Even Better Than the Photos

Two Canadians visit Iceland and discover that the mountain biking there is about so much more than pretty pictures

- By Ryan Stuart. Pics by Ryan Creary

No one goes to Iceland to get a tan. But snow? At the beginning of September? Fat flakes slap my face. Drips collect on my helmet peak, threatening to turn into icicles. My fingers and toes are numb. Every breath clouds the route ahead. As a Canadian I’m used to unseasonable weather, but this is a bit much. On my way to Iceland I’d imagined rolling hillsides painted in 50 shades of green, glacier-fed rivers plunging into dark canyons, dramatic northern sunlight, trailside hot-spring soaks and, through it all, a snaking black trail of dirt. These were the images that had filled my Instagram feed until I couldn’t take it anymore and I signed up for a week-long, hut-to-hut mountain bike tour, accompanied by my photographer friend Ryan Creary. It’s not like I expected blue skies and shorts, but I didn’t think we’d get winter conditions either.

As I polish off the first hour of riding, I’m reminded that pictures never tell the whole story. I’m about to find out that the mountain biking on this under-construction rock in the middle of the Atlantic is not for softies. Even on the hottest day of the summer, temperatures rarely climb above 20°C, snow falls all year round, the wind will knock you over and there’s rarely a tree to shelter behind. The reward for toughing it out is the privilege of adventuring in a place that’s wild, empty and unforgettably unique.

PROPER GEYSERS