A bit of POV of cycling the roads in Iceland in today’s bike touring video. Filmed on August 19th 2023, there’s commentary on my thoughts on bike touring during today’s ride. It was only a short day’s bike ride between Úlfljótsvatn Camping and Selfoss.
Find the complete Iceland bike touring route here: https://www.komoot.com/collection/2371447/-cycling-iceland-2023-snfellsnes-westfjords-f35-completed-route
Here’s what gear I took for camping during the bike tour in Iceland: https://www.davestravelpages.com/my-bicycle-camping-gear-list/
[Music] hello there it’s the 19th of August 2023 and my bike tour around Iceland continues today is a short day I’m starting at this campsite whose name I’m not even going to pronounce and I’m going to head along this road through to here and just down to SOS it’s a really really short day um just 20 km here’s some clips and commentary from the road here we go speaking a bit cheers good morning good morning it is Saturday the 19th of August and the time is 11:56 before midday uh I’m leaving the campground at a place whose name I’ve already forgotten or vot baten something like that and I got a really really short day today going to go back to SOS and I intend to spend uh two nights in SOS uh get some food from the supermarket have a look around the town um cuz I’ve got basically I’ve kind of got time to kill before my flight or before my um my booking at the door is now ahead of you straight or before my booking at where I am going to pack my bike up and it’s not quite enough time to go anywhere it’s a bit strange I seem to have painted myself into a corner navigation will continue so I enjoyed cycling around thing Bella Lake again uh but now really I just need to cycle around the South Coast around the I think it’s the rean peninsula and then back to vogar Camping where I started my tour anyway back to today expecting a relatively easy day Quiet Road to start with then getting back onto a main road it’s a Saturday don’t know what that means for traffic maybe everyone’s already out and going to their weekend destinations rained a little bit overnight not expecting rain today hopefully not expecting it for the rest of the trip but weather does change quickly here and yeah that’s about it really I guess uh more or less my mind is turning more and more to uh getting back home to Greece what I have to do to keep the business running and actually uh in know after a week after I arrive we’re going to Greek island for a while on holiday which I think I’ve earned so in the meantime I will give you some recordings from the road so you can see what this is like if I think about it I might do some sort of Time Lapse video of me setting the tent up as well not sure how interesting that is but give it a go okie dokie then here we go now it’s a pretty quiet Road will be until I reach the 35 I think this one is called the 350 which is like a Spur Road off of the 35 when I do reach the 35 that will be the the fourth time I’ve cycled that particular stretch of road second time in the direction of sellos but fourth time all together I think that’s right no maybe third time anyway I I do know that bit of road by now so a few thoughts about bike touring I first started my my first bike tour I think I was like 27 and I flew out to New Zealand uh with a couple of pias bought a bike there for cycled around for 2 months I think it was with the piers I brought over with me sold the bike for pretty much the same amount I bought it for and came back and that was my first real taste of it and on that bike tour I could feel myself getting stronger and stronger through the tour and it just seemed like a I don’t know it just seemed like the ideal way to travel I’ve done lots of backpacking before that after that bike tour I actually did another backpacking trip but it just didn’t feel the same it didn’t feel like I had any freedom like you’re tied to a bus timetable and you I seem to be on the same route as a lot of other people and it all seemed a little bit pointless I wasn’t really getting any insights into the countries or or myself actually and that’s probably what I think bike touring comes down to for me is uh you get insights about yourself and quite a few bik tours later I’m doing this one I’m how old am I 51 so you know time’s moved on still love bik touring I still think it’s the best way to travel still get insights about yourself one of them is yeah I can still do it uh but I think it teaches you to overcome problems te teaches you a bit of patience teaches you to appreciate the the little things and maybe to maximize the resources you’ve got whether that’s time energy food good weather whatever it is I think it helps if you have a positive mindset going into bike t course and if you’re just on the positive side I think doing a few tours you’re you’ll keep developing that positiveness cuz once you know you’ve had a cold wet and comfortable night and know you can survive then you you realize how much more you’re capable of and you know it’s not just about cycling distances or or that sort of thing it’s a little bit about resilience mental resilience really I think when it comes down to physicality people of all shapes and sizes can bite to once you’ve got over that mental hurdle and then you keep developing that mentality I guess it just makes you a stronger person in the end at least that’s what I think other people get different things out of Tours I’m sure there’s some people just like to uh do you know travel as much distance as they can in 2 weeks and that’s great and other people like to do 20 km a day and really get to know a country and that’s great you know each each of their own but for me it’s more about getting to know myself know thyself as they said in ancient Greece and that’s the the the good you know and the bad to be fair and then you kind of accept yourself a little bit more as well perhaps anyway I think I might have gone off on a tangent on that of the spee so I’ll continue going downhill towards SOS just coming up to the main road now there’s a river on my left hand side and I’ve mentioned in a couple of videos the amount of flies here you can kind of see the Flies I don’t know if the’re is kind of going into the water of what they’re doing but there’s also a couple of fly fishermen out there and I have to say even though I think I’ve only ever fished for E once in my life this would be a perfect day for fishing cuz it’s quite still uh the river looks very nice and this guy had kind of weighed it out and looked like he was fly fishing there’s a few other Fisher people Fisher people on the bank very politically correct of me wasn’t it saying Fisher people not fishermen so yeah I have no idea what sort of fish would be in there and it’s a weekend so yeah must be a great way to spend some time prefer it on the bike of course I think some people come to ice for the fishing as well you have to get various licenses and permits and whatnot but just like there’s B uh bicycle holidays there’s tracking holidays climbing and fishing so a lot of people concentrate on the Golden Circle as their must do thing which has got you know most of the tick box attractions if you’ve got Niche interests you can definitely uh Bas a trip around that as well golf must be a good one cuz I’ve never seen a country with so many golf courses as Iceland we seems strange saying it but it just feels like every single Village has got a golf course just as they’ve got like a swimming pool and a hot pot so just get into this uh Mayor Road now 35 follow this way 600 M and I’m going to be turning right in 600 M apparently and then uh be a busier road then into SOS shouldn’t take too long though and then I’ll go into the campground just see how busy it is if it’s not too busy and then stay there for the two nights I think if it’s too busy then I might change my plans to stock up at the supermarket and and carry on to another place instead I don’t know why an Icelander would particularly want to stay in SOS though although I understand if you’re doing like if you’re a tourist and you’re doing the Golden Circle then yeah it’s a very logical point to stay which is why I’m staying there you tend to find that a lot of campgrounds get filled up by icelanders particular in August you know they just go where the weather’s best and it looks like there South for the next few days the weather’s going to be pretty good so when I cycled this particular stretch of road before was very windy didn’t make it particularly enjoyable there’s not that much wind today though so that’s a good thing so far at least the traffic is heading out of self us I’m sure that some traffic will pass me by very soon already be a massive bus so from here I think I’ve Got 5 or 6 km to go to the campground and I’ve also got a bridge to go over at some point which I think has a path next to it so I’m going to take the path this time just because so this is the bridge I was on about it looks like there’s a cycle path to the left of it if this was in the UK there would be like some Ballard or something in the way so you couldn’t get your bike through so let’s see what this is like yeah seems to be okay next round