As a first-time visitor to Iceland, I decided South Iceland would provide the maximum variety of sights and experiences in a one-week trip. Here’s the itinerary I followed, along with the incredible highlights you won’t want to miss.
1. The glorious sights of the Golden Circle
My friend and I decided to start our visit to South Iceland by spending two nights in Laugarvatn, a village in the Golden Circle. Laugarvatn is a great base for the area and has a fabulous lakeside spa that costs a third of the price of the Blue Lagoon. The Golden Circle is the most visited area of the country outside the capital, Reykjavik, but for good reason. To find out more about the stunning waterfall, volcanic crater, lively geysers and historic national park that we visited, read this Golden Circle post.
2. Seljalandsfoss, the waterfall you can walk behind – or not!
From Laugarvatn, we drove to the town of Vik, with a few stops along the way. These were all a short hop off the Ring Road that circles the whole country, and the first was Seljalandsfoss. It’s one of the most famous of South Iceland’s waterfalls, primarily because you can walk all the way around and behind it. As a result, the 61km high falls have featured in movies and even a Justin Bieber music video. After watching a few people walk around, it was clear that you do get very wet! So, as it was our first stop of the day and we didn’t have full waterproofs, we decided to just admire the waterfall from the front. We also walked a bit further along the bottom of the cliff face to see a few smaller falls cascading down.
3. Skógafoss waterfall and Skógar’s fascinating folk museum
Twenty-five minutes further along the Ring Road is Skógafoss, one of the largest waterfalls in Iceland. The drop is about the same as Seljalandsfoss, but it’s much wider. That combination makes for a very powerful spray, and it’s a magnificent sight.
Another reason to stop off here is the Skógar Folk Museum. This is a great place to learn about Icelandic history through its architecture. In the outdoor part of the museum, you can see some old turf houses. Built in the mid-late 1800s from basaltic rock, they were roofed with turf to help withstand the harsh winters. There’s also the first wooden house ever built in Iceland and a schoolhouse that was originally built in 1901 and reconstructed at Skogar almost 100 years later.
The two indoor museum buildings are also full of interesting items, though there are around 15,000 artefacts, so you’d need a lot of time to see them all. Highlights include a large sailing boat and a ring claimed to be from a treasure chest that was hidden under the waterfall. It was also later used on the door to the village church. The museum also has a lovely cafe, Freya, which is an excellent place to stop for lunch, whether you visit the museum or not.
4. Giant rock formations and caves
The last stop we made before Vik was to visit Hálsanefshellir Cave and the Reynisdrangar basalt sea stacks that rise out of the sea. We found the best car park for this was Parking pour le plage, as it’s just a short walk down to the cave from here.
Hálsanefshellir was created by the pounding of the Atlantic Ocean, showing just how powerful its waves are. The hexagonal basalt columns that resulted are stunning and similar to Giant’s Causeway in Northern Ireland. From outside the cave, you can see the Reynisdrangar stacks, which are said to be the remains of trolls that stayed out too late and were turned to stone.
In the other direction, there’s a view of the Dyrhólaey arch, while above the cave and out to sea, there were dozens of puffins. We’d been considering booking a puffin-watching trip when we got to Reykjavik, but were very happy with the cute collection we spotted here.
5. Vík, the southernmost village in South Iceland
Vík is a pretty village that’s a popular overnight stop on the Ring Road. We stayed at Hotel Vík í Mýrdal, which wasn’t cheap (is anything in Iceland?!), but it’s in a good location and very comfortable. Right above it is Vík i Myrdal Church, a white building with a red roof that was exactly the sort of church I expected to see in Iceland. As it’s on a hill, the church provides an excellent vantage point to see the whole village as well as Víkurfjara Black Sand Beach and the basalt rock formations we’d seen earlier.
As well as visiting the church, Vik is a nice place to wander around and see the types of homes local people live in. It also has plenty of places to eat. Friends had recommended Restaurant Suður-Vík, which did look very nice, but was a bit of an uphill walk. So, as we didn’t want to drive to dinner, we walked across the road from the hotel to Ströndin. It’s called a pub, though not in the style of an English pub. But they did the most amazing Icelandic Fish Stew. It was so good, we could have literally eaten it all again!
Back at Hotel Vik, we realised the bar had an excellent cocktail list with both our favourites. We didn’t really expect to find a good Manhattan and Margarita this far from Reykjavik, so we sucked up the £20+ price tag and enjoyed every sip!
6. Breathtaking Jökulsárlón Glacier Lagoon
From Vik, we decided to travel directly to our furthest destination in South Iceland, Jökulsárlón Glacier Lagoon. It was almost 2.5 hours further around the Ring Road, and as the weather wasn’t the best that day, there were moments when we both secretly wondered if it was going to be worth it. But it absolutely was. As we drove over the bridge that crosses the entrance to the lagoon, our breath was taken away by the sight of dozens of gorgeous blue icebergs. There are walking paths alongside the lagoon and you can climb higher up for a better view.
For a closer look at the icebergs and glacier, you can do a boat tour. When we checked the tours online about two weeks before our visit, there were none available to book in the timeslot we needed. But they obviously keep plenty back for on-the-day bookings. We went straight to the booth on arrival and only had to wait about 45 minutes. We chose the cheaper amphibious boat rather than the zodiac. The latter is smaller, so it can cover more ground and get a bit closer to the glacier, but we were happy with our choice. We even got to hold a bit of glacial ice. I’d also recommend the Heimahumar food truck for lunch as they do great veggie as well as meat hot dogs.
7. ‘Diamond’ strewn Fellsfjara beach
Once you can tear yourself away from the lagoon, you can walk under the bridge to Fellsfjara beach. We actually parked on this side as it was much less busy than the car park closest to the lagoon. The black-sand beach glitters with beautiful ice boulders, which earned it the nickname Diamond Beach.
After visiting the beach, we headed back along the Ring Road and considered visiting Fjallsárlón, a smaller glacier lake. We’d read it’s a good, less busy alternative if you can’t get on a boat tour at Jökulsárlón. But as we’d been lucky enough to do that, we headed straight to Fosshotel Glacier Lagoon, where we were spending the night. It’s another eye-wateringly expensive hotel, but it is extremely nice. The decor is very stylish; there are outdoor hot tubs where we could relax; a nice bar that does a happy hour; and an excellent restaurant where we had one of the best meals of the trip. But we decided to skip the breakfast that cost £27 and bought a couple of tubs of Skyr (Icelandic yoghurt) from the ‘shop’ in the hotel reception!
8. Stunning Svínafellsjökull Glacier
The next morning, we took our Skyr to eat in the car park at Svínafellsjökull Glacier. It’s about a 25-minute drive from the hotel, and the glacier is 10 minutes walk from the car park. It’s another stunning sight and we were much closer to the edge of the glacier than when we were in the lagoon. Over to the left, you can also see Skaftafell Glacier. You can get to this one and Svartifoss waterfall by driving another five minutes or so along the Ring Road, but it’s a much longer hike from the car park.
9. Hveragerði’s hot springs and greenhouses
There are other glaciers and waterfalls you can stop off to visit on the route back, but as we felt we’d seen our fair share during our adventures around South Iceland, we drove on to Hveragerði, only slowing to admire some passing Icelandic horses.
Hveragerði is a small town in a geothermal area on the edge of the Golden Circle. It’s the only place in Iceland where there are hot springs in the centre of town, so it’s become known for those and its many greenhouses. It’s the northernmost place in the world where bananas grow! You can see the evidence of this at the Geothermal Park, where there is a small visitor centre and greenhouse as well as an active geyser and bubbling hot springs. Activities include mud baths, bread baking and boiling eggs! There’s a small cafe there, but I can also recommend nearby Almar Bakari for lunch.
10. Reykjavik, Iceland’s colourful capital
The most visited place in South Iceland and indeed the whole country is its capital, Reykjavik. That’s where we headed to finish our trip after visiting Hveragerði. To follow a similar itinerary to mine, you’ll need to hire a car, and a good tip is to pick it up at Keflavik International Airport, but drop it off at a car hire office near the domestic airport. This is just outside the city centre, so it only took five minutes in a cab to our hotel and saved us the time and expense of travelling from Keflavik. We arrived early evening and spent three nights in Reykjavik, which gave us two full days to explore the city and do a whale-watching tour. You can read my 10 tips for a great trip to Reykjavik in this blog post.
So that was how I spent a week touring South Iceland and took in many of the incredible sights that the country is famous for. I hope my itinerary inspires you to explore South Iceland too!
For more posts about European destinations I’ve visited, check the Europe section of my blog.