Iceland Ring Road

I always try to journal a lot when we travel to keep memories fresh, and I’m upset with myself for not really doing that for our trip to what is probably the most beautiful place we’ve traveled to (minus our home in Wyoming of course 🙂). Pictures I have thankfully, but I didn’t journal because I also decided I could work on this trip.  Lesson learned.  Let your vacation be a vacation!

As an Enneagram 9 the most important thing to me is peace, so our favorite travel experiences are the ones that are the most peaceful.  (Our first trip to the American West and our time in French Polynesia being two that top my peaceful list). On our trip to Iceland we had: flight delays and cancellations trying to get there causing us to lose an entire day in Iceland, me trying to meet a work deadline, one of our children trying to do their online school exams, news from friends of our home basement being flooded with water and very thick mud, having to split our family in half traveling home two different days because of flight issues again at the end of the trip … many opposite of relaxing and peaceful situations! HOWEVER, Iceland truly was one of the most spectacular, other worldly, most beautiful places we’ve been.  In spite of the craziness, it was an amazing experience.

We wanted to experience as much of Iceland as we could, so we decided to do the whole Ring Road - 828 miles that circles around the entire island. We chose 4 different Airbnb/VRBO houses along the way and got to explore so many incredible places. As you can see from our route below, we drove a total of 24 hours in 7 days (it was planned as an 8 day trip, but one of our days was spent in the Toronto airport).

South Iceland: Reykholt

Upon arriving in Iceland we did some exploring in Reykjavik, Iceland’s capital and largest city; however, day one of any international traveling always feels like a bit of a blur with the jet lag. We then started the Ring Road counterclockwise heading south. We stayed in a place within the Golden Circle, close to a lot of beautiful sites.

-Seljalandsfoss Waterfall - lots of people here, but for good reason. You can walk behind the waterfall (and get soaking wet!), but we chose not to. It was super windy, which we quickly found out is very common in Iceland.

-Gljúfrabúi Waterfall - a little walk past the Seljalandsfoss Waterfall is this smaller waterfall, tucked away inside a cliff that you have to climb through the opening to see - very cool!

-Skogafoss Waterfall - Another gorgeous waterfall that you can view from the bottom, and if you so desire (which we did and loved it!) you can take the 527 step stairway to the top of the waterfall for even more amazing views.

-Kvernufoss Waterfall - not as many people at this one, which was nice. Kind of tucked away, this area was crazy beautiful - the waterfall creating a rainbow at the bottom, birds and their nests along the cliff walls, all the colors so vibrant - quite possibly my favorite waterfall we visited.

-Reynishverfi Basalt Column Beach - Black sand and huge very defined basalt columns, created from how the lava cooled.  We had so much fun exploring this area!

-Vik - little town walking distance from the beach; had a fantastic meal here at Strondin Pub Vik. As you might expect, the seafood in Iceland was pretty amazing. We also rode Icelandic horses in Vik, surrounded by beautiful scenery, riding through water, and trying out their tolt gait, all of which became a really memorable experience.

So many beautiful sites in this area, especially waterfalls! We couldn’t get over how many waterfalls there were! Each of these places required some driving, but our base in Reykholt for a couple nights worked out perfectly.

East Iceland Fjords: Seydisfjordur

From Reykholt to Seydisfjordur was a long drive but with some breathtaking scenery and stops along the way.

First was Skaftafell National Park; we did a hike to the Svartifoss Waterfall - a great way to stretch our legs mid drive and take in some beauty - more basalt columns here too.

Then the Jokulsarlon Glacier Lagoon.  I have no words for this.  Huge electric blue glaciers … watching seals pop in and out of the water, striking beauty in every direction you look … it just seemed unreal.

And then right across from the Glacier Lagoon, Diamond Beach - a black sand beach where some of the small pieces of ice from the glaciers wash up on shore looking like diamonds.  Again, just unreal.  I loved this area so much!

Finally on to our rental in Seydisfjordur, and what I think is the family consensus, our favorite location of the Iceland Ring Road.  An amazing drive brings you into the eastern fjords and the tiny quaint little town of Seydisfjordur.  We enjoyed this little town so much (we are definitely more small town/rural people as opposed to big city/urban!). The best pancakes and Americano for breakfast one morning, cute shops where we found some souvenirs, and a couple amazing hikes without any other people around - just us, the quiet, the sheep, and of course, the waterfalls!

One of our favorite hikes here brought us to the Tvisongur, a sound sculpture made of five connected concrete domes of different sizes and heights. Each one of these domes was designed to resonate at the different harmonies of a pentatonic scale, and as the wind rushes in from the cliff through the door like arch openings, the wind creates music. The acoustics inside these domes were so cool, and yes - yes I did sit on the floor and sing.

On another hike here we had the entire thing to ourselves, and we just were overwhelmed by the beauty and peacefulness all around.

Looking through all of our pictures from the trip, Seydisfjordur has the most ~ a family favorite for sure.

Northern Iceland: Grenivik

Another drive day from the eastern fjords to northern Iceland with fun stops along the way:

-Grjótagjá: lava cave with a thermal spring inside. This is in a pretty remote area, but there is a surprisingly good pizza place called Daddi’s Pizza - some interesting toppings, but really good!

-Godafoss: another incredible waterfall (and nice walk and coffee/gift shop)

-Akureyri: really cute town where we ate well and found a fun Christmas village to find an ornament to bring home, which is a tradition for us.

We stayed in a cute little home in Grenivik on the shoreline that was the traditional all black with white windows and great views of the fjord. I forgot to mention that we visited Iceland in June, which is when there is 20-22 hours of daylight! For the most part this was awesome! It did make getting to sleep a little challenging at times, especially if the rental didn’t have black out curtains. Here is a picture from our place in Grenivik taken at midnight with no filters or adjustments.

Grenivik is close to Akureyri where we had another one of our favorite experiences - a whale watching tour! So very incredible to see these massive, beautiful creatures so close up. We would watch the water for the whale’s spray they produce when they breathe near the water’s surface and then would get to see them come up out of the water and dive back down.  I was surprised by how many whale sightings we got to experience, as well as some dolphins too!

Western Iceland: Suournesjabaer

When we realized our flight was cancelled and we weren’t going to be able to fly out for another two days - we panicked a little because we really needed to get home (remember the whole basement flooding part?! Super thankful for amazing friends helping while we were gone so that everything was not ruined!)

We were able to get 3 of us on a flight that day and then 3 more the next day, so we split up girls and boys and thankfully all made it back home with lots more stories to tell each other!

There may have been some stressful parts to this trip for our family, but overall, I wouldn’t change a thing about how we planned our trip. I love that we got to experience the whole island of Iceland. And our memories are of the incredible, indescribable beauty of God’s creation.  Everywhere we went we were completely in awe. So very thankful for the experience and to get to take those memories and feelings back home with us.

And who knows? Maybe we’ll go back again sometime and instead of needing to explore the whole island of Iceland, we’ll just hide out in Seydisfjordur, taking in the mountains, the fjords, the waterfalls … the peacefulness 🙂 It’s always fun to find a favorite to dream about going back to!