Travel: Reykjavik Iceland and Stops Along The Golden Circle

In September of 2022 my husband and I traveled to Iceland, England, Scotland, and Ireland. Iceland was our first stop. I had been wanting to visit Iceland for YEARS…it looked so beautiful and I had heard great things. It absolutely lived up to the hype…the Land Of Fire And Ice, as it’s known, was pretty amazing.

I love travel photography…I can’t imagine going on a trip and not bringing my camera. So obviously traveling to Iceland meant lots of photos which I was also super excited about.

We had 3 days in Iceland…which is not enough. I know that. But we also had other countries to visit, so we wanted it to be on the shorter side. Just enough time to explore Reykjavik, hit some stops along The Golden Circle, and meet some horses out by the side of the road…for some reason I really wanted to do that…I had heard a lot about the unique horses there and really wanted to take some photos…they just look so much prettier than our horses in the US! I’m not a horse person and I’m not sure why these horses fascinated me so much…but I really wanted to see them. It ended up being quite easy, as you can find them all over the countryside.

We also ate some delicious seafood, went to a punk rock museum that is housed in an old public bathroom, relaxed in the Blue Lagoon, and took in the views of Reykjavik from the top of Hallgrimskirkja church.

Reykjavik Travel

We had planned to rent a car at Keflavik airport when we landed in Iceland. It was a bit of a headache…we were jet lagged, I was starving and exhausted, and we ended up standing in line at Hertz rent a car for about 30 minutes for no reason. When we finally got up to the front we were told you had to have a reservation…whoops. We did not. We asked if there were any rental car companies that would rent without a reservation and were told it just depends on how many reservations/cars they had. Three more companies turned us down. We were advised to go to a small budget company on the other side of the airport. It all worked out, we rented a car…but I would highly advise making a reservation for a car ahead of time if you plan to travel to Iceland. I also recommend renting a wifi hotspot…it was an extra $25 with the car rental and came in so handy.

Driving to Reykjavik was easy and took about 45 minutes from the airport. We stayed at the Reykjavik Konsulat Hotel, it’s a Hilton Curio Collection hotel and it was amazing. We had tons of Hilton points (my husband has made a hobby of collecting points for travel) and basically all of our stays on this trips were booked with points or free night certificates. So no money, all points. Pretty cool.

Our room was small, but kind of fancy…the bed was so comfy and had these cloud-like feather duvets on it…one for each of us….I was so tired when we arrived and the bed was calling me. It was about 10am Iceland time at this point…4am Chicago time. I had only slept for about 4 hours on the plane (6 hour flight). When I travel overseas I try to adjust my sleeping times slowly over a few days before leaving… I like to book a flight so I land in the morning…that way I sleep on the plane and can stay up the entire day when I get to my destination, and go to bed at the proper time. Then I’m automatically on that city’s time, no jet lag. My one rule is to NOT nap on the first day…that can ruin everything! But in this instance, I was so tired…and it was raining anyway…so we both laid down on the comfy bed and fell asleep. I woke up 2 hours later (not bad) and insisted my husband get up. Which he did after some prodding. And then we went out to explore Reykjavik.

We came across a road I had seen in pictures…Skolavordustigur, a rainbow painted road. There were shops and restaurants along this road and at the top you can see Hallsgrimskirkja Church. I was still starving, hadn’t eaten yet, so we stopped at a place called Eldur og Ís for crepes…I had a gluten-free lemon curd crepe and it was so delicious.

The Icelandic Punk Museum

While out and about we came across some stairs in the middle of the downtown area that wind underground…there were punk rock stickers and posters all over…it was The Iceland Punk Museum. A small museum in a now defunct underground public bathroom. Being the punk rock lovers we are, we decided to go…it was about $10 to get in…a man (the owner?) meets you as you descend the steps, you pay, and follow the signs on the walls leading you through the bathroom stalls and another small area.

It was the whole history of punk rock in Iceland which was pretty cool. I hadn’t heard of many of these bands…but there were mentions of Sigur Ros and Bjork, who I know of. It was pretty interesting and cool! Glad we did it.

And oddly enough, it smelled really great down there.

Reykjavik Resturants:

Reykjavik Chips- This little place is great for a snack. Being that I’m gluten free I usually can’t have fries at resturants due to them being fried in the same fryer as things with gluten. But this place has a separate fryer for the fries and a bunch of great sauces (I’m a sucker for condiments) and it was a nice little stop during a cold, rainy, windy day walking around Reykjavik. I had a tasty strawberry cider with my fries and my husband had a strawberry shake that looked amazing.

Messinn- We had dinner at this restaurant on our second night here and it was soooo good. We split a lobster soup, and then I had the Icelandic ”Plokkfiskur” (cod) with béarnaise sauce, potatoes, onion, garlic, celery, lime, white wine, cream, and butter. It was amazing…my favorite meal in Iceland for sure.

Reykjavik Fish- We just happened upon this place while walking around our first night here. I knew I wanted as much seafood as I could get while we were here so of course we started off the trip with fish. I had the grilled Arctic Char fillet with garlic butter, and it came with some perfectly cooked root vegetables on the side. Cute little place too.

Tapas Barrin- We went to this restuarant on our last night in Reykjavik because it was late and this was one of few things that was open near our hotel. They also had some good gluten free reviews. It was tasty…but it was pretty pricey and the servings were a bit small (obviously I know it’s tapas, but still). They were out of a lot of things we ordered, which was disappointing. Some Icelandic delicacies on the menu included smoked puffin with blueberry “brennivín” sauce and horse. I absolutely could not bring myself to eat horse, but we did try the puffin. Although I kept picturing cute little puffins and that did make it hard. But we really wanted to try something Icelandic. I did not care for the puffin at all…it was pretty gamey and I was not a fan…neither was my husband. But glad we tried it.

All in all Reykjavik is pretty great for food allergies. I had no problems whatsoever finding gluten free foods, and all of the restaurants were extremely accommodating.

Hallgrimskirkja Church

At the top of Skolavordustigur, the rainbow painted road, is Hallsgrimskirkja church. The church itself was being worked on…you could only walk in so far in. It was not very impressive to me to be honest, it was very minimal…but that wasn’t why we were there. It was $8 to go to the top so we paid that and got in an elevator. The view from the top was amazing…360 views of Reykjavik and beyond. The sun had just come out and it was a really cool way to see Reykjavik on our first day there.

The area at the top is a square area with open air windows all around. There are metal bars on the windows. To take pictures I held my camera and phone (yes I also take photos on my iphone) out of the window past the bars. Word of caution! There are bells that go off every 15 minutes. And whenever the bells go off, it’s SO loud…like I jumped out of my skin when they rang. Other people did too. Just be careful when holding your phone or camera outside the window…you could get startled by the loud bells and drop it!

Stops Along The Golden Circle

The Golden Circle is a route in southern Iceland. It loops from Reykjavik into the southern uplands of Iceland and back. It is the area that contains the most travel-related activities in Iceland, so it’s well known to tourists.

We planned for a full day of driving the Golden Circle on our second day there. I had a few spots I wanted to hit so we made sure we would get to all of them…Thingvellir National Park, Strokkur Geyser, Seljalandsfoss waterfall, and ending at the Blue Lagoon.

We started our day with an amazing breakfast at our hotel. It was unlike any hotel breakfast I have had. I’m gluten free and sometimes can have issues finding breakfast foods. I usually rely on bacon and fruit at hotels. But there was a whole bar of healthy, delicious foods…pineapple chia pudding, the best gluten free bread (a whole mini loaf that they heated for me without me even asking), smoked salmon, marinated veggies, fruit, ginger tumeric shots, fancy cheese, and a few other things.

We started our drive around 9am. We stopped along the way to take photos and marvel at some of the beautiful landscapes.

I really wanted to see those horses so my husband pulled over at one point when he spotted a couple hanging out on a farm. I walked over to the fence and they quickly came right up to me. They seemed so sweet and one let me touch it’s nose for a quick second. It was a really nice moment…they seemed so calm and peaceful. The Icelandic horse is a special breed…they are smaller than regular horses and are one of the purest and oldest breeds in the world. They were brought to Iceland by the Vikings in the 8th century and to guarantee purity, Icelandic law prevents horses from being imported to the country and exported animals are not allowed to return. Super cool getting to meet those guys.

Thingvellir National Park

Thingvellir translates to “assembly plains.” The Iceland general assembly met in this spot for many years…it was established around 930 and continued to meet there until 1798. Many major historic events in Iceland have happened there and it is a legendary spot to Icelanders.

Thingvellir is also a Unesco World Heritage site, and a natural wonder of the world. Iceland is divided by the Mid-Atlantic Rift…this is where the North American and Eurasian tectonic plates meet. As you walk along the paths of this National Park you can actually see the tectonic plates and where they shift…the ridge runs along these paths. The tectonic plates move about 2.5cm a year and have done so for thousands of years. It was so interesting to get to experience this.

Also pretty cool…Games of Thrones filmed some scenes here. I love that show, so it was pretty cool to see that too!

The Geysir Geothermal Area

The word "geyser" is derived from the Icelandic word "geysir," meaning gusher. This particular geyser is literally where that word came from. The Great Geysir itself is now more or less inactive, it’s been dormant since 1916…but the area surrounding it (Haukadalur valley) is geothermically very active with many small hot springs. 

Strokkur is the most active geyser on site. It erupts every five to ten minutes, blasting boiling water 50-65 feet high…and it is known to reach up to 130 feet at times. We watched it erupt about 6-7 times. Every time was pretty exciting…and fast…it only lasts for like 15 seconds, so you have to be quick with the camera shutter.

The beauty of this area is made possible by natural forces of the earth; steam vents, hot-springs, mud-pits and other little geysers, and the ground itself is yellow, red, and green which comes from the elements sulfur, copper, and iron.

Seljalandsfoss Waterfall

I was super excited about this one. For the pure sight of the waterfall and for the potential photo ops. It looked beautiful in pictures, and it was one of the first stops I knew for sure I wanted to do.

As we pulled off the main road you can see Seljalandsfoss in the distance. We parked in the parking lot (don’t forget to pay at the kiosk, it’s about $5), and walked up the path to the waterfall. There were a lot of people but it didn’t bother me…the waterfall was so amazing. As you walk up there is a path that curves around and behind the waterfall itself. The cliff the water falls off of creates a cavern behind it, so you walk along a wet and slightly muddy path all the way around the waterfall. As you come to the other side, you have to climb up some wet rocks, and then you get to some stairs that you climb down to get back to the original path out to the parking lot and a little coffee/concession stand.

My husband decided not to go behind the waterfall, so I was on my own, which was fine. Luckily we had packed full size plastic raincoats that I ordered on Amazon as an afterthought days before our trip…they came in so handy the whole time in Iceland as it was very rainy, and particularly handy here. I did get a little wet but it wasn’t bad. The view and the experience of walking behind the waterfall was pretty spectacular…it was one of my favorite things in Iceland…probably on the whole trip. It was just beautiful.

The Blue Lagoon

The last stop was the famous Blue Lagoon. Originally we had planned to go here after arriving at Keflavik Airport as it’s on the way to Reykjavik…doing it that way came highly recommended on some blogs I read. However, by the time I went to book it, there were no more times available for that morning, so we decided to tack it on to the end of our Golden Circle trip. Which worked out for the better I think.

One of the top 3 things I wanted to do in Iceland was go to a natural hot spring in the middle of nowhere. I read about a few and hoped to fit one in. Unfortunately we didn’t have time, and also it was so cold and rainy…all of the spots I wanted to stop at involved a long hike to get there and we just didn’t feel like doing that.

So The Blue Lagoon was it!

The Blue Lagoon is a geothermal spa about 45 minutes outside of Reyjavik. It’s man-made and filled with run-off water from a nearby geothermal plant. The water is not toxic or dangerous- far from it…it’s actually very mineral rich. The water is a milky blue which is due to the high silica content, and is around 95-105°F.

We got there late, a little after 7pm just before it got dark. They closed at 9, so we had almost 2 hours. Our admission was about $60 and that included a towel each, one drink each from the swim up bar, and a face mud mask. Remember the silica I mentioned? It’s great for your skin, and they have a whole mask bar with different kinds of masks. Our admission got us the basic silica mask.

Before going into the lagoon you have to shower…my husband went to the men’s locker room and I went to the women’s and then we met up on the other side where the water starts indoors and then it gets deeper as you walk outside. One thing that is very important…the silica content in the water is very hard on your hair, so make sure to slather your hair with conditioner and leave it on when you head out to the lagoon.

It was pretty chilly out, probably around 45°F and the water felt soooo nice. There was so much space that you were never very close to other people if you didn’t want to be. You could find little secluded spots here and there to sit in and sometimes you would hit a nice little spot that was hotter than other areas. Some blogs I read said to wear flip flops but we didn’t…I actually really liked the way the bottom felt under my feet, it was really smooth with some bumps here and there.

The only crowded area was the bar…we waited in line for about 15 minutes to get a drink. I had a cider and my husband had a beer…they also smoothies. We took our drinks and waded around for a bit before heading to the mask bar. They scoop a handful of silica mud into your hands and then you spread it on your face. I love a good face mask, so when in Rome.

I had heard mixed things about the Blue Lagoon, some saying it’s touristy and not to bother, and other saying it’s touristy but amazing, and you have to go. I was worried it might be over crowded and over hyped, but I was happy to find out I was wrong! I loved it and would absolutely do it again.

Iceland was pretty amazing overall. We got to see some spectacular natural wonders, wandered around Reykjavik which is such a cute little city, ate some great seafood, relaxed at the Blue Lagoon, and met some cute horses on the side of the side of the road. Not bad for 3 days!

I definitely plan to go back. I want to go in winter to catch the northern lights and in summer to experience 24 hours of daylight and do Ring Road, which is a bigger version of the Golden Circle…it’s a big ring around the country with tons of stops…I’d love to take 2 weeks to do that trip someday.

Iceland isn’t too far from Chicago…6 hours isn’t bad in my opinion. I highly recommend going if you have the chance…you will never see natural landscapes like Iceland anywhere else in the world.