Iceland Travel Forum

Hi,

I am new to VT but must say it is a fabulous place to interact and share experiences. KUDOS to all of you!!

Me and my better half will be here in 21-28 may. Still trying to figure the best itineary though! Need help on car rental (incdg type of car) and an economical place for accomodation.
Do you guys think vegetarians can survive here? Would really appreciate if someone can point some Veg. Outlets!! Thanks

The circle around the island

Food is expensive and meat/fish oriented. They do grow some veggies in greenhouses using geothermal heat. I would suggest taking a supply of your favorite breakfast bars with you. You won't have trouble in the larger places but most towns are small and there are not that many options. I would make sure I got a 4WD or AWD car. The roads are in good shape, even when not paved, but most rentals I saw when I was there were the above. The Honda HRV looks wonderful - wish we could get it in the States. Check my Iceland pages. I would not miss Krafla - amazing but somehow I don't seem to have a tip on that. The whole country is amazing. If at all possible I would add some time.

Hi there
Welcome to VT. Yes it is a great place to get info and share some others. I would say that in a week you can do all kind of things. You can in a week drive around the country. The ring road is around I think 1300-1400 km and some pretty good roads most of it. You can have a look at this :

Reykjavik is a nice place, not to big and not to small. But when I get tired of it I have a few places in the country side to go to .
If you want a realy good view over the city, you can eather go to Hallgrimskirkja, a church near the center or you can also go to the Pearl . It is a view platform put on top of the tanks where the hot water is kept in before pumped out to heat the houses and the swimming pools and stuff. I think about 90-95 % houses in Iceland are heated by geothermacal hot water.And the cold water is the cleanest as it is a natural water coming from the ground and you can drink it straight from the tap.
Some good paths go arround most of the city along the seaside so it is nice to go walking / biking arround the city and don't miss out the harbour area and the Seltjarnarnes. There are some nice places to go dining and some others to go dancing and again some others to go shopping. There are some realy good swimming pools with hot pots as we call them and some with a free sauna. It only costs about 3-4 USD to get into the pools and it sure is worth it.
From Reykjavik you can fly to some parts of the country, you can get on sightseen tours, take buses to different parts of the country and of course you can take your own car and drive where ever you like :)

The rest of Iceland the land of Ice and fire
I am just gonna lead you on the ring road from Reykjavik going north.
When leaving Reykjavik heading north there are many places you can go to I will just name a few here. You can head to the north to Akureyri. It is a nice place 390 km from Reykjavik. From there about 100 km from Akureyri after passing Dettifoss waterfall you arrive at Myvatn. It is worth spending 2 days or so there. From there you head towards Egilstaðir. On that part there are some nice places like Goðafoss Jokulsargljufur and Asbyrgi.
Egilstadir is a nice little town in the east, you are actually half way arround the country there. Going from there you can drive arround the eastfjords and come to the small town Hofn. Just after Hofn you will have the big glacier Vatnajokull, where you can go on a snowmobile ride. A bout 50-100 Km from Hofn you will come to Jokulsarlon and that is a place you MUST stop at !!
It is soooooo beautiful . From there you can continue along the south and you will arrive at Skaftafell National park. That is also a place of must stop at . You can go for some nice hikes in that area and for one you can see the Svartifoss waterfall. Further west along the coast to Vik a small village with black sand beaches and in the area there is a rich bird life. Lots of puffins at the Dyrholaey aswell as Reynisfjall in the summer after 25 june . From there you can go to Solheimajokull a glacier tounge.You can park about 10 minutes walk from it and then walk all the way up to it and even touch it and clime on it but be care full. It comes from Myrdalsjokull a glacier where you can also go on snowmobile. You might also stop at Skogar where there is both a interresting museum and a nice waterfall Skogarfoss. Not far from there is another waterfall Seljalandsfoss and you can even walk behind that one. From there you have about 1,5-2 hours drive to Reykjavik .
Hope you enjoy the tour.

Well let us then have some more information on Iceland and how to travel arround and let us start by how to get there : You can come by flight there are 2 air liners that fly up here freqently :
A airliner flying to Iceland And Icelandair in UK
And the USA link to Icelandair Icelandair USA link .
Then you can come by ferry from Scandinavia and Shetlands .
A ferry sailing Icekand,Faroe Islands, Shetlands,Denmark and Norway

Then we can take the difernt buses arround the country : The main terminal for buses going arround the country from Reykjavik

The fly bus aswell as the main bus company taking care of the eatern route along the south coast

The bus company taking care of the northern route

This one takes care of the West part

That is the local airliner

Then to keep on with the transport I want to name this car rental : a very good car rental in Reykjavik

Another one here covers more of the country : Car rental arround the country

And now you are here then you need a place to stay and at the first 2 I might get a deal fo you : A good well located hotel in Reykjavik
Another goodhotel in Reykjavik

And here is a list of some hotels in Reykjavik :
Hotels in Reykjavik and arround Keflavik

And here is if you want to go arround Iceland staying at farms and it a good option : Good acccommadation arround Iceland

And here is another link for hotels arround the country : Hotels arround Iceland

And one more from the same chain : http://www.icehotel.is/

And of course info about hostels Hostels in Iceland

A list of accomadation arround Iceland

This one is about all kind of accomadation : Info on accomadation

Now about the gas and sevicestations arround Iceland at this company Esso ( not in english) starts from Reykjavik going to Keflavik (S-V) going west then to westfjords goingto the north and then the restarround the country here is the list :
Esso service stationsarround Iceland

Here is Shell map of stations : Shell stations arround Iceland

And here is a pretty good site if ou want to rent a cottage well you can in many of them even have your own private hot tub and all take a look at his one :
Rent a cottage somwhere in Iceland

If you want to go fishing or something else then look here a good list over different activities :
Some good list of activities in Iceland

Some good Jeep tour company is here : A good jeep tour company

Here is a good snowmobile and 4x4 bikes tour company : Good snowmobile and 4x4 bikes tour company

And then this one : A great boat trips arround Dyrholaey



Willing to help out as much as possible to make your trip to Iceland a good one, I am able to get you different discounts on hotels ,tours,horse riding,whale watching,car rental.

I am sorry but my links got lost but they can be seen in http://www.lonelyplanet.com/ under europe scandinavia FAQ link number 22 and 27 and then some more.
Bragi