Adventure travel, the real story!

Everyone thinks that adventure travel is just a charmed life.  Blue skies and the wind at your back.  But the truth is some days suck!!!

Yesterday, I was heading into one of the most desolate regions of Iceland.  An area that resembles the moon with it's black volcanic sands and volcanic mountains.  It's a narrow two track road that crosses the country and gives you the impression of being on a different planet.  It's also rather remote.  That's why when I got not one, but two flats, it was an event.  Seems I found the only nails ever spewed from a volcano into it's black volcanic sand.  Making things even worse was the fact that it was raining and amazingly windy.  The loose volcanic sand became volcanic muck and it was a freakin' mess.  One car passed and saw the bike on it's side with my stuff strewn all over and assumed I was in an accident.  Surprisingly a Ranger showed up after a while and offered what limited assistance he could.  Actually, I had taken care of the problem by then so he more or less just watched as I put things back together.

This means a big change of plans for me though since I was expecting to be on the north side of the country last night.  Now that I am running a 21 inch tube in a 17 inch tire I will go looking for a shop to get a new tube or have mine installed.  Unfortunately, that takes me in the opposite direction of where I was to be and the exact opposite side of the country from where I was to pick up the ferry.  

Such is the life of adventure travel.  Some days are indeed beautiful and some just suck!

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Regards,
TJ Parrent