Sept 14, 2015 – Reykjavik

I am having a nice Scandinavian breakfast buffet, reading news clips on-line, thinking about how to progress today.  Yesterday I arrived after a 6 hour flight from Edmonton at about 6:30 am.  An hour through the airport and another hour on the bus put me at the City Hostel at about 9:00.  Check-in is at 14:00, but I could use the open areas and store my stuff.

I spent two hours putting my bike together, which means I had a fair amount of trouble.  I then rode the bike the 3 km into Centrum, noting all of the things that would have to be adjusted.  It is pretty obvious from both my bike assembly and my riding that I was very punchy.  But I struggled through the day, determined to get onto Iceland time as soon as possible.  I had visits to the information centre, a bookstore, an Icelandic history museum and Hallsgrimkirkja, the big modernistic church that is the biggest building in this low profile capital.

Across the Bay

Pedestrian Way

Generally it is grey and fairly chilly but not real cold.  A few patches of sun appeared and it was then very pleasant.  Back at the hostel I struggled to get set up in an upper bunk in a nice 4 bed dorm, fiddled with my bike, read some and had a very nice dinner close to the hostel.  I decided early that I could not attempt anything important until I had a good sleep.

Today, I need to finalize preparations to hit the road.  Primarily I need to organize my things into my panniers and get my bike tuned. I will touch on a few more tourist attractions as I ride around town.  It has been fairly easy to get into the swing of Iceland.  There are no language issues – everyone speaks English to me, road customs are similar, and signage is good and I am gradually finding out enough about my prospective route to head off tomorrow.

Later, at the day’s end..

Rested, I was quite productive.  Within an hour I found a good bike shop and got my bike nicely tuned and had a sim card installed.  As the day progressed I rode quite a bit, visited some more book shops, had a slow lunch and read a lot.  I cooked my own dinner and packed my panniers.  I feel good about getting on the road in the morning and the grey weather seems to be holding, so I should get a few days before rain comes.  At any rate I am off in the morning heading North and West along the Ring Road.

All for now.