Guided Tour Grand tour of Iceland

The Flybus shuttle brings you from Keflavík International airport to Reykjavík where you spend the first night in Iceland. We provide you with ideas how to explore Iceland‘s capital on your own.

We see classic highlights today, the Golden Circle Route. We start with a visit to a geothermal greenhouse and watch how Icelanders grow tomatoes. Next door, we can take a selfie with an Icelandic horse and learn about its unique qualities and history. We explore Gullfoss, the beautiful double “Golden Falls”, and we walk through the active geothermal area of Geysir, where Strokkur “the churn” spouts up to 25 meters (70 feet) every five to seven minutes. The next stop is the ancient Viking Parliament area and the UNESCO world heritage site of Þingvellir National Park. The Þingvellir Plain is situated on a tectonic plate boundary where North America and Europe are slowly tearing away from each other. As a result, the plain is scarred by dramatic fissures, ponds, and rivers, including the great rift Almannagjá.
 

Today, we explore the Snaefellsnes Peninsula, which juts out from Iceland’s West Coast. A rugged mountain chain runs its length, capped by the 1,446-meter Snaefellsjokull glacier, a mystical cone-shaped stratovolcano. We travel around the Snaefellsnes Peninsula, through lava fields, and along the ocean with many excellent Icelandic photo opportunities. We see the most popular sites at the Snaefellsnes National Park where volcanic craters, lava flows, an ice cap, glaciated peaks, fjords, sandy beaches, and high cliffs shape its landscapes. We follow the adventure of Jules Verne’s classic science-fiction novel about “The Journey to the Center of the Earth”. Do not miss your chance to go on a trip to the interior of the earth under the glacier Snaefellsjokull! This lava cave tour takes you 35 meters underground and about 200 meters into the lava tube called Vatnshellir. In the afternoon, we catch the car ferry Baldur from Stykkisholmur to Brjanslaekur in the West Fjords. On the 2,5-hour journey over Breidafjordur Bay, we pass the island of Flatey, which is inhabited only during the summertime. If the weather is beautiful, you will enjoy a magnificent view of the bay’s countless isles as well as the glacier Snaefellsjokull.
 

We follow the coastline and stop at the folk and transport museum in Hnjotur. We continue through a very remote and sparsely populated region to the bird cliffs of Látrabjarg, the most abundant seabird cliff and the westernmost point of Iceland and Europe where you can see puffins from mid-May till mid-August. We take a walk in the wilderness to the top of the highest bird cliff in Iceland. Latrabjarg is known in the world for its density of Nordic birds. Puffins, razorbills, guillemots, fulmars, cormorants, kittiwakes, and other cliff birds flock either in hundreds, thousands or even millions. Latrabjarg is a place where you can get very close to the seabirds, and even if you’re not into bird watching, you are entertained by the comic puffins and mesmerized by the sheer number of birds. If weather and road conditions allow, we travel to Raudisandur Beach with endless red sand. Well, not endless but 10 km is a lot. The magnificent hues of the sand differ with daylight, tides, and weather. This pure sand beach is home to countless seabirds and seals and is an oasis of unique tranquillity. Forget everything, except maybe getting the perfect shot of the ever-changing hues of yellow, orange and red.

We travel over mountains and along the shore of scenic fjords until we reach the majestic fjord Arnarfjordur, surrounded by high mountains. At the bottom of the fjord, we come across the unique waterfall Dynjandi with its seven levels of plunging water, declared the country’s most beautiful waterfall by the people of Iceland. We continue over a mountain pass and along the southern shores of the West Fjords which is a route less travelled and is characterized by sheer cliffs, deep cut bays and narrow stretches of coastal lowland. We reach Erpsstadir, a family-run dairy farm best known for its ice cream and various other dairy products. Take a look at the milk production world and taste their unique ice cream directly from the farm, with local seasonal flavours

Today’s journey is a little bit off the beaten track, around the Vatnsnes peninsula. We pass the fishing village of Hvammstangi, also called the seal capital of Iceland. A gravel road takes us around the peninsula to Hvítserkur, a highlight on the east coast of the region; a mass of igneous rock, about 15 meters high, situated on the seashore where fulmars and gulls live. An old story has it that Hvitserkur is a petrified troll who intended to stone a nearby cloister, but dawn arrived before he could succeed. We continue to Kolugljufur Canyon, where waterfalls cascade into the deep, rugged gorge. It is a breathtaking sight to walk on the viewing platform and watch the calm waters of the river suddenly leap and tumble onwards over so many impressive falls – a sight which will leave no one unmoved. Further north we stop at Vidimyri to visit one of the few preserved turf churches in Iceland. The church was built in 1834 and has turf walls, but timber gables both back and front. We continue along a high mountain road to Akureyri, also called the capital of North Iceland, where we stay for two nights.

Enjoy breakfast in the beautiful surroundings of the botanical garden in Akureyri. Afterwards, enjoy a whale-watching tour for 2-3 hours in Eyjafjordur – Iceland’s longest fjord right below the Arctic Circle. For additional bonus and fun, try your luck at sea angling towards the end of the tour. In the afternoon see the spectacular fjord landscapes while travelling to Siglufjordur, Iceland’s northernmost town, known as the herring capital of the North Atlantic. Siglufjordur is located on the mountainous Trollaskagi Peninsula. On the way, we pass small fishing villages and stop at a deserted valley that even most Icelanders have not seen. Included is a visit to the Herring Era Museum in Siglufjordur, Iceland’s largest maritime museum and the only one in Iceland that won the European Museum Awards. We won’t miss the opportunity to taste the herring along with Brennivín, Icelandic schnapps.

We explore Godafoss, the waterfall of the Gods, and continue to Lake Myvatn, known for its abundant bird life and amazing volcanic lava landscapes. We see pseudo craters, walk in the mysterious lava field Dimmuborgir, see the tephra cone Hverfjall, and explore the hot springs, fumaroles, and bubbling mud pools of Namaskard. We travel to Dettifoss, Europe’s most powerful waterfall, in the northern part of Vatnajokull National Park. The round-trip walk takes about 40-60 minutes. We continue east through the bare and sometimes deserted landscape with mountains all around and head through the uninhabited highlands to East Iceland. We end the day at Vok Baths, a geothermal floating pool in Lake Urridavatn where guests can soak in hot water within and surrounded by the lake.
 

It’s a day to admire the dramatic fjord landscape and its tiny fishing villages at the end of twisty roads in the East Fjords. The first stop of the day is Petra’s fascinating rock collection. A naturalist and a collector are two terms that have been used to describe Petra since she was a little girl. Petra collected for nearly 80 years this unique treasure of rocks, crystals, zeolites, quartz and more, all from the nearby area in the East Fjords. Finally, in the afternoon, we see Vatnajokull, Europe’s biggest glacier visible all over Southeast Iceland.
 

Today we visit Vatnajokull National Park which covers about 14% of Iceland, making it Europe’s 2nd largest national park in terms of area. We stop for a boat ride amongst the floating icebergs on the magnificent Jokulsarlon glacial lagoon, considered one of the highlights on tour around Iceland. Next, we walk along the black sands of the so-called Diamond beach. We explore the region of Skaftafell which is nestled below Iceland’s highest mountain and the second-biggest stratovolcano in Europe, the 2.110-meter high Hvannadalshnukur. We walk close to one of the many glacial tongues in the area – a true photo moment. We cross a sandy desert before reaching our overnight location Vik, the southernmost village in Iceland.

Today we travel along the South Coast of Iceland, between the sea, rugged mountains, glaciers, and waterfalls. We explore the black lava beach, Reynisfjara, and bird cliffs before stopping at the Skogafoss waterfall, another must-see location in South Iceland. The crashing water creates a mist that results in frequent and magical rainbows, just adding some more memorable experiences to the sheer beauty of this stunning scenery and place. Afterwards, we visit the Skogar folk museum with its turf houses assemblage of traditions of territorial relics on display. Later reach Seljalandsfoss waterfall where you can follow a slick and wet trail and walk right behind it. Come prepared and bring a raincoat and good boots as you will get wet. Then we visited the Lava & Volcano Exhibition Centre focused on geology and active volcanoes and watched a documentary film about volcanic eruptions in the past years in Iceland. Farewell dinner at a local restaurant in Reykjavík, Iceland’s capital.

The Flybus airport shuttle picks you up at your hotel and takes you the Keflavík International airport.