overland quest to visit the Arctic Circle
by motorbike. I’d last visited the Arctic
in Norway 4 years ago and ever since
had become obsessed with conquer-
ing the Arctic in every country pos-
sible by motorbike. This might have
been leg 2 of 8 Arctic destinations, but
I’d already felt the brute force of the
Arctic weather on this trip.
Almost a week into my journey, I’d
left my home in Newcastle in the UK
during a rare heat wave. The ride
down to the south east of England,
then east on through the Netherlands,
Germany, and north to the top of Den-
mark, had been super. To reach Ice-
land I’d taken a two day ferry from the
Danish port of Hirtshals to Seydisfjor-
dur in eastern Iceland, with a brief
stop at The Faroe Islands.
When I landed in Iceland the weath-
er was the opposite of what I’d left on
mainland Europe. Gale-force winds,
barely above freezing, and rain bat-
tered me from almost the first mile.
I’d come equipped to Iceland with a
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