Memorable Travel & Adventures

The landscapes are as ridiculous as advertised. That's the thing nobody can fully prepare you for — you've seen the photos, you know it's supposed to be beautiful, and you still stop dead on the roadside because a valley just materialized out of fog and looks like nothing you've seen before. Here's what I'd tell any group before they land.

Skip the Northern Lights tour bus — watch from a private geothermal pool

Every tour company in Reykjavik sells a Northern Lights bus tour. You'll pay about $80, stand in a field with 40 strangers, and the guide will check a weather app on his phone every fifteen minutes. Skip it. Book a guesthouse or farm stay outside the city that has a private outdoor geothermal pool — naturally heated, warm enough to stay in for hours. When the lights show up (and if you're there September through March, the odds are genuinely good), you're floating in hot water watching green light move across the sky. I've done it both ways. It's not close.

Drive the Golden Circle yourself, slowly

The Golden Circle — Þingvellir National Park, the Geysir area, and Gullfoss waterfall — is Iceland's most popular day route, and every tour bus does it. Do it yourself anyway, just in a rental car instead of a coach. Start early. Give yourself the whole day. The buses rush you through in five hours; in your own car you stop whenever you feel like it. Between Geysir and Gullfoss there's a valley of steam vents and nothing else and nobody around. That part doesn't make the tour brochure.

Snorkel or dive Silfra — between two continents

At Silfra fissure in Þingvellir, you can swim in the gap between the North American and Eurasian tectonic plates — touch both continents at once. The water is about 2°C year-round. Dry suits are provided. Visibility is 100 meters because the water is glacial melt filtered through lava rock for decades. It sounds strange on paper. In the water it's completely surreal. This is the one activity I would never cut from an Iceland itinerary.

Take a small boat into Jökulsárlón glacier lagoon

Southeast Iceland, about five hours from Reykjavik. Icebergs calve off Breiðamerkurjökull glacier into a lagoon and drift slowly to the sea. James Bond films have used this location twice — you'll recognize it when you see it. The amphibious boat tours are fine. If your group is small, try to book a zodiac instead — lower to the water, closer to the ice, completely different. It's a long drive from the capital; stay nearby rather than making it a rushed day trip.

Time the Blue Lagoon right

Book the last entry slot. The Blue Lagoon at 2pm is crowded and feels like a theme park. The same lagoon at 7pm is quieter, the steam gets more dramatic as the air cools, and it feels like a different place. If the budget allows, the Retreat side has a separate private lagoon that's a different experience altogether. Use the silica mud mask even if you feel a little ridiculous doing it. It works and you'll be glad you did.

Build slack into whatever you're doing in Iceland. The weather will change your plans — mine got rerouted twice in a single week. Both times the detour turned out better than what I'd planned. That's just Iceland.

From the Trip