Snails on Wheels Daktari Appeal: The end of the road...for now

Our most generous of Icelandic hosts, Vidir offered us a ride to his place on the remote west coast of Iceland, giving us a realistic opportunity of heroically cycling into Reykjavik within our remaining 3 days. Furthermore, he suggested we take the coastal route we had intended on tackling (rather than the convenient highway 1) in order for us to see some of the most isolated communities in the north. Our gratitude increased as we motored over the dirt-road mountain pass that we'd contemplated cycling, and powered into the ridiculously isolated fishing town of Siglufjordur. The most northerly town in Iceland, Siglufjordur was a boom town in the mid 20th Century thanks to a thriving herring industry which was eventually over fished. Girls covered in fish guts were common back then as they came from across the land to make their fortunes gutting fish throughout the long summer days. Yum.

After hours traversing the north coast we arrived at his home in Kroksfjardarnes, a cosy old house looking across an island dotted bay (one of the islands was Bjork's private island for escapism). Our house used to be accommodation for the workers in the neighbouring abattoir and was apparently haunted. Whilst we failed to encounter either beast or man ghost, the place was certainly haunted by our poor bbq-ing skills as we shamed our Aussie origins by serving up some rawish steaks to our surprised hosts. Damn.

Our final 3 days of riding required dedication so as to get us back in time for departure and enjoy the satisfaction of powering ourselves into the capital. An 80km stretch confronted us the first day which included our final epic mountain climb known affectionately by the locals as "the hill". Feeling more and more like seasoned cyclists we tackled the hill if relative ease in comparison to our previous mountain climbs, though constant headwinds which had been forecast to be tailwinds infuriated us all day as they sapped our energy. The highlight of the day was prompting herds of horses to run next to us on either side of the road as we sped through the lonely countryside. A beautiful sight uniformly galloping across the plains.

Our 2nd last day was a miserable rainy affair that had us unenthusiastically hiding in our tent. To enhance our misery we were confronted with an unappetizing donation dare involving the bizarre Icelandic cuisine Svid (sheep's head cut in half, usually bought frozen) which we were to strap to our helmets for the day's riding. In aid of our fund raising we could not ignore the generous donation on offer and so we reluctantly took up the foul challenge. More will be said about this in our dares for donations report which will be posted here soon. For now, let's just say it was an unpleasant, slightly humiliating assignment which was compounded by the thawing properties of rain. Our rainy ride concluded in a majestically cloud strewn fjord in a warm farm house, just 80km shy of our destination. To complete our Svid challenge we cooked up our now well acquainted sheep heads for an evening feast.

Our final day was all about blue skies and tail winds as we happily powered into Reykjavik. 50km of peaceful fjord riding ended when we re-joined the main northern artery into the metropolis of over 200,000 (more than half the country's population). From there it was a stressful ride buffeted by winds amongst the heavy traffic that we had happily forgotten about during our countryside meanderings. Loudly ting-ing our bells and announcing victorious Woo Hoo's to the city skyline we rolled into our destination with pride, relief, manly smells and aching limbs thinking of few things but beer, showers and bed! The snails had made it.