Laugavegurinn

Me and Heiðar, my sister's boyfriend decided some time ago to bike Laugavegurinn - the most popular hiking route in Iceland. 54 kilometers total, rising from a starting altitude of about 500 meters, up to 1,000 meters and then down to roughly 30 meters. With an amazingly varied landscape the route is incredibly beautiful and lots to see.
Normally the route is taken in four legs (one each day) while hiking. Some do it in two days and then there is a group of crazy people that do the ultramarathons there - in 5 hours or something like that. Me and Heiðar decided to bike it in one go. There are three cabins on the way and we planned
We drove on Friday the 5th of September (if I remember correctly) up to Landmannalaugar where we stopped for the night. Luckily my sister was willing to drive the car over to Þórsmörk on Saturday so we wouldn't have to worry about anything else than the pedals. As we expected this to take most of the day we were up bright and early to eat and get going. The trail starts going uphill from almost the very beginning. As expected, I felt dead one meter after the almost very beginning.
The total route took us about thirteen and a half hours if I remember correctly. We managed to get over to Þórsmörk just as it got dark - a good thing as any biking would have been impossible in the dark. This trip had been a goal of mine for a long time, pretty much since I started working out and biking. So I'm pretty ecstatic about finishing it. It wasn't easy and there were times where my head just wanted the body to stop. Fortunately Heiðar is the opposite, with endless drive. And my pride didn't allow me to stop. Now I wonder what is next?
For entertainment, a few photos can be seen here on Flickr. For obvious reasons I cut all those that showed how bad I was feeling at any given time.

Labels: english, exercise, travel

as written by Tobbi G. at 9:05 PM GMT