Fifth day – Tuesday July 12th

After a hefty breakfast at Hotel Kiðagil we had out at 10:45. The first 20 km to Aldeyjarfoss were on a good gravel road but we were going uphill with a slight breeze in our face. It was a lovely and clear day. We had our breakfast at Aldeyjarfoss and enjoyed this one of the more spectacular waterfalls here in Iceland. Onward we went on to the actual mountain road which had not been open to traffic at that time. It was recently graded and we were the kings of the road. Not cars, no dust. Just us two. The only problem was that in some places the road was very sandy a problem which would continue to cause problem throughout the rest of the trip.  This problem was especially difficult since we were ascending some 800 m this day. Loosing tire grip in the slope is not good. As the day progressed the wind picked up. It was in our face at 10-15 m/s. At the end this had become a difficult struggle against the sandy slopes and the wind. We had intended to bike 50 km this day but gave up after 45 km and put up our tents in the only green patch in a 20 km radius (near an area called Fremstu mosar). It was difficult to put up the tents in this wind but with teamwork we were able to succeed in that task. The statistics for the day: We biked 45 km. We were moving for 5h and 56m and resting for 2h and 42m. Max speed was 29 km/h, the moving average was 7,1 km/h. The total ascent was 730 m.