Iceland: the land of fire and ice! We’ve been wanting to make a trip around the ring road in Iceland for many years.

The flights to Iceland from Boston are short and inexpensive, English is widely spoken, driving is relatively easy, and of course Iceland has so much unique & beautiful scenery!

In this blog I’ll share practical information about planning a self-drive trip to Iceland as well as share our itinerary and photos from our trip in late May 2023.

Map of Places To Go In Iceland

I made the map below while planning what places to potentially see and where it made sense to stay along the ring road.

There are more places on this map than you could possibly see in 9 days or even 2 weeks but it helped me learn what’s out there.

On most of the icons, you can click them and see a photo of the destination.

The light blue icons are in the Reykjavik/Keflavik area and the extended golden circle. The Golden Circle can be done in a day, but there’s much more in the area.

The brown icons are locations on the F-Roads, which are only open mid-June through August/September and require a 4WD/AWD vehicle to access. Maybe our next trip to Iceland?

The dark blue icons are along the south-west coast, near Vik. Lots of waterfalls and the famous black sand beach here!

The purple icons are in the south-west, home of Vatnajökull glacier, glacier lagoon and Fjaðrárgljúfur Canyon.

The dark red icons are on the east coast of Iceland. Some people drive right through this region but look at all the places to see! Home of hidden gems!

The green icons are in northern Iceland, mostly between Akureyri and Myvatn, and the area known as the diamond circle.

The yellow icons are in western Iceland, mostly Snæfellsnes Peninsula.

The orange icons are the hotels that we stayed at on our 9 day ring road trip, May 21st through May 29th of 2023.

Why visit Iceland?

The number one reason for most people to visit Iceland is to see the scenery. See the land of fire & ice! You probably won’t see fire, unless a volcano happens to be erupting, but there are glaciers you can visit all year round.

Photography

Iceland is a photographer’s dream. The unique landscapes, the ever-changing weather, the 24 hours of light in June, extra long “golden hour”, wildlife, etc. The weather can make it a challenging environment for photography (i.e. wind and rain) but its worth it and you’ll become a better photographer.

Waterfalls

We’ve been to a lot of places with waterfalls but we’ve never seen so many waterfalls as we did in Iceland. They’re everywhere! If you drive the ring road, you’ll actually get used to them and only stop for the really nice ones.

My favorite waterfalls were the ones on the south coast near Vik: Seljalandsfoss, Skogafoss and Kvernufoss. I have many more on my Iceland map in this post.

A note about photographing waterfalls on DSLR or mirrorless cameras … If you want that silky look that I have in some of my photos, you need to use a long shutter speed, which usually means you’ll need a tripod to prevent blur. Set the aperture to a high number (i.e. f/16) and use an ND filter, which is essentially sunglasses for your camera. I typically photograph waterfalls at a shutter speed of 1 second for that silky look.

Glaciers

Iceland has the second largest glacier in Europe. Vatnajökull in southeast Iceland is absolutely massive. There are many tours you can go on to walk on the glacier for as little as 3 hours or for the entire day. There’s also ice climbing tours for the most adventurous travelers and even zip lining!

If you go in the winter, there’s also tours through beautiful ice caves.

Northern Lights

If you go to Iceland between the months of September and April, you may get to see the northern lights! Your best odds are between October and March when the nights are longest and darkest. However, its never a guarantee.

Although I haven’t yet seen the northern lights in Iceland because I haven’t visited in winter, I have seen them in Maine where I live. Unless the aurora borealis is really strong, the northern lights may actually look dull and grey to the naked eye but they will show up bright green on your camera… Even on a smartphone. That’s because cameras can capture more light than our eyes.

For best results on a DSLR or mirrorless camera, set the camera to manual, with the lowest number aperture possible (i.e. f/2.8), the focal length as wide as possible, and experiment with longer shutter speeds. The longer the shutter is open, the more light it captures, and the photos are brighter.

Hiking / Biking

We didn’t do much hiking on this trip but there’s no shortage of hiking trails with amazing views. Go in late June, July or August if you want to go hiking or biking.

Check out AllTrails for maps and reviews of popular hiking trails.

Spas, Baths & Lagoons

Soaking with friends in warm water pools is a big part of Iceland culture. There are many pools throughout the country where the locals go, as well as natural hot springs out in the wild and beautiful lagoons for the tourists.

Blue Lagoon is the most famous and I recommend visiting it if you’ve never been. Yes, it’s touristy but its a unique experience!

We went to 4 lagoons during our trip around the ring road and our favorite was the brand new Forest Lagoon in Akureyri (north Iceland). Forest Lagoon is less of a tourist attraction and more of a legitimate nordic spa.

A note about spa etiquette in Iceland… You wear a bathing suit, even in saunas, but you absolutely must shower naked before getting in the water. There are separate men and women locker rooms and all of the lagoons we visited had at least some private shower stalls if you’re not comfortable in a communal shower area.

Icelandic Food

The food in Iceland isn’t talked about much but we thought it was fantastic! You’ll probably have the best lamb in your life in Iceland. The seafood is very good too and even the burgers were amazing.

And for a quick meal on-the-go? Try the hot dogs at the gas stations! We had them almost every day for lunch. Get your hot dog with the works: crispy and raw onions and all of the sauces.

Skip the fermented shark. We didn’t try it but heard its disgusting.

Also, please don’t support the horrible act of whale hunting. Don’t eat whale!

Iceland’s “Ring Road”

The Ring Road takes you around much of the perimeter of Iceland. Without any additional detours, it would be 1,433 km (≈900 miles) and take 18 hours to drive around the ring road. That’s not realistic though, because of course you’re going to take some detours, such as the famous “Golden Circle” about an hour outside of Reykjavik and to other destinations not located directly on the ring road.

In our case, we drove 2,600 km (≈1600 miles) in 9 days on our self drive tour around the ring road of Iceland, including detours for the golden circle, Borgarfjörður eystri in the northeast, as well as driving around the perimeter of Snæfellsnes Peninsula in the west.

To put 1,600 miles in perspective, that’s like driving from Bangor, Maine to Orlando, FL. It would be a lot at once, but spaced over 9 days it didn’t feel bad at all. Each day we had a 2 or 3 hour drive between places we stayed along the ring road, with many stops along the way and magnificent scenery from the road.

Driving in Iceland

Iceland is a very easy country to drive in; you drive on the right side, the roads aren’t too narrow, there isn’t a lot of other cars and the speed limit is low.

There are a lot of round-abouts (traffic circles) in Iceland, so if you’re coming from the US, that may be intimidating, so read up on round-abouts and other rules of the road in Iceland. Most of the round-about are one lane, which is easier.

Even with all those roundabouts, we weren’t ever nervous driving in Iceland, especially compared to Ireland and Scotland where we had some white knuckle drives on very narrow roads or busy cities. This is subjective of course and it would be an entirely different story in the winter but we felt very relaxed driving in Iceland in late May.

Iceland is also easy to self-tour because of the wealth of information online, like this blog post. You’ll quickly learn which sights you want to see and be on your way to building your own itinerary.

Alternatively, if driving isn’t your thing, there’s no shortage of single-day or multi-day tours out of Reykavik either. However, if you want to do the whole ring road, I suggest a self drive tour.

Renting a Car

We rented our vehicle from Lotus Car Rental after reading many positive reviews about them in Iceland Facebook groups. It was $1,070 for 9 days ($119/day) for an AWD automatic Suzuki Vitara with their “platinum coverage”.

The insurance covered absolutely any accidental damage that occurred to the vehicle, giving us peace of mind. A portable WiFi hotspot was also included which we loved because it let us use navigation and look things up on our phones.

Navigation

Speaking of navigation, many rental cars now have Apple CarPlay and Android Auto built-in. Just plug your phone into the USB and the map will appear on the car’s screen. If you don’t have WiFi or international roaming, you can download an offline map of Iceland in Google Maps on your phone before your trip.

Fuel

Much of the ring road is very remote, and it could be hours between gas stations, so fill up whenever you can. We never got below about half a tank.

On the subject of filling up at gas stations, most offer pay-at-the-pump, but you almost always need a card with a pin number, so I used my debit card. (Credit cards without a pin are accepted everywhere else) There will be a hold on your debit card account for the amount you selected, and if you don’t use that full amount, it will clear in a couple of days and you’ll only be charged for what you used. Easy. Just make sure to select “English” on the machine. 🙂

Parking

Parking is free at many destinations, or at least inexpensive. Some tourist sites such as Seljalandsfoss, Hverir in Myvatn, and Kirkjufell have pay machines at the parking lot. (Pro tip: Take a photo of your license plate when you pick up your rental car so that you can quickly look it up)

In cities like Reykjavik and Akureyri and even at some tourist sites, they utilize the Parka app. Download the app to your phone, enter your credit card and license plate number, and you can quickly and easily pay for parking on your phone.

Where To Stay along the Ring Road

When we had looked at a potential trip years ago when tourism was just starting to take off, we had found that there weren’t a lot of accommodations outside of Reykjavik. Since then, hotels have caught up quite a bit with demand, though options are still relatively limited and you must book well in advance.

We saw a lot of camper vans in Iceland; probably more than we’ve seen anywhere else. I can’t tell you much about that because we’ve never done it, but I know that you have to stay at campgrounds. You can’t just park and sleep anywhere.

We booked all of the hotels we stayed at on Hotels.com. All but one included free breakfast. I highly recommend booking hotels with a breakfast buffet on any trip, but especially Iceland. Its great starting the day with a big breakfast and cappuccino to give me energy for the day, especially since lunch only consisted of either gas station hot dogs (they’re great, BTW) or protein bars.

Book hotels along the ring road so that you never have a drive over 3 hours between nights and that way it won’t feel like too much driving.

Here’s how we did it during our 9 day ring road trip …

We stayed at Frost & Fire Hotel in Hveragerði (45 minutes outside Reykjavik) the first night. This put us pretty close to the Golden Circle. Nearby Selfoss has many hotels too. Reykjavik has the most hotels by far but then it’s a slightly longer drive to the attractions on the Golden Circle.

The second night we stayed in Hotel Katla in Vik on the south coast, home of a very popular black sand beach, about 2.5 hours from Reykjavik, with lots of sight seeing along the way.

The third night we stayed at Fosshotel Vatnajokull just outside Höfn in the southeast, about 3 hours from Vik, and close the largest glacer in Iceland.

The fourth night we stayed at Blábjörg Resort in Borgarfjörður Eystri in the northeast, a cute coastal town almost 4 hours from Höfn, but an extremely scenic drive. It’s about an hour from Egilsstaðir, which would be another good choice on the east, as its a centrally located hub for day trips.

Next, we stayed in Mývatn at Hótel Laxá in the north for the next 2 nights. Akureyri, the second largest city in Iceland, would be another good place to stay in the north, but Mývatn is more convenient for day trips.

Our next destination was the Snæfellsnes Peninsula, but that would be about 6 hours from Myvatn, so we stayed at around the halfway point in Laugarbakki for our 7th night. There aren’t as many attractions in this northwest region but it was nice to break up the drive.

On our 8th night, we stayed in Grundarfjörður on the Snæfellsnes Peninsula, before returning to Reykjavik for our final day and spending our last night at a hotel near the airport.

Out of all the places to stay along the ring road, I’m glad we stayed 2 nights in the north but if we had more time I would do another night in Vik, and if possible another night somewhere on the very under-rated east coast.

Iceland Weather

The downside of going to Iceland is of course the extremely volatile weather. It’s said that you can experience four seasons of weather in one day in Iceland and that was absolutely true for us, minus any kind of hot summer weather.

Temperatures were in the high 40s when we went in May, which would have been perfectly fine if it wasn’t for the wind.

Weather is usually a gamble when you visit someplace for vacation. We’ve been lucky and unlucky. In Iceland I think we were a bit on the unlucky side, because we had a lot of rain and strong wind, but I get the impression that kind of weather occurs more often than not in Iceland and it certainly could’ve been worse.

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Does it rain a lot in Iceland?

In our 9 full days in Iceland, we had 2 mostly-sunny days and 3 days of bad weather with heavy rain and fog throughout all or most of the day and night. The remaining 4 days had a mix of weather.

There were clouds and showers for much of the day, but they would pass and then the sun would make an appearance. Sometimes you just have to wait for the weather to clear. In fact, one of our nicest days in the north started with fresh snow on the ground but then it became a beautiful day!

What about the wind in Iceland?

The one thing that was consistent throughout the 9 days was the wind! Iceland is known for its strong winds, but we had a few days of yellow alerts due to the strong winds. Wind so strong that it shakes the car and could damage the car door if you don’t hold onto it when opening it.

Bad weather can happen anytime, but from what I hear you’ll have the best odds of good weather in June, July and August, which is of course the busiest and most expensive time to visit Iceland.

Iceland Weather App

The best app and website for weather in Iceland is Vedur. We found their hourly forecasts to be quite accurate, and that’s where you’ll see any weather warnings.

Another good app to download is SafeTravel. This app will show you any current road closures, which is common outside of summer.

What To Pack, What To Wear

After talking about the weather, the next natural thing to discuss is what to pack and what to wear. This is going to vary by season of course, but I suggest layers.

Bring a warm mid-layer zip-up jacket and a waterproof jacket shell.

Bring a pair of waterproof pants that you can slip over your pants in case you get stuck in a downpour, or if you want to get really close to waterfalls.

Unless you’re going in July or August, I suggest a warm hat and two pairs of gloves in case one pair gets wet.

I also suggest bringing a small towel to dry off your stuff after you’ve been out in the rain, go behind a waterfall, etc.

You’ll see in the photos what we were wearing. I did fine with 3 pairs of pants, a thin base layer long sleeve shirt for each day, 2 mid-layer zip-ups (I only needed 1) and 2 waterproof jacket shells (again I only needed 1).

Also, to plug in and charge your devices, I suggest bringing a standard car charger for your phone, a portable battery with multiple USBs to charge multiple devices on the go, and “type C” plug adapters for the hotel rooms.

Our 9 Day Ring Road Itinerary

Below is the rough itinerary that I made in Excel for our 9 day ring road self-drive tour, knowing that we wouldn’t realistically be able to see all of these places.

I bolded the locations that we made it to and italicized the locations that we weren’t able to see due to either time constraints or most often because of really bad weather.

Now, without further ado, here are the details of our Iceland 9 Day Ring Road Itinerary and the photos we took along the way!

Day 1: The Golden Circle

We started the day off at Sky Lagoon near Reykjavik. It’s very nice, like the spa we visited in Quebec City, but unfortunately much more crowded/touristy.

Sky Lagoon offers a 7 step ritual, which includes a sauna, mineral scrub and steam bath. It was definitely worth the upgrade, but you can only use those facilities once, and there were way too many people at a time doing it.

Next was shopping and lunch in Reykjavik. It started raining pretty hard so instead of starting our circuit on the golden circle, we checked into our hotel, Frost & Fire in Hveragerdi, soaked in their hot tub and napped.

At 6pm the weather was clearing so we got onto the golden circle. However, on the way, it began HAILING!

Luckily the hail passed by the time we got to Strokkur Geysir, but while watching the eruptions the weather changed quickly on us and it began to sleet and snow with crazy wind gusts.

Fortunately the skies cleared (again) when we got to Gullfoss just a half hour later. With it being late in the evening, plus the volatile weather, Gulfoss wasn’t busy at all, and it’s absolutely beautiful. Much bigger than I imagined.

On the way back to the hotel, we stopped at another smaller waterfall, Faxafoss, because it was literally on the way.

We didn’t get back to the hotel until 10:00pm and by the time everything in town was closed, so no dinner for us! Luckily we had some protein bars so we didn’t go to bed with empty stomachs.

We missed Þingvellir National Park, Bruarfoss and Kerid Crater on the golden circle but could’ve easily seen them that day if we had better weather.

If we had another day, we would’ve made the trip to Gjáin and Háifoss but hopefully I’ll see that area if we visit again in the summer. We would combine those sights with a drive though Landmannalaugar on the F-roads in the highlands. The F-roads are usually only open mid-June through August.

Day 2: Hveragerdi to Vik

Much better weather on day #2! First stop of the day was Seljalandsfoss. Stunning! Walking behind the falls was fun. We got soaked but were prepared with waterproof pants, jackets and shoes.

We didn’t go to the other falls nearby, Gljufrabui, b/c it was really busy and I think that’s a tight spot.

Next was Skogafoss, and that was equally beautiful! Again very crowded because we were there at 1:00pm, which is probably the busiest time of the day but we still got nice photos and I could erase people in the photos in Photoshop.

Next was Kvernufoss just down the road. This seemed like more of a secret spot. No tour busses and hardly anyone there. A short hike on a well established trail takes you into the canyon where you can walk behind the falls. I loved this place.

Farther down the road, we saw the Sólheimajökull Glacier from the road. We should have driven up to it and went on a short walk to see it up-close but we were ready for a break, so we headed to our hotel, Katla Hotel, in Vik.

We enjoyed the hot tub and sauna at our hotel, as well as their really good buffet dinner with many Icelandic specialties.

After dinner we headed back out and went to Reynisfjara Beach, the black sand beach in Vik, but unfortunately the weather had changed for the worse, with more wind, clouds and fog. The beach is remarkable though. The rocks and the absolutely huge waves! This is a place I would love to see again on a nicer day.

Day 3: Vik to Höfn

We had a yellow alert for the entire day in Iceland’s weather app, Veður, for winds up to 23 m/s (45mph!) with possible hail or sleet.

The wind was no joke! We started the day off at Dyrhólaey Viewpoint where the wind was stronger than anything we’ve ever experienced. I was afraid my phone or camera would fly out of my hands. Unfortunately not the experience we hoped for there but the day got better.

Despite intermittent rain, hail and wind gusts, we still enjoyed Fjaðrárgljúfur Canyon, Jökulsárlón Lagoon and the scenery from the car.

At Fjaðrárgljúfur Canyon, an easy 1.5 mile roundtrip walk from the parking area takes you to several viewpoints of this beautiful canyon. The last viewpoint was the best, and there’s also a waterfall there.

At Jökulsárlón Lagoon, the icebergs were a brighter blue than I imagined. It was a highlight of my trip seeing those icebergs so close and we didn’t even need the boat tour, though I’m sure it would’ve been fun if it wasn’t cancelled because of the crazy wind. We also saw several seals swimming in the lagoon.

We went to “Diamond Beach” (Breiðamerkursandur) across the street from the glacier lagoon, a black sand beach where many of the smaller icebergs get washed up on the sand. The crystal clear icebergs look like diamonds. Unfortunately there weren’t many pieces of ice on the beach when we visited, and the weather was pretty terrible when we visited so we didn’t stay long.

The mountains and glaciers in this part of South Iceland were the nicest scenery we had seen so far on the trip, especially near Hofn.

Day 4: Höfn to Egilsstaðir & Borgarfjörður Eystri

This was one of the two nice sunny days we had on our trip, but it was still very windy in the first half of the day while the yellow weather alert was still active.

First stop of the day was Stokknes Beach and Vestahorn. Absolutely epic landscape! The wind was blowing hard, throwing black sand everywhere.

You have to take a private road to get there and the cost was about $7 per person, paid in the store by the road’s gate.

There’s a viking village prop for a movie here as well but we skipped it.

Next was a stop at Hvalnes Nature Reserve Beach for another black sand beach and more mountain views.

As much as we enjoyed the coastal views, we took the shortcut to Egilsstaðir on 939/95, a high elevation dirt/gravel road. The weather was much cloudier here than on the coast but we stopped to take some photos of waterfalls along the way.

Finally we made it to Egilsstaðir where we gassed up and made the final 45 minute drive to Borgarfjörður Eystri on an amazing mountain pass with lots of switch backs. It was a fun drive but it would be scary if it was snowing!

We loved Borgarfjörður Eystri! It’s a little fishing village, like what I would expect to see in Norway, surrounded by snow capped mountains. It’s a very popular hiking area but our main reason for going was to see the puffins.

The puffins viewing area is free to visit, always open and the puffins came within a few feet of us. It was only 10 minutes from our hotel, the Blabjorg Resort. We went to see the puffins after dinner and took tons of photos.

Here are a couple of drone photos from the mountain pass to Borgarfjörður Eystri. As you can imagine, its an epic place for hiking.

Day 5: Borgarfjörður Eystri to Mývatn

We left the charming fishing village and headed to the northern part of Iceland that really looks like another planet.

But of course we had several stops along the way.

First, an unplanned stop at a scenic foot bridge over Jökulsá á Brú, near the intersection of Route 1 and 925. It’s a beautiful canyon, with aqua water like at the famous Stuðlagil Canyon, but requires no effort and has no crowds.

We passed several waterfalls on the way, but the biggest one and the one with a parking area is Rjúkandi Waterfall. A quick but steep walk from the parking area takes you to a viewpoint of the falls.

Next, Instagram’s favorite canyon: Stuðlagil Canyon.

It’s a long dusty gravel road to Stuðlagil Canyon, about a half hour drive from Route 1 to the parking area. We stopped at the side with the stairs first only to use the toilet there b/c there was nowhere else to go on this drive! (That’s a common issue by the way, there aren’t many rest stops along the ring road)

The stairs at the Stuðlagil Canyon viewpoint looked like hell to climb and the view wouldn’t be as good on that side anyway, so we backtracked and drove to the other side, over the bridge, to the second larger parking lot.

It’s an easy to moderate 3.5 mile roundtrip hike and then some sketchy climbing down rocks and hopping over mud to get down to the water, but you’ll get perfectly nice views without going all the way down to the water.

Yes, the water in Stuðlagil Canyon really is this beautiful aqua color, at least when we were there! But you won’t be alone! Although this is a very remote region of Iceland, a lot of people go see this canyon!

After getting back onto Route 1, the landscape changed and suddenly we found ourselves driving on the moon. No greenery here; all volcanic rock.

After getting into Myvatn and having dinner, we went to Myvatn Nature Baths.

Myvatn Nature Baths felt less touristy than Sky Lagoon and there seemed to be a lot of locals there. It’s a beautiful setting however I didn’t enjoy the strong smell of sulfur and it wasn’t as clean or bou-jee as Sky Lagoon.

Nearby, we checked out Grjótagjá, a small cave made famous when it appeared in Game of Thrones, in the scene where Jon Snow breaks his oath with Ygritte. Above the cave is another cool sight – the open fissure where you can hop from Europe to North America over the tectonic plates!

Day 6: Mývatn

This was the only part of our trip when we stayed more than one night in one hotel. If vacation time and money weren’t a thing, it would’ve great to stay everywhere for 2 nights!

The weather on day 4 started off with rain, clouds and lots of wind.

We started off by walking around the geothermal area at Hverir Geothermal Area. Stinky (sulfur) and muddy but fascinating.

Next we backtracked about 20 minutes to the road for the west side of Dettifoss (862). This road is part of the so-called “Diamond Circle” which also includes Ásbyrgi Canyon, Húsavík and Goðafoss, but we would only being visiting Dettifoss and seeing Goðafoss the following day when we headed west.

It’s an easy 2 mile loop walk from the parking area to the viewing platform for Dettifoss as well as Selfoss a bit farther up the river. Dettifoss is said to be the most powerful waterfall in Europe. It isn’t nearly as scenic as many other waterfalls in Iceland, but still worth seeing. Selfoss is much smaller but more scenic than Dettifoss.

As the weather cleared up we checked out Krafla / Viti Crater. It’s near a power plant and there are some hiking trails in the area. Viti Crater looks cool from the trail around the permiter crater but looked even better above from my drone.

Next was a hike up to the rim of Hverfjdall volcano. Obviously it’s a steep hike up but the views are amazing. 1 mile round trip with 300 ft elevation gain, or a longer hike if you want to walk around the entire rim, or even into the volcano.

Next was dinner at Vogafjós Farm and it was the best dinner of the trip. Located on a farm with sheep and cows, and there’s even some tables next to a huge window into the cow barn so you can eat right next to the cows. After dinner we took some photos of the happy little lambs that were skipping around.

Lastly, we made a stop at Skútustaðagígar, an area by Lake Myvatn with walking paths and a bunch of pseudo-craters, which looked really cool from the drone.

Day 7: Mývatn to Laugarbakki

After a beautiful evening we woke up to fresh snow on the ground in Myvatn! What a surprise to see in the last week of May! However, the clouds cleared throughout the morning and the entire afternoon we had the best weather of the week. Abundant sunshine, very little wind, and warm enough to go outside without our winter jackets while in Akureyri!

First stop of the day was at Goðafoss and it did not disappoint. This is one of the nicest waterfalls we’ve seen in Iceland and it’s just a short walk from the parking lots.

Unfortunately this is where some of my photography equipment became a victim of Iceland’s weather (a common occurrence in Iceland). I had my camera on my tripod and left it un-attended for 10 seconds to take a photo of me and my wife when a big wind gust knocked my tripod over, snapping my lens! Luckily this mishap occurred toward the end of the trip and not at the beginning.

Next we visited Akureyri for shopping and lunch. On the way you go through a long tunnel through the mountains. The toll was $12, paid online.

After walking around Akureyri we spent a couple hours at the fabulous Forest Lagoon. This was our favorite spa of the trip. Very relaxing, didn’t feel toursity, a big warm lagoon, a hot tub, sauna and cold plunge pool.

After jumping in and out of the cold pool, I saw Icelanders actually sitting in the cold pool, so I kept getting back in, staying in longer each time. It really does give you an incredible natural high alternating between hot and cold water!

After Akureyri, heading west, we didn’t stop anywhere and just admired the stunning scenery from the car. Farms with sheep and horses with a backdrop of huge snow capped mountains.

I only wish there were more pullouts to stop and take photos because I had to take the photos from the car. Moving at 90km per hour I’m surprised some of the photos came out nice.

That’s one thing I didn’t like about the ring road; not enough places to stop and take photos. There is not even a shoulder on the road, so you can’t stop, and there aren’t very many pull-outs or “lay-bys” as they say in the UK.

Shortly before arriving at our hotel in Laugarbakki we stopped at Kolugljúfur Canyon. A short drive on a gravel road in good condition takes you there from Route 1 and the canyon and waterfalls are right by the parking lots on either side of the bridge. It’s not a stunning location but it was worth a stop on the way.

On the way back from the canyon we were blessed with the sight of gorgeous horses right by the gravel road. Finally! I had been wanting to photograph the horses all week but we couldn’t stop anywhere when we saw them from a main road. Note that there are no wild horses in Iceland – they are on private farm land, so be respectful and do not trespass.

Day 8: Laugarbakki to Snæfellsnes Peninsula

This was our worst weather day of the week …. It rained hard from the time we woke up until around 7:00pm.

The plan was to drive straight to Snæfellsnes and see Arnarstapi and the beaches, but due to the rain, we took a detour to go see Hraunfossar because it’s still possible to take nice photos of waterfalls even when it’s rainy and cloudy.

Hraunfossar was stunning! Once again, you never know if a place looks as good in real life as it does on Instagram and this place does! The water is bright aqua and there are so many little waterfalls. No hike, it’s right by the parking lot.

Next we made our way to Snæfellsnes, hoping it would clear up a bit but unfortunately it did not.

This was heavy rain, the kind that makes it not worth getting out of the car, and the fog would prevent us from seeing much anyway, so we went straight to the hotel in Grundarfjörður and napped.

Finally at around 7pm, the rain stopped, the fog lifted and we could see Kirkjufell and the other beautiful mountains around Grundarfjörður. This place looks a lot like Isle of Skye in Scotland. I didn’t realize it would be so mountainous.

After getting the classic photos of Kirkjufell by the waterfalls, we skipped dinner and settled for hot dogs at a gas station, hoping to make up for lost time and getting the chance to see the southern coast of Snæfellsnes. Well, that didn’t work out!

As we drove around the coast we went into a thick fog. We couldn’t see anything beyond the road in front of us! Bummer. I was most excited about doing the Arnarstapi Cliff Walk, seeing Lóndrangar View Point and going to the beaches. I’m sure we drove through some beautiful scenery but we couldn’t see it!

We drove back to Grundarfjörður, out of the thick fog again and into some nice golden hour light.

Day 9: Snæfellsnes Peninsula to Reykjavik/Keflavik

Our final day was another rainy/cloudy day, so we really didn’t get to see anything else on Snæfellsnes Peninsula. It’s a shame because I had a lot of places to see there! Instead of giving the southern coast of the peninsula another shot, we drove to Reykjavik to do some shopping and then ended the day at the famous Blue Lagoon near the airport (advanced reservations required!)

The Blue Lagoon is massive! It had more people there than anywhere else we visited in Iceland, but the lagoon is so big that it’s not a problem. The sauna and steam room were too small for the amount of people that visit here, but otherwise it was really nice and worth the hype. One drink at the swim-up bar is included with admission. We relaxed here for a couple of hours – a really nice way to end our 9 day adventure in Iceland!

Total Trip Expenses

You’ve probably heard that everything in Iceland is expensive. For full transparency and to help you budget, here’s what we spent:

Flight: $590 x 2 = $1,180

Hotels: $2,079 (avg $210 per night)

Rental Car: $1,070 ($119 per day)

Fuel: $375

Restaurants: $800

Groceries: $100

Parking: $35

Blue Lagoon: $105 x 2 = $210

Sky Lagoon = $79 x 2 = $158

Forest Lagoon = $47 x 2 = $94

Myvatn Nature Baths = $44 x 2 = $88

It was a grand total of about $6,000 for a 9 day, 10 night vacation. It could certainly be done for much less (i.e. booking a cheaper flight without checked bags, renting camper van or staying in hostels, making meals, not renting a car at all, not going to 4 different lagoon spas!) but vacation should include relax time and we enjoyed the comfort of nice hotels and high quality dinners with drinks.

For the sake of comparison, I think that the total expenses of our last trip to Scotland for 8 days was about $4,000-$5,000.

People talk about how expensive the food is in Iceland but I found it comparable to dining out at nice restaurants in the US, considering that you don’t have to add a 20% tip to the total in Iceland.

Also, don’t worry about getting krono (cash) in Iceland. Everywhere we went accepted credit cards and I didn’t even see a krono the entire time. My wife used cash just once to use the toilet somewhere and they accepted US or Euro coins.

Conclusion

Thank you for reading about our Iceland 9 Day Ring Road Itinerary! I hope that it helped you plan YOUR trip to Iceland!

In summary, pack for a variety of weather, don’t forget a bathing suit, be a good visitor/tourist by obeying all of the rules in Iceland (i.e. do not stop on the road, do not walk into roped-off areas, respect private property, etc.) and don’t forget to RELAX! – you’re on vacation!

Safe Travels!

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