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Old 20 May 17, 09:20 PM  
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NatsyNoo
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Natsynoo's Icelandic Adventure - March 2017

I thought it was about time I did the trippie from our trip to Iceland in March! I had a major setback in that our hard drive went kaput but now that that’s resolved and our photos were (thankfully) saved (I hadn’t had a chance to back them up before it happened), I can press on and hopefully help anyone planning a trip or thinking of going to the land of fire and ice!

Highs & Lows can be found here

Day 1 – Travel & Arrival

We woke up at 6.30am ready for the day ahead! Today was actually my birthday, although this trip was DH’s Christmas present (cheeky me! ) so we started off with prezzies, before getting up, packing the final bits and bobs, and hitting the road.

We planned to stop off at the Toby Carvery for one of their bargain breakfasts first, and before that, I had to quickly nip into work to send an email that I had dopily put into draft the day before but not sent. We also had to drop our house rabbit, Buttons, off at my friend’s. She always takes care of him when we go on holiday, we’re very lucky to have her and he has a ball playing with her bunnies, Bonnie & Clive.

It didn’t take us long to tuck away a decent amount of egg, bacon and Yorkshire puddings (£14.48 for two breakfasts and two large OJs) before we hit the road. We live in Bournemouth, and the drive to Stansted took about 2.5 hours, which was a pretty good run.

We dropped off our case at the Easyjet desk, and then headed through security to departures. We had a while before our 2.45pm flight, so we bought a couple of drinks from WHSmith and then sat and people watched.

The flight took off a few minutes late but we still landed on time at 6pm. It was a fairly uneventful flight (I watched something on my tablet, and I think Matt read the paper on his). We both remarked on how quiet the airport was when we landed. It was a ghost town. Our case came through fairly quickly, and we then waited about 15 minutes for our car hire company to collect us.

The process was very smooth and before long, we paid our balance (£215 less the £45 deposit that we had already paid) for our Suzuki Vitara, and hit the road. Matt was a bit thrown by going around the roundabouts the wrong way, but he soon got used to it!

Standard car shots…taken at Diamond Beach on day 3!



We had to visit a supermarket before finding our accommodation to get some essentials, packed lunches for the few days we were there, and some dinner for this evening, and at just after 7pm, we found that most were closed! We did thankfully find a Netto on our 4th attempt and for just a few essentials (bottled water, bread, ham, cheese, 2 oven pizzas, some butter and 2 pots of Skyr) it came to £39!

That is one thing we found during our entire stay. EVERYTHING is so expensive. I knew it would be but I wasn’t quite prepared for this. It was £15 for a pack of sliced cheese that we found (8 slices). We very quickly put that back. When we went to Gulfoss the next day, we found that it was £15 for a bowl of soup or a sandwich. We were glad that we bought the bits that we needed to make our own and had packed lots of snacks to bring with us from the UK. They were a Godsend, as having had to unexpectedly move house the month before, we had a bit of a tighter budget for this trip than we would have liked.

Anyway, on with the story, we found our Air B&B apartment with no hassle, and arrived at 8.15pm. Our host was lovely, showed us around, handed over the keys, and then left us to it, so we quickly unpacked, and sat down with our pizzas for a couple of hours watching the English speaking channel on TV. We also had a Fondant Fancy…it was my birthday after all!

Knowing what a busy few days ahead of us we had, we headed into bed at 10.30pm.

Here are a few piccies of the apartment:













Day 2 – Golden Circle & Secret Lagoon

The agenda today was very busy, so we were up and out at 8am. One thing that struck us was the smell, it was very sulphuric. We got used to it during our time here though.

The views whilst driving were just spectacular!



Our first stop was Thingvellir, which we arrived at at 8.50am. Thingvellir is a fissure where the tectonic plates are splitting (and also the home of Iceland’s first parliament, in the 1200s). It was a wonderful sight, but boy oh boy, I have never felt cold like it. It felt like brain freeze. We spent an hour wandering around and taking photos, before getting back into our car onto our next stop.























I loved seeing the Icelandic Ponies on the side of the road! We didn’t stop today, in the hope that we would tomorrow, but we didn’t get the chance in the end



It took about another 40 minutes to get to Geysir, the home of the Geysir and Strokkur geysers. This was probably both of our favourite sights on the whole trip, there was nothing more spectacular than seeing these natural wonders exploding into the sky. The smell was gross but worth it to witness it. I would go back to Iceland just to see Strokkur again!





We left here at about 11.30am, and headed to Gulfoss, which was only about a 10 minute drive away. Gulfoss is a giant waterfall, or cluster of waterfalls, and it was spectacular.









We didn’t stay here for too long, but we did buy a magnet of all of the main sights of Iceland for 670ISK or £5 which was at the top end of what we would feel comfortable paying for a basic magnet! Before heading off to our next stop, we ate our sandwiches, as the next drive was quite a long one.

Before embarking on our long journey though, we went back to Geysir for petrol, which was 7500ISK (£60) for about ½ tank. Little did we know that the petrol station held an additional £200 on my debit card for the next 2 weeks (which is apparently standard over there!).

Our next stop was Seljalandsfoss, which was a little bit off the beaten track but well worth the visit. Seljalandsfoss is another spectacular waterfall, and well worth the 90 minute drive. We arrived at 2.30pm and left again at 2.50pm.





We continued to drive east, onto Skogafoss, which was by far our favourite waterfall. It was probably because the sun treated us with its presence, but it was magnificent!









We left here at 3.45pm, and headed back towards the west, to the Secret Lagoon.

Now Iceland is famous for the Blue Lagoon. It often pops up on Facebook as ‘places you must visit before you die’ and is heavily marketed at the airport. But it is expensive, at about £70 (from memory) per person to visit. But what many people don’t know is that it is not a natural geothermal pool, but entirely man-made. It is actually a converted quarry.

As such, I just couldn’t see that the experience justified the price. I wanted to visit a real geothermal pool. And so with some research, I found the Secret Lagoon. It was not too busy, just enough to make an atmosphere, and I loved floating around for an hour, watching the people, and listening to people’s travel experiences.

As you can imagine, getting from the changing room to the pool was absolutely freezing! And getting out again even worse! Brrrrr! It was wonderful though, I loved finding the spots where the water from the hot springs entered the pool and feeling it scald my back! Knowing it was all natural was a really unique experience, and we both loved it!







After taking some photos, we left the Secret Lagoon at 6.45pm and headed back to our apartment, which took about 90 minutes.





We saw the most beautiful sunset on the way home!





We both showered, tucked into some mac & cheese (brought from home) for dinner, and were in bed by about 10.30pm.
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Old 20 May 17, 09:22 PM  
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Day 3 – Jokulsarlon

When I first booked this trip, I didn’t know a lot about Iceland. I didn’t know what we were going to see and do. It was all new to me. I started by looking at the two guide books that I had bought, and looking online, and collating a list of sites that looked pretty or sounded interesting. I collated them geographically and ended up coming up with an itinerary. One of the images that blew me away was of Jokulsarlon, so although it was a 5 hour drive away from our apartment, I knew that we had to go there. Matt was happy driving, so it made the itinerary!

We left the apartment at 7.20am, which was a little later than planned, and noticed that the traffic was a lot busier than the day before (today was Monday). We topped up with some petrol locally (this time on the credit card to avoid another hold on my debit card!) and headed off.

After a 3-hour drive, we arrived at our first stop, Dyrholaey (Deer-Hay), where we hoped to see some puffins. They had obviously had some heavy snowfall overnight, as the roads were very white, but we powered through…to a point, and then we couldn’t see what was the side of the road versus a ditch, having almost been blown off the road by a strong coastal wind. We are not experienced in driving in the snow, and being unfamiliar with the area also, we started to feel unsafe, and frankly, out of our depth, so we took the decision to abandon this stop and move onto the next. It was a shame, as we had really wanted to see the puffins, but knew our safety mattered most.

Just to add here, that we had researched this trip, and had read mixed reviews about driving in Iceland in March. A couple said that tourists shouldn’t do it. Others said we’d be fine. Some said we would be fine in a normal car. Others recommended a 4x4. We took the decision to go for it, over tours, largely to enable as much flexibility with our plans as we could, and both agree that we would do the same again, but we knew that we had to be very careful, sensible, and to have our wits about us. Nothing at all in our research had prepared us for what would happen next though.

Our next stop was Rejnisfjara (famous black beach and black stone pillars). The roads in Iceland are largely quiet enough for you to stop without affecting traffic. We peered down the side road, and saw something not dissimilar to what we had seen at Dyrholaey. Having read about a snowstorm in Vik, ahead, we decided to try and beat it before it got too bad, rather than risk it. Again, it was a shame, but our safety mattered more.

We did have a discussion at this point about whether we should turn back or keep going. We were 3 ½ hours in already, with only 1 ½ to go, and decided to just keep making sensible decisions but keep going for now.

It didn’t take long for us to join the storm. We slowed our pace, kept in the tracks of the cars in front, and were very careful.

It was a serious relief to get out the other side. We weren’t entirely safe yet, there were a couple more hairy moments between Vik and Jokulsarlon, and we were very relieved to get to Jokulsarlon unscathed.

Although at times tricky, the drive was beautiful.



We arrived at 12.30pm, and before heading out and exploring, we had our lunch.

We were used to the cold by this point, we were well wrapped up against it, but here we were being absolutely pelted by hail, right in our faces. We hadn’t come all this way and driven in the conditions that we had though to give up, so we made sure we wandered as far as we could, before moving onto our next stop, Diamond Beach.

Jokulsarlon:















The grey/black bergs are that way because volcanic ash has landed on them in the past.

Diamond Beach:























Jokulsarlon was wonderful (although would definitely have been more impressive if the sun had been shining) but Diamond Beach was spectacular. I absolutely loved it, playing around with the icebergs and trying to escape from the breaking waves. I’d have loved to stay longer, but we were very mindful of the raging storm that we had to pass through to get back home, and it was only going to make the road conditions even more treacherous, so we didn’t want to leave it too long to turn back.

Look at this snowflake…so pretty!



We did also stop at Fjallsarlon, basically the other side of Jokulsarlon, but the snow was just too deep, and we couldn’t walk far enough to see anything much.

We ended up leaving the area at 3.15pm, so we weren’t there long considering the time it had taken to get there, and we’re glad we saw it, but as I say, knew we couldn’t leave it too long to get back again.

On our way back, we saw this sculpture, which we learned was remains from a bridge that was destroyed following a volcanic eruption some years ago!



When we got to Hof (the next major town after Vik heading eastwards), there was another terrible snowstorm, but again, we took it slow and made it out the other side ok. Not knowing if we might get stuck on the way back, we topped up with petrol again in Hof before moving on.

The storm that we hit next was the worst thing that we have ever experienced in our lives. There was zero visibility (we couldn’t even see our bumper…let alone where the side of the road was and therefore ended up in a lava field!). This lasted for a good hour, and our hearts were in our mouths throughout. We let a snowplough go in front of us, thinking the tracks would help us, but it didn’t last long before it sped off, swinging from side to side in the snow. We spent about 20 minutes leading the convoy, which Matt was less than pleased about, but thankfully, a lifesaving tourist bus overtook us and led the way at a speed that we could keep up with.

We saw no less than 6 cars that had come off the road and ditched in the lava field, and then when we got to Vik, and there was a steep hill, there were about 10 or 12 cars/coaches that couldn’t make it up as it was so slippery. It was at this moment that we were really thankful for our automatic 4x4.

Thankfully, the rest of the journey was largely uneventful, and we made it home at about 9.30pm. We were absolutely exhausted. It had been a stressful and emotional day, and all we wanted was shower and bed, so that is exactly what we did.

Day 4 – Reykjavik & Home

Today was time to go home. We had a great time in Iceland, but we were ready to go home. I think yesterday had really cemented this. We had another busy day ahead of us first though!

We left the apartment for the final time at 8.10am, and arrived in Reykjavik at 8.40pm, after an uneventful journey.

We parked the car opposite the Tjornin which cost 500ISK for 4-hours. Very reasonable!



We walked down to the Harpa concert hall first, just by coincidence. It is a wonderful piece of architecture!





Our next stop was the iconic Sun Voyager, which is a fantastic landmark. We were lucky that the sun had come out!







This is the view of the lake by the Harpa and Sunvoyager…beautiful!




We then found the Hallgrimmskirkja, before wandering down the Laugavegur (main shopping street in Reykjavik).









Finally, we stopped in Old Reykjavik, to see the town hall, Domkirkja and Austurvollur.





We were glad to have spent a couple of hours wandering around Reykjavik, but we were not particularly blown away. It’s not somewhere we’d rush back to particularly, and are glad that we didn’t stay here.

Before heading back to the car, we grabbed a hotdog (900ISK) from the place that Bill Clinton and Kim Kardashian had opted for.



We left Reykjavik at 10.30am, to see the sights of the Reykjanes Peninsular.

Our first stop was the Bridge Between Continents. We loved this, particularly when I stood in the USA and Matt was in Eurasia!





We then headed to Gunnuhver, another steaming hot spring.



We had another car lunch, before crossing over to the Reykjanesviti (lighthouse). The view here was amazing, so raw!









Our final stop was Gardur, to kill some time before heading back to the airport. This was a little fishing town. There wasn’t too much to see, but at least we can say we visited!







Before we left Gardur, I repacked our hand luggage, and then we drove back to the airport via one final petrol stop. Dropping the car off was a seamless process, and they dropped us off at the terminal. Check-in and security was simple, so we just sat and chilled for a couple of hours before our flight home.

The Verdict

We had a great time in Iceland. I hadn’t realised when I first booked it how big the country is! It is certainly baron, but beautiful in its own special way. It was freezing cold, but you get used to it, and it was worth braving the cold to see the natural sights. If my school had brought me here, perhaps I would have shown a greater flare and interest in Geography, as it would really have engaged me!

By far and away, our highlight was Geysir, closely followed by Skogafoss. Jokulsarlon should have been up there but the day was sort of tainted by the driving conditions and we didn’t see it at its best without the sun.

We both would absolutely return to Iceland in the future, but we’d head up to the north (Akuyeri) and the western fjords. We would also go in the summer in the hope that we would not be as impacted by the climate.

If anyone is thinking about visiting Iceland, I would totally say ‘do it’, but remember that the ‘best bits’ are off-piste.
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Old 20 May 17, 09:42 PM  
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charly77
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Great trippie! My son visited as part of geography gcse back in Feb and absolutely loved it. Thank you for sharing.
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Old 21 May 17, 06:11 AM  
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What fabulous photos - it looks stunning!

Driving in snowstorms is so very scary - Matt did well to get you there and back in one piece!
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2016 Quebec - Kuala Lumpar - New York City 2017 Dubai - Eurocamps France - Ontario and Quebec - So-Cal 2018 Montreal - Bangkok - New England 2019 Argentina - Quebec City - Hong Kong - 2020 Switzerland 2022 Arizona - Costa Med Cruise - Oslo 2023 Hong Kong - Gothenburg
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Old 21 May 17, 07:34 AM  
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Thanks for sharing, it's all so interesting, love the pics, some simply stunning scenery . Well done on managing the scary snowstorm journeys, I would not like that ! Gosh, how expensive ... I hadn't realised , those prices are ouch. Never thought about Iceland before but definitely intrigued now. Brill trippy, thank you ... And unexpected house move? Hope that all went ok X
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Old 21 May 17, 08:16 AM  
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Thanks for sharing - Great photos but you do look freezing! I knew Iceland was expensive but I think your costs are worse than I expected. I've got an itinerary planned out to hopefully take the kids next May half term. Would've loved to see northern lights after they let us down in Lapland a few years ago but I decided to opt for the almost midnight sun instead so that we can hopefullly do the full ringroad. Just need to convince hubby he wants to do all that driving.
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Old 21 May 17, 05:31 PM  
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Great pictures - you can really feel the cold as well looking at them! Glad you had a good trip.
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Old 22 May 17, 07:47 PM  
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Thank you for the trippie

We are debating about going in December but I'm torn between December or warmer months . We would like to see The Northern Lights although we wouldn't book a trip just for them as we know we might not see them, even in December.
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Old 23 May 17, 12:57 PM  
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NatsyNoo
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Originally Posted by charly77 View Post
Great trippie! My son visited as part of geography gcse back in Feb and absolutely loved it. Thank you for sharing.
Thanks for reading Sounds like a fantastic school trip!

Originally Posted by Melbatb View Post
What fabulous photos - it looks stunning!

Driving in snowstorms is so very scary - Matt did well to get you there and back in one piece!
It really is a beautiful place, once you get used to the baron-ness of it. The snow was so terrifying and he was not at all comfortable, I had to share a lot of encouraging words!

Originally Posted by WileyCoyote View Post
Thanks for sharing, it's all so interesting, love the pics, some simply stunning scenery . Well done on managing the scary snowstorm journeys, I would not like that ! Gosh, how expensive ... I hadn't realised , those prices are ouch. Never thought about Iceland before but definitely intrigued now. Brill trippy, thank you ... And unexpected house move? Hope that all went ok X
It was very scary and not an experience I wish to repeat!
The prices were very ouchy too but thankfully we managed to minimise our spends! If I hadn't been better prepared, we could have been in a bit of a pickle!
Yes, we still rent (too many holidays lol...we're working on it though!) and the landlady wanted to sell so we got kicked out which just ended up costing a fortune as our rent is now a lot higher, all the fees, etc. Such a pain but we like our new pad, thankfully!

Originally Posted by Geordieprincess View Post
Thanks for sharing - Great photos but you do look freezing! I knew Iceland was expensive but I think your costs are worse than I expected. I've got an itinerary planned out to hopefully take the kids next May half term. Would've loved to see northern lights after they let us down in Lapland a few years ago but I decided to opt for the almost midnight sun instead so that we can hopefullly do the full ringroad. Just need to convince hubby he wants to do all that driving.
It was so so so cold! We din't luck out with the Northern Lights, unfortunately. It was just too cloudy. May seems to be an ideal time to visit, and the ringroad would be great!

Originally Posted by CrispyA View Post
Great pictures - you can really feel the cold as well looking at them! Glad you had a good trip.
Haha it was so cold! Thanks for reading!

Originally Posted by P&S View Post
Thank you for the trippie

We are debating about going in December but I'm torn between December or warmer months . We would like to see The Northern Lights although we wouldn't book a trip just for them as we know we might not see them, even in December.
I think if I had the chance to go back, I wouldn't go in December. The weather in March was treacherous enough to stop us from doing things and to be dangerous and that's when it's improving. In December, even the locals struggle with the conditions. If I could give you some advice, it would be to stick to the warmer months, for sure.

Thanks for reading
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Old 3 Jun 17, 06:36 PM  
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Our daughter is loving your report she also gave a trip to Iceland for her partner as a Christmas present

They went the week of Valentine's Day and stayed in a village called hverageroi and also went everywhere you went. Diamond Beach, Geysir and also went to secret lagoon instead of blue lagoon. And also went into the rocket church

As they were there for a week they booked the northern light trip with a company that they had three nights to hopefully to see them. They had to phone them every morning the first was Valentines day but it was a no go, they managed to go out on the trip the following and although they stood out in the dark looking at sky for over 3 hours they did managed to see them

They loved Iceland but also found it expensive but will never forget their experiences

Glad you had a brilliant time and thank you for your report.

Melvin and Lesley
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