guy riding a mountain bike and decided to ask him where we were.  He was a very talkative guy and he rode with us for about 10 km to show us where to go.

We had a nice talk about all things biking.  He’s serious into cycling, you could tell.  I mentioned that we’d ridden the Stelvio on the tandem and he thought it was a hoot.  He said that there’s only 2 other tandems in Iceland and neither are ever ridden.  Eventually we figured out why he knows a lot about cycling, he’s the National Champion MTB rider for 2016 from Iceland, Ingvar Omarrson.  He's also ridden professionally on the road.

Among other things, I asked if he is going to Rio for the Olympics.  He said “no,” since it is too hard for a small country to send many athletes to such things, and besides he said “it just isn’t that interesting.”  He lives in Holland so he can train throughout the year.  Nice guy to help us find our way.

Ingvar Omarsson in his National Champion's jersey

The direction we're heading

He showed us all the way to the one turn that we needed to make to connect to our route.  It would have been hard without his help.  Oh, we’d have made it eventually, but the helpfulness of random folks we meet never ceases to amaze.

We rode back to town, with some modifications in the route to make our pre-planned route easier.  We found kind of haphazardly a hot water water fall that the locals were enjoying.  There's a ton of geothermal pools on the island.

The water is very warm

And when we got back we rode to the “geothermal beach” that we’d read about.  The place was crowded but we wanted to feel the water.  It was cold, but there’s a couple of hot water vents in the shallow water that keep the water around the vents really toasty – you can see in this photo a round barrier just under the water – that’s where the vents are. 

The hot water is in the circle

We finished the day with a beer from a local brewery we’d spied when we rode to the lighthouse.  Good beer.  By far the best we’ve had on this trip.

Beer from bryggjan brugghús in Reykjavic

I am not sure if we’ll have any WiFi connection for the next three or four days.  If we do, I’ll try to update the blog.

Cheers!