When Scott Portnoy and his friend Max went bikepacking, they got together all the normal gear.

Spare tubes? Check.

Pannier bags? Check.

Ice axe? Check.

Wait. Ice axe?! This was no ordinary bike trip. And it ended in tragedy. I met Scott while biking at North Head in Sydney, and he told me the story.

What Scott and Max wanted to do

In March 2022, two American friends named Scott and Max flew into Egilsstaðir, a little town in East Iceland, with their bikes, their skis, and a plan to spend roughly a month riding across the north of Iceland. They would use their bikes as their only transport and backcountry ski in the mountains along the way.

"Once you get out of your 20s, it's not often that you get opportunities to take more time and do something hard, something that you might remember," Scott says.

One key consideration was who to choose as travelling companion. Scott said his partnership with Max worked perfectly.

"Max is a good mechanic, and I'm far more organised when it comes to planning. We each had a partner who complemented our own weaknesses and strengths."

Their adventure

The plan was to ski for a week or so in each area, then move on by bike. They'd base themselves in a town and ride out to the local mountains to ski each day.

They chose Iceland because it tends to have stable snow.

One day, they were cycling up to a local ski hill when the snow and wind started. There were eight centimetres of snow on the road and they were slipping all over the place.

That night at their accommodation, the guy running the place said his cousin had sent him a photo:

"Look at these idiots riding on bikes to the ski hill."

He taught Scott and Max how to say in Icelandic, "We're geniuses, not idiots." And sent that back to his cousin.

(According to Google Translate, the phrase is, "Við erum snillingar, ekki fífl.")

The biggest days were when they rode from the east to the north, passing over the highlands: about 80 km a day for a week.

Conditions could quickly get serious.

"We caught a headwind. Then it started to rain, to sleet, to snow," Scott said. They stopped in a grass-roofed sheep shed by the road.

After they started again, they found themselves cycling through a herd of reindeer that was crossing the road around them.

Another time, they were struggling with sidewinds. Scott managed to survive one especially hard gust and looked behind him to check on Max. He didn't see him at first, because Max had been blown 20 metres, off the road and into an icy ditch.

Despite the conditions, they managed to struggle through the last 10 km.

At temperatures of about -5°C, their derailleurs froze. "Moisture on the road kicks up and settles on the derailleur and chain. At those temperatures it freezes. Then when you hit a hill you're not able to change gear."

"We peed on them to thaw them out. Nothing worked." They finished the last hour or two in whatever gear they happened to be in when they froze.

Before Akureyri, there's a tunnel, but unlike most tunnels in Iceland, bikes aren't allowed through it. Scott and Max tried to hitchhike for an hour, but no one even looked at them.

In the end, they had to detour for two hours over the nearby Víkurskarð pass. That added 16 kilometres of exposed roads to the journey.

Most afternoons after skiing, Scott and Max ended up in the local community's geothermally heated hot pools. In Iceland, these pools play the role of the pub or park in Australia.

Indeed, the people of Iceland were the highlight of the trip.

"Icelandic people are really good humans," Scott told CycleHub. "They tend to take you in and make you one of their own. Community matters a lot to them."

Fuel

When Scott and Max arrived in Iceland, they were prepared for its famously unusual foods, such as fermented ram's testicles, rotten shark, minke whale, and Harðfiskur, which is beef-jerky-style dried fish.

But they didn't expect all the hot dogs.

"I can't tell you how many hot dogs we ate!" Scott exclaimed. "It's practically a national dish. They are way better than American hot dogs, and people in Iceland are very good about the toppings."

Both Scott and Max found they liked their "pylsur", as hot dogs are called in Icelandic, covered in the crunchy onions topping.

"The crunch makes a big difference," Scott said.

To keep both their bags and their expenses light, the two would stock up at a local convenience store every few days. Only occasionally would they eat at a restaurant.

"We had plenty of chocolate," Scott recounted, "but I wouldn't say vegetables were at the top of the list."

The food highlight was the fish soup at a world-famous café in Dalvík called Gísli, Eiríkur, Helgi. It's run by a man named Bjarni, and it's named after three brothers from an Icelandic folktale.

Their bikes

For the trip, both Scott and Max rode Salsa Marrakeshes.

The Marrakesh was designed as a heavy-duty world touring bike. They have steel frames, which are sturdier and easier to fix, and they have mechanical rather than hydraulic disc brakes.

Scott explained that it's "super basic but built to get tossed in the back of a ute and you're fine."

Apart from the frozen derailleurs, the only mechanical issue that afflicted them in Iceland came one mile out of the airport on the day they arrived. Scott's tyre got a puncture and sealant sprayed out everywhere.

He was able to plug it, and this repair lasted for three weeks. It finally popped again on the far side of the highlands. At that point, he just put a tube in.

Scott still rides the same Marrakesh today. It's the one he was riding at North Head when CycleHub ran into him. His only other bike is a road bike from 15 years ago.

The tragedy

After three and a half weeks of riding, a third good friend, named Chris, flew in to join Scott and Max in some backcountry skiing.

While Scott and Max felt like the hardest part of their trip was behind them, it turned out things were about to turn much worse.

"We got caught in an avalanche a couple of days after Chris arrived," Scott said. It led to death.

All three had avalanche training and years of backcountry skiing and mountaineering. They constantly evaluated the conditions and even selected a mountain face that all indications suggested would be a safe choice.

But as Scott explained, "You can manage out a lot of risk, but in certain things there is an undeniable level of risk that you cannot mitigate. And then sometimes you just have a bad day."

The avalanche hit them in Svarfaðardalur, near Dalvík, on the evening of 7 April 2022. About 130 rescuers from Dalvík, Siglufjörður and Akureyri responded, along with a Coast Guard helicopter.

Scott's memory of the avalanche is fragmentary. He remembers sliding at an incredibly fast pace. He remembers being caught in what felt like a washing machine, dark for a moment, then light for a moment, then dark, and on and on it repeated.

He had the presence of mind to advise himself to try to create an air pocket around his face once he stopped moving. In the pit of his stomach, he explained later, he felt that this was how he was going to die.

The rescuers were heroic and arrived to find Max had been knocked unconscious, Scott was conscious but shaken up, and sadly, the recently arrived Chris was dead.

Of the two survivors, Max's injuries were the worst. He suffered a traumatic brain injury and needed 13 surgeries to reassemble the bones of his leg.

Bittersweet Memories

The kindness of Icelanders lent them strength. Some of the people they had met earlier in the trip came to visit them in the hospital after the accident. And they remain friends today.

While Scott's recovery was relatively quick, Max was in a wheelchair for six months. To help his bones form up again, he had a large steel frame called an "external fixator" screwed to the leg.

Max's wife gave him an ultimatum. "You only get one avalanche per marriage," she said. Yet, he made an unbelievable recovery.

He's back skiing and running and working again as an engineer. He and Scott are currently planning their next bikepacking adventure.

Of Chris, Scott says, "Chris was a friend you can't really replace. Sneaky strong. When he passed you on a hill, you knew the next time you would see him was at the top. Super smart. He finished at the top of his class, something I never knew until he shared it in Iceland. Funny as hell at times. Most importantly, he cared a lot for the people around him."

In retrospect, Scott says, "Sometimes, shit just happens. You can get hit by a bus just walking across the street. It comes down to being able to look yourself in the mirror about the decisions you made."

"Given what happened, we have done OK to not let the avalanche spook us unreasonably." And he encourages anyone considering Iceland to go ahead with the trip.

"99.9% of the time, it is a fantastic place to ski and bike," he says.

Tips and advice for cyclists who want to ride in Iceland

• Take the SOS beacon. "We resisted an SOS beacon but were convinced by our families. Don't be a big guy; just take the damn device. It probably saved Max's life."
• Leave a travel plan. Iceland's Safetravel service lets you submit a travel plan, and its app can send your GPS location to emergency services on 112 (Safetravel).
• Plastic bags over your socks. In cold rain and snow, they put Ziplocs over their socks under their shoes. "Your feet are going to get wet, so at least they stay warmer."
• Barmitts. These go on your handlebars. "Those were clutch." They ordered them online.
• Don't skimp on the essentials. Scott's wife convinced them to take full ski helmets rather than lighter bike helmets. "It was warmer and safer in our accident. Don't skimp on the essentials. Just go as light as possible with everything else."
• Pack one emergency layer. Scott's only excess was a set of polar expedition gloves and a lightweight, super warm down jacket. He ended up using the jacket after the avalanche while waiting to be rescued. "If you have to fix something on the bike and your hands are too cold, you're screwed."
• Practise with the full setup. Scott did a bunch of rides on local hills in Colorado with his skis and the whole setup to work out the most stable arrangement. "That was super helpful."
• Carrying skis. Bring a ton of ski straps, and plastic wrap so the skis don't rub a hole in your crotch as you ride. Their backpacks ended up on their backs because they were too big for the bike.
• Be consistent about where you put things. "The wind is blowing, it's snowing, you're soaked and it's freezing. So you have to know where to find things."
• A waterproof handlebar bag. Scott's Ortlieb kept his phone, food and spare warm gloves and socks dry no matter how bad the weather got.
• Get medical travel insurance, make sure you have life insurance, and make sure people know your passwords. "You don't need it until you really need it."
• Overtrain. "Being able to keep going when we thought we would have been done already was helpful."
• Expect the wind. Iceland's weather is famously unpredictable, with strong winds, sudden changes and long stretches without shelter.

Cool facts about cycling and skiing in Iceland

• Hot dogs are practically the national dish. Iceland's most famous stand, Bæjarins Beztu Pylsur, has been selling them in Reykjavík since 1937, and Bill Clinton famously stopped there in 2004 and ordered his with only mustard.
• They're not like American hot dogs. Icelandic dogs are made from a mix of lamb, pork and beef, and come topped with both crispy fried and raw onions.
• Wild reindeer only live in East Iceland. They were brought over from Norway in the 18th century, and in winter they come down to the eastern valleys and coast, often near the Ring Road.
• Every town has a hot pool. Iceland has about a hundred public swimming pools, and they're as much a social hub as a place to swim.
• The Troll Peninsula is ski touring heaven. Guiding companies are based in Dalvík (Bergmenn) and Siglufjörður (Visit Iceland), running ski touring in the mountains between them.

Tour providers and organisers

Scott and Max did it self-supported, but you don’t have to. Here are some Icelandic operators that handle either bikepacking or ski touring:

• Bergmenn Mountain Guides, based in Dalvík, runs ski touring from two lodges on the Troll Peninsula, plus heli-skiing (Bergmenn).
• Scandic Mountain Guides, based in Siglufjörður, offers winter ski touring and splitboarding on the Troll Peninsula (Visit Iceland).
• Icebike Adventures, a family-owned company in Reykjavík, runs mountain bike trips, heli-biking and fatbiking (Manawa).
• Cycling Westfjords runs guided, self-guided and supported tours of the Westfjords Way, plus an ultra-endurance bikepacking race (Cycling Westfjords).
• Bikepacking Iceland offers bike rentals and self-supported to fully guided tours from hubs in Keflavík and Ísafjörður (Iceland Review).