Excursions – Reykjavik, Iceland

If you’re not into museums, listen up. Even if you are into museums, these several excursions are some of Iceland’s biggest outdoor attractions. Trips to Iceland are generally considered incomplete without having visited these top sights.

Blue Lagoon: This is definitely touristy, and in my opinion, definitely amazing. Soaking in this huge, cathartic steaming pool of natural, mineral-rich, geothermal water makes visiting Blue Lagoon an ideal day trip. 40 minutes from Reykjavik, buses leave BSI Bus Terminal six times throughout the day for the spa. Blue Lagoon is open daily, from 10AM to 9:45PM, in the summer months. Price is 1200kr for adults, but make sure to bring your own towel and bathing suit if you can, because each of those is an extra 300kr. They have implemented a great system whereby your admission price pays for a locker to keep your things safe and dry, and the key to your locker is a bracelet which you can also charge drinks and food to. Very resorty.

The bus ride to Blue Lagoon, on FlyBus, costs 1000kr each way. In some instances, it is cheaper to take an organized tour to Blue Lagoon, than to use public transport. In the package, the transport and admission are combined for a price of 2750kr, which is not only cheaper by about 500kr, but the tour will pick you up and drop you off at your accommodation. This is through the Thingvallaleid- the Blue Lagoon Public Bus, as opposed to FlyBus. Phone number for this bus is 354 511 2600. In general, look into your options before you take even a daytrip….why a tour is cheaper than a local bus, who knows.

Geysir & Gullfoss: These two attractions are most often visited together because of their close proximity to one another. If you are only in Reykjavik for a short time, these are the two sights to see- you can do Blue Lagoon on the way from or back to the airport. The FlyBus leaves from the Long Distance Bus Terminal, and in the summer runs two buses daily on the Geysir/Gullfoss loop. Departures from Reykjavik are at 8AM and 12PM. The fare was 4800 Kronur roundtrip, and while this bus ride is not a “tour” per se, it stops at the destinations for an allotted amount of time, and most people get back on the bus to continue on to the next destination. Thus it operates like a tour, but without a guide.

The first stop is at a beautiful crater lake in the middle of nowhere for 10 minutes (photo opp and stretching and awe). Then the bus is on to Gullfoss for an hour, stopping right in the visitor’s parking lot at the site of these impressively huge and beautiful waterfalls. There is a walking trail that allows one to get near the falls, but there is not much else to do in the area, so an hour is a good amount of time. If the weather is wet, get a good, cheap cup of tea at the visitor’s cafe.

Geysir is a surreal playground of natural phenomena. Little boiling pots bubble furiously, sulfuric steam rises in a continuous mist, and of course, the geysir emerges from deep within the earth’s surface to spout straight to the sky and fall back down again, in a matter of seconds. Truth be told, the geysir that the everyone visits today is actually called Stokkur, as the original geysir suddenly ceased to spout in 1916. Stokkur is located 100 meters south of the legendary Geysir, and still spouts an impressive skyward shot up to 30 meters in height, every five to eight minutes.

The bus stops for two hours at Geysir, which is plenty of time to be mesmerized by Stokkur, and to walk around the surrounding area. Make your way up the hill to get a look at the other sulphur pools, the parts of the ground that, due to rich mineral content, have been reddened and browned in deep colorful hues, and for a breath-taking panoramic view at the top of the hill. There is a fence weakly blocking off the way up the hill, but there was a small step ladder over it when I was there. So don’t be shy, make your way up the hill.

A couple things to keep in mind while photographing Stokkur: If it’s a cloudy day, the white of the water won’t show up against the white/grey of the sky. I had this problem in most of my pictures. The spouting looks invisible. Try photographing the spouting from an angle which gives the water a colored background, accentuating the contrast. For example, you can take the photo on higher ground, so green land is the background instead of white sky. Also, get familiar with the rapid-fire function on your camera if you have it and haven’t used it yet before. It was made for events like this!

If you want a bit of history and some factoids, FlyBus also runs two tours of the Geysir-Gullfoss sights, but also stopping at the Blue Lagoon. There are two tours available, a 8-9 hour tour, and a condensed 6 hour tour, which I believe does not include the Blue Lagoon. However, the way the normal, public bus schedule works when doing this route leaves ample, if not ideal, time at both sites and is slightly more affordable.

But no matter which way you choose to get there, you have GOT to get there!
If you need to see to believe, check out:
these pictures and these, too!

Questions?
If you want more information about this area you can email the author or check out our Europe Insiders page.

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