ICELAND: 22-25 August 2023

12 months ago, Iceland was not on my list of ‘must visit’ places.

When, early in our holiday planning, Dave suggested we visit Iceland on this trip, I was not jumping at the bit. Iceland sounded cold, distant and boring. How wrong could I have been!

It’s a good lesson for me to not base my thoughts on assumptions or preconceived ideas. It turns out Iceland was truly amazing, and three days was definitely not enough for us to get a full appreciation of what is, without a doubt, one of the most fascinating cultures I have experienced.

Iceland is a land of vivid contrasts of climate, geography, and culture. Physically, it is a land whose features have been shaped and reshaped by the opposing agents of Fire and Ice, with extreme volcanic activity and huge glaciers which take up more than 11 per cent of the total land mass.

With a population of less than 400,000, Iceland is by no means a large economy. It was evident as we explored the country that tourism is a booming industry, although it wasn’t that way even just a few years ago. Tourism is now Iceland’s largest export sector by far and accounts for more than a third of the country’s GDP. It seems like I am the only person who didn’t already know it was a fabulous place to visit!

TUESDAY 22nd AUGUST

We choose to fly ‘Play Airlines’, a relatively new airline taking advantage of the booming market. Our flights were quite cheap, less than $300 return from London (Stanstead) to Keflavik Airport which sits around an hour south of the Island’s capital of Reykjavik. Will and Emma joined us for the trip, as did my niece Emilia, who coincidentally arrived at Stanstead Airport to start her European Gap Year holiday the day before we flew to Iceland.

I had researched the Iceland part of our trip to within an inch of its life. In Ireland, we took on Will and Emma’s ‘go with the flow’ approach, but in Iceland we went with my highly organised version 😉 I wouldn’t like to say which is better, both have their own advantages.

No matter how much you research, it seems there are sometimes things you miss. In this case I missed that they drive on the right-hand side of the road in Iceland. I took on the driving duties for the three days hire, and think I managed remarkably well on the narrow roads, especially with signposting in Icelandic and being on the right side. Others may not agree, and I do admit the first roundabout was a little hairy 😉

Our Airbnb accommodation for the first two nights was in a small farm-side guest house just out of Selfoss, about 150km along the south coast road from the capital. After some grocery shopping (who also loves to visit grocery shops in unusual countries?) we checked in, played some arcade games (including pinball) in their shed (which interestingly housed about a dozen old style games), then headed back to Selfoss where I had booked dinner at a Viking Restaurant.

Here is where I was reminded to listen to my own advice! Don’t go to themed restaurants! Contrary to the online reviews, dinner was pretty ordinary. Dave had fish, I had salmon, Emilia had lamb loin, as did Will and Emma (who shared). Even though I had read a lot about the prices in Iceland, it was even worse than I thought it might be, with dinner (main course only plus one drink each) costing more than $300 for the five of us!

After a lovely long soak in the accommodation’s large spa bath, I headed off to bed, as did Dave, but not the three younger ones who had regular alarms set throughout the night to check if they could see the Northern Lights!

WEDNESDAY 23rd AUGUST

Wednesday was huge! We covered more than 300km of the south coast of Iceland (each way!), seeing amazing waterfalls; glaciers; lava fields; snow-capped and volcano-topped mountains; a black beach with ice on it (diamond beach); sheep; goats and many, many horses!

The highlight for me was a zodiac boat ride on the lake next to the Fjallsarlon glacier. The 45-minute ride included seeing (and hearing!) three separate collapses of ice to create icebergs. Honestly, if I was ever in doubt that nature is powerful, I’m not anymore. Wow.

I think I said ‘WOW’ a hundred times on Wednesday alone!

We had hoped to visit the site of a crashed US Navy Dakota on our way back to Selfoss. Sadly, when we got there at around 6pm, the shuttle bus had finished operating for the day and the 7km round trip walk wouldn’t have been able to be completed before dark. I’ve included a picture to show what we missed, and miss it we did… this was the reason Dave wanted to visit Iceland 🙁

THURSDAY 24th AUGUST

On Thursday we added geysers; more waterfalls; Canyons, Silfra (to see the tectonic boundary between the North American and Eurasian plates); bubbling roadside ponds; the site of the world’s oldest parliament and gorgeous mist-covered lakes to our list of ‘WOW’ moments, while driving the ‘Golden Circle’. The Golden Circle is the most famous of all scenic routes in Iceland and took us about three hours to drive (approx. 150km), finishing up back in Reykjavik, the capital, in the early afternoon.

We explored the Reykjavik city centre for a couple of hours, seeing the famous Rainbow Street; had a quick snack at a food hall; got a great view of the city from the top of the steeple at the architecturally renowned Hallgrímskirkja Lutheran church; then made our way on foot to the waterside Harpa music hall, where we met Tina, our guide for a three-hour Reykjavik food walking tour!

As anyone who has read my blog before will know, I do love a food walking tour, and this one was as good as any of them. The five of us enjoyed all sorts of delicious tastes and loved hearing the food tales; history and quite a few jokes along the way 🙂

Super stuffed with food and tired (20,000 steps today!), we headed out on the one-hour drive to our accommodation back close to the airport… planned very well I think (this is where overplanning helps 😉 ), given our 6:15am flight back to the UK on Friday morning!