2010

The adventure begins…

| gloriakidsfirst

Well, what a start. Dave has been delayed as he is unwell at the moment and unable to fly for the next few days. Its been an interesting first day, Iceland Air had no records of me on the flight as I had to change it but rather strangely, my bike was booked on! After a protracted “discussion” with the Iceland Air staff I finally made it onto the flight.

It gets better.

Angelique, our cyclist from San Fransisco did not encounter any such problems arriving safely with her bike, only to discover that her bags have been lost with all her gear. We can’t go anywhere without Angelique’s bag so we have to stay put for tonight and plan to head back to the airport – some 40km away – tomorrow morning.

All is not lost though. An incredibly kind lady called Bára, has offered to let us stay in her apartment tonight for free and is going to help us sort things out tomorrow. You can find out more about Bára´s lovely apartment her: www.270mos.is Angelique and I have been studying the map and we are dying to get out on the road so fingers crossed the bag will arrive.

Here’s to the kindness of strangers and high adventure!

Please support Kids First Trust by sponsoring Julien on his Just Giving Page

Meet the Iceland 2010 team: Angelique

| Zapfly

My other riding partner this year is Angelique.

She is Canadian, living in California and has also done big bike rides of a different sort. Washington DC to Costa Rica on a BMW 750 for starters (no pedals). No motorbikes on this one though!

Angelique has always been into road and mountain biking and flirting with the idea of touring but like Dave, has never done it, so she’s ‘way psyched’ as they say in the San Fran vernacular. She’s on an endless prep schedule, antagonising bike shops all over the Bay Area, to help her convert her mountain bike’s to a touring bike. Good luck!

Angelique has several other great outdoor passions. Earlier this year, she went climbing in Thailand and kitting in the Philippines.  She’s a big fan of remote, exercised filled adventures like canoeing down the Zambezi.  I feel like a lightweight in comparison as I did the Zambezi in an eight man dingy back in 1994.

We’ll both be hauling Canon 5DII’s as she’s also a very keen photographer. She’ll be bringing along her 17-40 for the ride.  I’ll post some of her images as well, if she lets me.

Finally, Angelique just took ownership of her first dog, Ziggy, an 8 week old German Shepherd, who she will be abandoning to come on this trip.  That’s how great it’s going to be 🙂

Meet the Iceland 2010 team: Dave

| Zapfly

As I will be spending sometime in the saddle with Dave and Angelique, I thought I would dedicate a blog entries to each of my teammates.

Dave has been fond of travelling distance and the outdoors for most of his life. He completed his first 1km swim at the age of 8.  He also walked halfway across Hong Kong Island the same year after forgetting his school bus money.  He completed his first ultra walk of 160km at the age of 14.

Dave has since done more than 30 multi-day organised ultra-distance walks and runs.  This includes over 10 finishes of the annual Nijmegen 4-Day Marches in the Netherlands where he is a Gold Cross Holder and member of the KNBLO (Royal Dutch League for Health and Fitness). He has the IML Silver Medal and is also an enthusiastic hiker.

Having proven himself in supported walking events, Dave has made the decision to return to his roots, by giving cycle touring a go.  Indeed, prior to training for this trip, the only bikes Dave has used in the past 5 years were bolted to a gym floor.

Ultimately, Dave is hoping to gain experience of a new mode of long distance travel, bike touring and maintenance, with some tips on photography thrown in for good measure.  Most importantly Dave is hoping to raise a good amount of money for a worthy cause while adventuring round the marvellous Icelandic landscape.  You never know, he may just see his first erupting volcano.

Cycling for the Kids First Trust

| Zapfly

Each year I like to raise money for a worthy charity when I undertake my annual cycling challenge.  This year I have chosen Kids First Trust after speaking with an old Raleigh International friend of mine, Gloria, who also happens to be the CEO.  The Kids First Trust is a children’s charity that makes kids the centre of all their actions, such as developing core skills and competencies as well as providing vital funding support for a variety of needs.

If you would like to find out more about Kids First Trust, you can visit their website: www.kidsfirsttrust.org

I believe that the money we raise from this year’s cycle ride will go towards one of the Kids First Trust´s Playground partnerships.  More on this soon.  In the meantime, you can donate to this extremely worthwhile cause via my fundraising page on Just Giving.

If you want to find out any more information about the Kids First Trust, here are their contact details:

Tel: 020 7837 0044
Email: info@kidsfirsttrust.org

Join their Facebook Group

Back on the road again

| allterrainphotos


(Image by Paul van Roekel: http://www.paulvanroekel.nl/)

It has been a long time since I last wrote an entry.  In fact, it has been almost a year.

This year will be slightly different to 2009.  I will be joined by potentially two other cyclists. Dave, depending on whether he makes it back from New Zealand, is a cert to join me for the whole trip.  In addition, Angelique, a new work colleague at Blast Radius, has shown interest in joining me for part of the journey as well.  However, she is based in San Francisco, which means that this trip posses some interesting logistical issues for my cycle partners.

The route for this year’s journey will be a full lap of Iceland.  In addition, if we have sufficient time and weather permitting, I hope to cross the uninhabited centre of the country.  Here we will get to see first-hand the island’s interior, the Highlands of Iceland, which are meant to be a cold and uninhabitable combination of sand, mountains and glaciers.

Iceland is the world’s 18th largest island and Europe’s second largest island after Great Britain.  To put this into context, it is about the same size as Cuba (the main island) and 25% larger than Ireland.  Reykjavík, the capital city, is home to two-thirds of the national population, which means that a lot of the ride will be very remote.  We will be cycling close to the Arctic Circle, which Iceland is situated just south of, which means inclement and potentially cold weather but hopefully almost uninterrupted daylight.

Iceland was made famous in 2008 for the economic meltdown of its financial and banking sector.  Being an island with few if any agricultural output, almost all of the daily necessities have to be imported, making it a punishingly expensive place to visit.  This year (2010), on 21st March, the volcano Eyjafjallajökull in the south of Iceland erupted, forcing 600 people to flee their homes.  Our route will takes us within close proximity of the volcano, so hopefully, I should be able to take some great shots.

Iceland has 2,869 miles of paved roads.  Route 1, or the Ring Road (Icelandic: Þjóðvegur 1 or Hringvegur), completed in 1974, is Iceland’s main road and circumnavigates the island, connecting the majority of inhabited parts of the island.  This paved road is 831 miles long, which is well below the anticipated 1500 miles I hope to cover in this outing.  Alas, we will not be able to complete the full lap on this road, as bicycles are not allowed through the Hvalfjörður Tunnel.  Instead, we will need to follow a 62 mile detour.

The main question to me at this stage is whether to cycle the island clockwise or anticlockwise.  I am aware of strong prevailing winds along a large part of the southern route and many other blogs I have read about their cycling endeavours in Iceland would tend to suggest the smart money would be on a clockwise approach.  The benefit of this is that the most impressive scenery is along the south coast.

Here are some links to other Iceland cyclist´s blogs.  If you know of any other good blogs, please post URLs and comments: