Reykjavik, Iceland

I will be making my second trip to Iceland in October and plan on renting a car. The first time I went, we booked the Golden Circle Tour and a Southern Iceland Tour. Both were on tour buses of course. I agree with others who have said to rent a car or campervan because I didn’t like being rushed as many of the key sites to get off and on the bus. Plus, the majority on the buses we were on were of the older crowd. I personally wouldn’t book a Reykjavik City Tour because the town is actually kind of small and you can probably see it on your own. It’s not a hard city to navigate. The public transportation isn’t that great. There is maybe one bus an hour, so if you miss a bus, you might as well just walk to your destination because it may be another hour before the next one comes.

I’ll point out some of the places we stopped at as well as some places that might be off the beaten path. If you’re renting a car, you might be able to go to a lot of the other towns outside Reykjavik. Regardless of if you’re taking the tour bus or driving, I would say that the below places and things might be cool to put on your list.
– The Blue Lagoon – Yes, I know practically everyone goes here, but it’s a nice way to relax. If you don’t want to pay to go, there are so many other hot springs/geothermal baths all around the land that are free. You may just have to ask the owners if you can hop in or you can find cheaper baths in the North. There is actually a bath similar to the Blue Lagoon near Akureyri for less money. Just do your research

-Gullfoss
-Seljalandsfoss
-Skogafoss (this one was my favorite because of the double rainbow that is almost always there)
-any other waterfall
-Hallgrimskirkja or any other Icelandic church. Hallgrimskirkja is in downtown Reykjavik but there are so many other beautiful churches short distances away from the city if you’re interested in cool architecture.
-Seeing the Northern Lights – we booked through Reykjavik Excursions. They let you keep going every night until you see the lights. We went every night we were there for 4 nights and saw the lights 3 times (in March). I thought that was really cool because basically you pay for 1 night and get to go every night until you don’t feel like going anymore.
-Geysir and all the other geothermal geysers
-the black sand beaches near Vik
-Jokulsarlon Glacier Lagoon – this place makes for great shots at sunset and sunrise due to the floating ice on the lagoon which makes it look like large pieces of glass floating. This is on the southeast side of the island so it can be a bit of a drive and the weather can change drastically
-Reynisfjara Beach – cool basalt columns in the shapes of hexagons
-Ice Climbing and Glacier Walking on a glacier – we walked on Sólheimajökull and did some ice climbing with the help of our guides. I would say it was one of the most fun and adventurous things I’ve ever done and well worth the money
– Visit the Harpa Concert Hall and walk along the harbor
– Visit the Phallogical Museum – yes it’s a penis museum. it’s great for laughs but it’s also informative as there are other animal species captured in the museum. The ticket is a lil pricey but my sister wanted to do it and sometimes you’re only in Iceland once, so why not?
-Thingvellir Park or the Silfra snorkeling/diving – you can touch two of the tectonic plates of the world at the same time and swim in crystal clear water with maximum visibility.
-Visit an Icelandic horse farm – Icelandic horses are odd in how they walk and move and are unique to Iceland. They do a lot to preserve the pedigree of the horses and if the horses ever leave the island, they can never come back in order to not taint the breeding pool. They are also so beautiful and have a great temperament.
– Solheimasandur Plane Wreck – it’s near Reynisfjara Beach and Skogafoss and if you look it up on Instagram you’ll see that a lot of people take photos there.
-Skogar Museum – lots of Icelandic history and some cool models of historic Iceland houses that look like gnomes live in them outside the museum.

I honestly didn’t find Reykjavik that expensive. We were frugal as we’re kind of budget travelers. All the tours and glacier walk was about $300 USD per person. You can get cheap flights out of NYC, DC, Boston, and other East Coast cities. The accommodation was just a place to sleep and store our belongings as we knew we weren’t going to spend much time in the room. That was maybe $400 total or $200 per person as we had 2 people. $10 to get into Hallgrimskirkja tower and about $20 to go to the Phallogical museum. The Blue Lagoon tickets were included in our Golden Circle tour but they’re usually like $70-$90 for the basic package depending on what time of day you go. If you book separate, you MUST book in advance, no exceptions. As for food, we maybe spent about $70 per person. Since we were on the tour bus and in a tour van for the glacier hike for a large portion of our days, we really only ate when the bus/van stopped and then again when we returned to Reykjavik. Our accommodation had breakfast, so we made sure we ate a big breakfast to work off of during the day. There is a really nice Nepalese place in downtown Reykjavik called Nepalese Kitchen. It’s a great place to end the day in a warm restaurant. The food takes a while to make so be patient, plus you get a lot of food for the price. We only paid about $34 for two people, plus the owner was super nice and let us try Brennivin, Iceland’s signature distilled alcoholic beverage. You might ask why we ate Nepalese. We also did the Noodle Station which is a short walk down the block. There wasn’t a whole bunch for vegetarians but we made due. They eat a lot of fish dishes in Iceland for obvious reasons.

Overall, I’d say get out of Reykjavik if you can. You can see it in about 1 day and then after that, you might get bored. A lot of places close early too and be aware of the hours of sunlight/darkness when you travel as the days can be very long or very short depending on when you go. It’s also super cold on many nights from October – early March. So if you’re going to see the Northern Lights, put on ALLLLLL your layers and invest in those Hot Hands hand warmers. We bought 2 multi-paks from Amazon which includes ones you can put in your shoes and socks and in your gloves.

Also, wear layers in order to take off layers. Since the houses are heated with excess geothermal heat, there is no way to turn the heat down, so they just open windows or take off layers. The way they use geothermal heat is amazing so if you visit a geothermal plant while you’re there, pay attention as it’s really amazing that the country transitioned from coal-based to geothermal in about 2-3 years. The whole country! Talk about being green!

If you want to read more, I wrote a blog post with a bit more detail:

https://www.boyversusworld.com/top-10-things-to-see-while-in-iceland/