Iceland tourist traps and how to avoid them.
- Claire Ottaviano
- Mar 25, 2017
- 7 min read
Search Iceland and you will most likely see travellers posed in the picture-perfect steaming water of the Blue Lagoon and exploring the twisted beauty of the south coast ice caves. Don’t be fooled! It’s a trap!
Instagram is full to the brim with mud clad faces and smooth bodies soothing their souls in Iceland’s famous Blue Lagoon and inside the light refracting waves of naturally moulded ice caves.
Photo sharing sites can be great for travel inspiration, in fact these pictures are the reason I travelled to Iceland.
But what awaited me there this March was far beyond what those filtered Instagram photos portrayed.
Iceland is natural, Iceland is relatively untouched and Iceland is free for you to explore.
Prices at the Blue Lagoon range from $64AUD (all prices hereafter in AUD) for entrance to $629 for wine, towel, use of the exclusive lounge and other inclusions. If you have your heart set on going here I won’t be able to change your mind. But if you continue with me I can show you a whole new world of opportunities that await you in Iceland, to capture your heart and feed your sense of adventure.
This is a budget friendly travel blog, where I show you how to enjoy a place on little money without compromising on experience. If you want to know where the finest restaurants and resorts are this is not the article for you my friend.
Firstly, you will need to spend some money in Iceland but by avoiding the tourist traps we saved ourselves more than 50 per cent.
What you do need:
Accommodation. Depending on the time of year accommodation will really set you back here. We came in the off season but booked last minute so we paid $100AUD a night at Capital Inn on the outskirts of Reykjavik and $300AUD for two nights at Hotel Drangslid near Skogafoss and the Dc-3 Plane Wreck.
Much more than we usually spend on accommodation (around $50 a night or free when we’re volunteering, staying with friends or working). So as usual my suggestions are to book out of season, book ahead of time, do your research and use AirBnB if you can.
Transportation When I saw all the things to do in Iceland I said to Mark, we need a tour! I thought a tour would be the only way to see this vast and diverse land. The three day overnight tours started at about $1000pp with transport, accommodation and breakfast.
After researching until 3am in the morning we decided to go with Budget Car Rental and paid only $230 including insurance for three days.
With accommodation and $120 on fuel, the total came to $750 for both of us compared to $2000 on a tour.
The tour from Reykjavik to Glacier Lagoon had everything we wanted to do including an ice cave tour and glacier hiking. I get it, these companies need to make money somehow, but if you’re a budget traveller this is where the tourist traps will get you, watch out for added costs like the need to hire hiking shoes.
We traded the glacier walking and ice caving for a hike to an amazing hot spring and a trip to see the Dc-3 Plane Wreck. Compromise is not always about missing out, you just trade experiences that’s all.
If you’re on a regular tourist holiday, I think this deal is not too bad for what you get, as always, be thorough, do your research.
Food
As usual if you follow this blog you know we’re big fans of supermarket shopping. We shopped at Hagkaup the first night as it was the only one open but discovered on the last day Bonus is much cheaper.
We spent $40 on three days of food. The food needed to be easy to prepare, quick and somewhat nutritious, when we are on expensive trips (in Europe in general) we give up food variety for travel experiences. Shopping list: Eggs, milk, couscous, tuna, bananas, apples, two-minute noodles, beans, oats, digestive biscuits and canned peaches. (We just came from Morocco where a meal for two was €4, so we ate out everyday, it’s not always two-minute noodles and tuna haha).
WHERE TO BEGIN
We flew into Reykjavik airport at 5pm and picked up the rental car.
Reykjavik is 48.9km from Keflavik international airport and a one-way bus transfer ticket with Grey Line will cost you $28 or $29 with FlyBus.
Each way per person the transfer is almost $120, with our $230 car hire we were already well ahead in savings.
We reached the Hallgrimskirkja Church at sunset for some quick pics before a quick stop at Hagkaup for groceries for the next three days.
DAY ONE ICELAND - Reykjavik to Skogafoss
For the first stop on our Icelandic adventure we head straight to the Reykjadalur Hot Spring trailhead.
We decided to trail run it for our daily exercise as we had been pretty slack through Morocco, Switzerland and Germany the previous few weeks. It was pretty snowed in so it took us about 45 to 50 minutes but in summer I understand it takes the same amount of time to hike. In winter allow more time.
On the way you'll be greeted with waterfalls and boiling steam vents. It was a slippery time with some miss-steps in snow hidden rivers but it was all worth it for the end.
You'll know you're close when the sulphur smell hits you and you wade through a thick plume of sulphuric steam and over a bridge.
Getting out of our running gear was the hardest part then stepping into the boiling water was heaven. It took our bodies about 10 minutes to adjust to the temperature and for my skin to actually begin to warm and then we were soon too hot!
Getting changed again was the easy part as we were so warm it took a long time for the cold to reach our bones. The going back was much easier and we were on our way again to Kerið Crater.
Now just to prove we do not exclude everything with a cost, entry to Kerið Crater is $5 and a worth while experience. In winter I'd say you could give it a miss but it summer this Crater shows amazing hues of blue and vivid greens from the surrounding foliage. Just because you pay for something doesn't make it a tourist trap, here you will find no souvenirs or a desk clerk trying to up sell you to the 'premium experience' package.
Not too far away are the Great Geysir and Strokkur Geysir. The Great Geysir has remained quiet these past few years but Strokkur Geysir puts on a show every few minutes!
Do not stand too close or you'll get a shower. I was surprised they let you stand that close after the restrictions around Old Faithful Geyser in Yellowstone National park. Isn't the water really hot? I didn't stand close enough to find out!
Then very close by is Gullfoss falls which I must have forgotten to star on my maps to see because we totally missed it! It's tagged on the map above for your reference but unfortunately we didn't go there.
Instead we started making our way back to the ring road towards Seljalandsfoss.
By the time we had arrived it was bucketing fat snowflakes! Because of the snow we missed the look out point for Eyjafjallajökull, the Volcano that erupted in 2010 and disrupted flights across Europe. There is a pull off and cafe so you can easily stop on the way for a quick snap.
Walking behind the falls at Seljalandsfoss is a fantastic experience! The people around us on tour guides were told not to go behind the falls due to the weather conditions but really it was no problem as the track had plenty of footholds and vegetation to grip onto.
It was about 6pm and we made it to our Hotel by about 7pm for a meal of couscous, tuna and noodles and off to bed.
DAY TWO ICELAND Skogafoss to Glacier Lagoon
Skogafoss was next door to Hotel Drangslid and it was our first stop. Here you will find what I called the Jacob's Ladder of Iceland where you can climb 370 steps to the top of the falls. It was a good wake up for the morning.
We wanted to make sure we had enough time to get three hours from the hotel to Glacier Lagoon so we drove past everything else to get there. We did spend a lot of time at Glacier Lagoon because it was so mesmerising. I did not know if there would be Glaciers or icebergs in the lake.
I prayed for one or two icebergs and instead we arrived to this:
How lucky were we with this blue sky?? This destination could not have been more perfect for us.
I would suggest stopping before the official stop for Glacier Lagoon at the smaller car park(s) just before the bridge. It's much quieter and you can get closer to the Lagoon.
By this stage it was already about 3pm and unfortunately we had to give up seeing a few things to have time enough to see Svínafellsjökull Glacier and Black Sand Beach.
Svínafellsjökull Glacier
Black Sand Beach
If you have more time than us I would also suggest going to Svartifoss waterfall and Fjaðrárgljúfur Canyon.
DAY THREE ICELAND - Dc-3 Plane Wreck and back to Reykjavik.
We reeeaalllly wanted to get out to see the Dc-3 Plane that crashed on the beach near Vik on 24 November 1973 but it is a 4km journey on foot from the Ring Road and we were strapped for time needing to get back to the airport for 2pm.
Getting up at 6am to run to the wreck was the best decision we made! It was light already when we hit the road at about 6.20am and the air was crisp and clear for a purely breathtaking run across the flats to the beach. This hot spot is notorious for crowds and even at 7am there was already another couple there when we arrived!
The golden sun peaking through the clouds was truly jaw-dropping. The mangled wreck was a stunning image against the barren snow covered land and left an imprint in my mind forever.
After only half an hour our bodies had cooled and with only thin running gear we soon began to shiver. The run back was not pleasurable as my toes and fingers froze in my sneakers and my legs resisted the run.
We made it back to the hotel before 8.30am for breakfast. When we wandered in ragged and dishevelled I'm sure we just looked like lazy tourists slow out of bed haha. It was a damned good breakfast I'll tell you that.
And that's our Iceland adventure over. I really wish we had another day but we had stayed in Schengnen right up to our 90th day and the good little travellers we are did not want to overstay the visa by even a day.
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