Travelled in: October 2010
Overall Itinerary (as planned):
1. 13th Oct - Arrive at Reykjavik at 15:10. Relax. Overnight at Reykjavik.
2. 14th October – At Reykjavik. Whale watching.
3. 15th October – Photography tour to Snaefellsnes.
4. 16th Oct – Leave Reykjavik in the morning. On the road for 11N/12D. Back to Reykjavik on 27th Oct, evening.
5. 28th Oct – At Reykjavik. Also Northern lights trip.
6. 29th Oct - Landmannalaugar & Hekla by superjeep. (Went to West Iceland, instead)
7. 30th Oct - At Reykjavik. Northern lights trip.
8. 31st Oct – Early morning departure from hotel. Flight back home.
Drive itinerary (as planned):
Day 1: Reykjavik – Hafnarfjordur – Gardskagi (light-houses) – Grindavik - Kleifarvatn – Graenvatn & Krysuvik – Selfoss. Overnight at Selfoss.
Day 2: Selfoss – Gullfoss & Geysir – Seljalandsfoss – Skogar – Skogafoss – Myrdalsjokull – Dryholaey – Reynisfjara – Vik. Overnight at Vik.
Day 3: Vik – Klauster – Lakagigar & Fagrifoss – via Skeidararsandur – Skaftafell - Svartifoss – Hof. Overnight at farm near Jokulsarlon.
Day 4: Explore Skaftafell, Jokulsarlon & Vatnajokull. Overnight at farm near Jokulsarlon.
Day 5: Skalafellsjokull – Hofn - Djupivogur – Berunes – Breidalsvik. Overnight at Breidalsvik.
Day 6: Breidalsvik - Stodvarfjordur (stone collection) - Faskrudsfjordur - Reydarfjordur – Eskifjordur - Seydisfjordur. Overnight at Seydisfjordur.
Day 7: Relax at Seydisfjordur. Hikes & walks. Overnight at Seydisfjordur.
Day 8: Seydisfjordur – Lagarflot – Hallormsstadaskogur – Reykjahlid – Dimmuborgir. Overnight at Dimmuborgir.
Day 9: Explore Myvatn / Krafla & Dettifoss. Overnight at Dimmuborgir.
Day 10: Dimmuborgir – Godafoss – Akureyri – Laufas - Siglufjordur. Overnight at Siglufjordur.
Day 11: Siglufjordur. Overnight at Siglufjordur.
Day 12: Siglufjordur to Reykjavik. Drive via Hofsos (Grof church & museum ) and Glaumbaer.
Our planned itinerary was disrupted due to the weather (the blue line in the map below), as mentioned earlier. So, we drove back to Reykjavik on 24th
Oct itself & spent the rest of the days there, exploring Reykjavik
& going on day trips to Reykjanes & West Iceland.
Planning a trip to Iceland:
While
planning our itinerary, it was initially confusing. Iceland looked pint
sized, drivable in a few days! Most people seemed to visit for 3 to 4
days. The more I read about Iceland, I realized that even 3 weeks might
be too short! Planning a trip to Iceland, of all my trips so far, has
required the most amount of precision planning. Especially if you are
travelling in winter & have to deal with a lot of challenges:
shorter day-light hours, reduced timings for museums & stores,
hotels, restaurants & museums that might be shut, towns that are
more deserted than in summer, delays due to the weather, change of
itinerary due to the weather. Driving in Iceland was a different
ball-game altogether…..you see very few people on the road, so you can’t
ask for directions frequently. Rest-stops are few & far apart. You
can’t pull over for your meals whenever you like…it has to be planned or
the option is to carry food with you. None of this is to put you off
Iceland; it’s just to tell you that you need to plan things out in
Iceland, unless you’re okay with having a clumsy trip due to lack of
planning. Also, driving distances may look really small on paper, but,
remember that the Ring road (Route 1) has speed limits. Most of the
time, it was 90 kmph. Within towns, it was almost always 30-50 kmph.
Also, you tend to spend a lot of time enjoying the scenic drive &
stopping to click photographs. Definitely try to pack in very less in a
day, unless you want to be just zipping past everything.
Informative
websites are available for most parts of Iceland, which are a great to
refer to while planning your trip. The 2 websites for weather forecasts
& road condition status updates are indispensible. I’ve listed out
all the websites that I referred to & found useful, at the end of
this report. Once you reach Iceland, there’s a huge selection of maps
& informative brochures to choose from, available for free,
beginning right at the airport exit. They’re also stocked at all
guest-houses & hotels. Detailed driving maps are available at
bookstores. I picked up the Ferdakort (1:500,000 scale) & it was
pretty accurate & useful.
Packing Essentials:
These are some items that I carried & found really useful, on our Iceland trip:
Ready
to eat food (most B&Bs, Guesthouses & farm-stays allow guests
to use their kitchen. If you want to stay in during bad weather or if
you are unwell or you want to cut costs - this is handy), Biscuits,
chocolates & snack bars (I carried a few of these as well, to tide
through hunger pangs just when there’s not a store in sight! You could
also buy them in Iceland & they’re not very expensive. We also
stocked up on Skyr & fruits, which we bought locally), Re-usable
plate & spoon/fork (useful if you are trying to eat a pre-packaged
sandwich that you got earlier & the wrapper gives way), Ziploc
bags (to keep opened packs of biscuits fresh & also to waterproof
important items in your backpack, when venturing out in the rain),
Garbage bags (very handy to dispose trash in while on the road, until
you find a waste bin), A small water bottle (hang on to the one that you
might have purchased at the airport while flying in. It’s very handy to
have a bottle that you can fill & carry each morning, as you leave
your hotel).
Umbrella
(not very useful due to the wind, but, handy as a cover over the
photographer, on rainy days), Alarm clock (could either be your mobile
phone or an alarm – useful if you’re not planning to stay at hotels
where you can ask for a wake-up call), Torch / flashlight, with spare
batteries (for exploring caves or venturing out at night), CDs of your
favourite music (For the drive. Your only other option is the radio),
Power adapter (for all your gadgets), a Net-book (this was great as it
was much smaller & lighter than my regular laptop. I used it
wherever I had wi-fi access, to keep in touch with family & keeping
an eye on road & weather conditions in Iceland. It was also great
for daily back-ups & analysis of our photographs).
Spare
shoes (Incase your shoe is soaked in the rain / slush. If you don’t
want to carry a spare, dry your wet shoes overnight by placing them in
front of the room heater, at a safe distance), A basic first aid kit
(also all your prescribed medication as well as ones for basics like
cold & fever), Synthetic clothes rather than cotton (they dry very
quickly, in the rare case that you are caught in the rain without your
waterproof jacket), lots of spare socks, and finally, Swimwear (even in
winter, to use at hot tubs & pools).
Guide-book:
Lonely Planet’s guide to Iceland, 2010 edition. We
also picked up useful brochures (for local zones) along our way &
the ‘Around Iceland’ guide at the airport, when we arrived. Reading the
paper while at Reykjavik is another great way of getting information on
shows, exhibitions & local events.
Maps:
Our
primary map was Ferdakort, 1:5,00,000 scale. We also used maps
available in our guide-book & brochures. We also printed &
carried the Iceland Road Administration map from Vegagerdin.is, which
was useful.
Navigation:
We
used the Garmin GPS system that we got from our car rental agency. For
route planning, we relied more on our Ferdakort map (especially after
our experience on day 1), though our GPS was always switched on as a
back-up. It was very useful, though, to get directions to restaurants,
fuel stations or supermarkets within every town / city. We also used
Garmin to roughly estimate driving times between places (rough
estimates, not because Garmin is inaccurate, but, because it does not
take into consideration time spent in stopping & admiring the
scenery, which for us, sometimes lead to delays of even an hour or
more).
Websites:
Online guides & Blogs:
www.frommers.com/destinations/iceland/
www.parrikar.com/blog/?s=iceland&searchsubmit-top=Search
reluctantadventurer.blogspot.com/2008/09.html
www.travelpod.com/travel-blog/dunder/2/tpod
www.bigbigplanet.com/iceland/index
homepage.mac.com/wasleys/faroe_iceland_mw/iceland/index
www.xs4all.nl/~cile/travel/iceland/iceland_info.htm
gummiey.posterous.com/tag/iceland
www.hostel.is/Inspireme/SampleItineraries/ (sample itineraries around Iceland)
www.heimur.is/world/ (for the Around Iceland guidebook)
Weather, Roads, Buses:
http://en.vedur.is/ (Weather)
www.vegagerdin.is/english/ (Iceland Road administration)
www.re.is/Flybus/Schedule/ (Flybus schedules)
www.gedds.alaska.edu/AuroraForecast/ (Northern lights forecast)
Driving in Iceland:
www.safetravel.is/safetravel/en/
www.icelandguest.com/about-iceland/how-to-drive-in-iceland/
www.us.is/id/2693
Accommodation:
www.accommodation.is/
www.farmholidays.is/
General planning:
nat.is/main.html
www.inspiredbyiceland.com
www.travelnet.is/
www.visitreykjavik.is/desktopdefault.aspx/tabid-116
www.virtualtourist.com/travel/Europe/Iceland/Packing_Lists-Iceland-TG-C-1.html (packing lists)
www.gsmbensin.is/gsmbensin_web.php?language=en (for fuel prices)
www.youtube.com/watch?v=GxzhWkMD3co&NR=1 (Icelandic pronounciation & phrases - videos)
www.south.is/
http://en.east.is/
www.westiceland.is/
www.northiceland.is/
www.northwest.is/
www.visitnortheasticeland.is/
Guides & tours:
www.icelandguide.is/ (for guides)
www.superjeep.is
www.glacierjeeps.is
www.privatetravel.is
Weather & Clothing:
We
were unable to purchase our wind & water-proof jackets from home or
through the online North Face store. We bought them in Reykjavik, from a
local brand called 'Ice-wear', which was recommended to us by
Icelanders. It was slightly in-expensive than even North Face &
worked very well for us in all the harsh conditions that we faced. We
also got a good outer jacket from Ellingsen, by the harbor. We
constantly faced temperatures of -3 deg. C to + 5 deg. C. If you take
the wind chill factor into account, I suspect it was more like braving
weather below 0 all the time, going up to lows of -15 deg.C. We had
strong winds on a lot of days (10 mps) going up to 21 mps on one very
bad day. There were days when we encountered snow, rain & sunshine,
all within a few hours of each other. Use sunblock...the weather in
winter might be deceptive, but, I did tan. Waterproof trousers were very
useful on a lot of days, especially when we were out sight-seeing in
the rain. Umbrellas are pretty useless….we did use them on the day we
got there, before we purchased our water-proofs & we did provide a
few laughs to Reykjavikeurs, what with our umbrella turning inside out
& threatening to fly away! It was useful, though, to shield our
camera from the rain, on days when there was no wind (there weren’t too
many days like that!)
This
information may not be useful for those from/familiar with cold
climates. It’s for those from warmer countries: We dressed in layers –
thermal inners, with regular clothes, a mid-layer of fleece & an
outer layer that was wind & waterproof. We used waterproof gloves
when necessary & fleece-lined gloves at other times. A fleece lined
cap is also better - the wind just pierces through regular knit caps.
Car Rental:
We had a great experience with Reykjavik Rent-a-car.
The car was in very good condition and the agency was friendly &
hassle-free to deal with. We had mailed them before arriving, to ask if
they can get us a couple of small cushions to prop our back while
driving & they remembered & got us a couple of them. We extended
the car rent by a day & that too was a simple process. It
was also very nice of them to let us retain our Icelandic mobile number
for a couple of days after we returned the car, at no extra cost!
Car:
Hyundai
Tucson, 4x4, Petrol variant. With Garmin (GPS) and a mobile phone (with
an Icelandic sim card from Vodafone & 1000 ISK talk-time). After
exhausting the 1000 ISK, we got Vodafone re-charge cards from fuel
stations as & when required.
Hotels:
Reykjavik – Snorri’s Guesthouse
Selfoss – Gesthus
Vik – Hotel Hofdabrekka
Jokulsarlon – Gerdi (Farmhouse)
Breidalsvik – Hotel Blafell
Museums visited / Shows seen:
Duushus (a collection of hand-made models of ships & boats), Keflavik
Skogar Folk Museum, Skogar
National Museum, Reykjavik
Reykjavik Museum of Photography, Reykjavik
Arbaejarsafn, Reykjavik
Saga Museum, Perlan, Reykjavik
Settlement Exhibition (Reykjavik 871 +/-2), Reykjavik
Let’s talk local - Reykjavik, Reykjavik
There
are countless museums, exhibitions & sculptures that you can visit
and shows that you can watch. Due to lack of time, we could see only a
few. Also, during winter, many of the smaller ones are shut so find out
before you turn up.
Guides:
Glacier walk – Icelandic Mountain Guides
Laki tour – Arcanum (snow.is), with Ashpure as our guide.
Thingvellir, Langjokull & West Iceland– Privatetravel.is, with Oli as our guide.
Photography tour to Snaefellsnes & Northern Lights Tour – Icelandaurora.com
Food:
I’m
vegetarian & my husband eats very limited meat (chicken &
fish). Most restaurants in Reykjavik had at least a couple of meat-free
dishes on their menu. Outside of Reykjavik, we did have a harder time…we
had to sustain only on sandwiches, fries, pita or soup. Pasta &
pizza were available at cafés in some larger towns. A lot of the
restaurants at very small towns were shut due to winter & we managed
by eating at fuel stations. We did get some different food at a few
farms that we stayed in, but, it was really expensive. We stocked up on
fruits & Skyr, which soon became a favourite. My reluctant husband
did try Icelandic lamb & he loved it!
Typically,
for vegetarian meals, we spent 1200 to 2000 ISK per person. The more
expensive restaurants at Reykjavik cost 2500-3000 ISK per person. At
farmhouses, meals cost 3500-4500 per person. Breakfast was provided at
all our hotels, except at Selfoss (the kitchen was closed as it was
winter).
Restaurants:
Reykjavik:
Graenn Kostur (Veg-repeat visits), A Naestu Grosum (Veg), Kitchen
Eldhus (Nepali), Eldsmidjan Pizza (repeat visits), Rossopomodoro
(Italian), Bakari Sandholt, Caruso (Italian-repeat visits), Geysir
Bistro & Bar, Krua Thai (Thai), Austur India Felagid (Indian), Basil
& lime (Italian), Food court at Kringlan Mall.
Keflavik: Rain
Grindavik: Mamma Mia
Selfoss: Subway, Gudnabakari (for breakfast).
Gulfoss: Café near the visitors’ center.
Hvolsvollur: Galleri Pizza
Vik: At the N1 fuel station. Also at our hotel, Hofdabrekka.
Skaftafell, Jokulsarlon: At our farmstay, Gerdi. Also at the fuel station at Freysnes.
Hofn: Kaffi Hornid
Djupivogur: Vid Voginn
Breidalsvik: Hotel Blafell
Read this to know more about my experience in Iceland.
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