Iceland, or Land of Ice as I like to call it, is truly spectacular. You quickly run out of superlatives when trying to describe the landscape. Song and I both agree it’s the best scenery we have seen. The photos don’t do it justice – the vistas are too wide to capture on camera, and I tried using the panorama setting but it just doesn’t show it as it is in reality.
Reykjavik is where you need to stay – it has all the best restaurants, all the tours, and is within easy reach of the Golden Circle.
One bad thing about Iceland is that most things are expensive – coffee was between $5 and $7, a decent meal (and an average one) costs around $30-$50 a head. The bus to the Blue Lagoon was about $85 for 2. So if you go, be prepared.
Another bad thing is that the drivers are rubbish – most of them never signal and cut across lanes and in front of you without warning. Half of them drive 20 kmh above the speed limit and the other half 20 kmh below the limit. So you are either being tail-gated or have to drive too close to the car in front or drop to a crawl. However, because the landscape is generally flat where the roads are, you can see for miles and can overtake. Sometimes we drove for ages without seeing another car.
Song wants to come back, so we’re thinking about when – we didn’t explore South of Reykjavik so maybe we’ll do that next time.
If you are travelling to Europe, I’d highly recommend adding Iceland to the itinerary – it’s less than 3 hours from London. We spent 6 days and we felt that was enough time to see everything and not be rushed. I’d also recommend hiring a car – it gives you flexibility and isn’t too much more expensive than taking the coaches.
