Over the last few months, travel magazines and articles have been filled with all things Iceland. If you want to see the Northern Lights, apparently 2012 is the best year to see them. It’s predicted that this year the lights will be at their brightest level seen for over 50 years. With this in mind and our overwhelming lust to visit Iceland we booked our flights with easyJet.
Since booking them in February, we have been pouring over Iceland guides and blogs such as Don’t Ever Look Back, A Dangerous Business and The Scrapbook of Life. And finally we now have a brief itinerary. We booked our car hire with Blue Car Rental on the recommendation of The Scrapbook of Life. We found them much cheaper than other companies paying 43000 ISK (roughly £220) for an old Suzuki Jimmy and an extra driver.
Here’s our rough plans for our six day trip during mid October 2012:
Day 1:
Once we have our hire car, we’ll go straight for a dip in the Blue Lagoon.
We then plan to drive to Vik and stay for two nights taking in the sights along the way and exploring Vik when we get there.
Day 2:
We will visit Jökulsárlón Glacier Lagoon and Skaftafell National Park where we plan to do a glacier walk.
Day 3:
On day three we’ll visit Reynishverfi Beach, Skógafoss, Eyjafjallajoekull and Seljalandsfoss. When night falls we plan to head to Reykjavik for a three night stay.
Day 4:
From our Reykjavik base we’ll do our own Golden Circle tour in our hopefully trusty Jimmy.We plan to snorkel through the tectonic plates in Thingvellir National Park and go snow mobiling. This might be ambitious for one day so we will play it by ear.
Day 5:
Providing day 4 all goes to plan we will hopefully go on a whale watching tour and explore Reykjavik.
Day 6:
Head home 
In the evenings across our adventure we will chase the Northern Lights. Iceland seems so full of opportunity and whilst seeing the lights is one of the main reasons for going, there seems to be so much beauty that even if we don’t see them we won’t be too disheartened! The whole trip will be full of photo opportunities too so Stu will be in his element!
So how does our itinerary look? Would you recommend anything else? Do you have any tips on chasing the Northern Lights? Would you recommend any hotels or activities?
Some useful links from the car hire company:
Photo courtesy of Stuck in Customs
Comments
Hey guys! Looks like a great itinerary you’ve cooked up! And I think October will be a fantastic time to go.
As for your plans, here’s my two cents:
Visiting the Blue Lagoon as soon as you get there is a great idea! It’s very relaxing. The earlier you get there the better, but obviously you won’t have much control over what time your flight arrives.
I’ll tell you right now that there’s really not much to see/do in Vik (it is REALLY tiny; like, under 500 people), but the South Coast is amazing!
Good call on the glacier lagoon (I sadly didn’t get to see it, but wanted to!), as well as glacier hiking – so cool!
Day 3 will be awesome – I saw all of those things! Not sure if the Puffins will still be around at Reynishverfi in October, but if they are, be sure to keep an eye out for them!
You could probably fit everything you mentioned into Day 4, though it will really depend on how you’re booking things. The sites themselves aren’t very far from one another at all.
If you need Reykjavik tips, let me know! I LOVE that city.
And, ask for Northern Lights chasing, hopefully you’ll have weather that’s clear enough! There are quite a few big-bus tour companies that do Northern Lights tour, but Grayline is the best. They also offer you a sort of guarantee – if you don’t see the lights the first night, you can book a second night for free (so try to start seeing them the first night you can!). Grayline won’t waste your time, though – if they don’t think there’s a chance of seeing lights (for example, if it’s too cloudy), the tour won’t even run.
Amanda recently posted..Fire and Ice in Iceland
Thanks for the tips, we understand that Vik is small hence why we are only spend two nights there, we are simply using it as a base to see the other sights withing a relative short distance. It means we are wasting less time traveling.
Hopefully we can fit everything into Day 4 because we really want to go Whale Watching, we need to see what time the activities are. Having our own vehicle certainly helps get around the place so we are not relying on tour companies.
We really can’t wait to go! Thanks once again.
This itinerary looks great guys! You’ve included whale watching and a glacier walk which were probably our two favourite activities in Iceland. I don’t think you’ve missed much at all to be honest – just make sure you’ve got enough time to wander around Reykjavik one afternoon.
Good luck with catching the Northern Lights… unfortunately we missed out but you should definitely do everything in your power to try and see them.
Oh, and whatever you do – DO NOT speed in Iceland! The fines here are substantial and you’d probably be sacrificing at least a week of your travel budget if you break the law!
As for hotels, we can highly recommend the Thingholt Hotel however it might be a little beyond your budget. There are plenty of great hostels though (and apartment rentals) so you should be able to find a great deal somewhere.
Enjoy your time in Iceland and never hesitate to ask if you have any other questions!
Hi Kieron,
Thanks for your suggestions. We will make sure we visit Reykjavik even if we have to sacrifice something but fingers crossed we won’t need to do that. The key activities for us is the Glacier climbing and the snorkelling.
We have booked our hotel in Vik and have decided to stay at the Hotel Volcano. With regards to the hotel in Reykjavik we are definitely booking the Thingholt hotel (we love our design hotels) and its only £65 per night which is relatively cheap in our eyes for a hotel of that quality. We are not RTW travellers but we aim to do at least 2 – 3 trips each year. The benefit of this is we have slightly higher budgets than travellers who are hop scotching from one location to the next on their RTW trip so we can indulge from time to time in nice hotels.
Hopefully as the site grows companies will be keen to hear our reviews and offer some nice discounts on activities and hotels.
Once again thanks for the tips, it’s always a pleasure talking to other fellow travellers!