The travel itinerary

Welcome

Hi! My name is Laurens, 28 years of age and happily living in Belgium. You know, the tiny country famous for its beer and chocolate.

In September 2021 I traveled together with my girlfriend, Ann, to Iceland for a two week road trip across the country. In this blog I would like to take you along for the ride and share our experience. May it inspire you to one day visit this magnificent country.

Travel planning 

After all the misery that COVID-19 brought into our lives, we dared to speak of holidays abroad in late spring 2021. The vaccination campaign was fully under way in Belgium and if all went according to plan, our government deemed international travel possible for the summer holidays. A bit precautious we decided to plan our trip in September. Firstly because we were a bit sceptical about the government's planning, secondly because travelling outside the touristic season is always a benefit. Not only financially, but especially when travelling to a country where you want to see nature... not tourists.

On the downside does September brings more uncertainty for the weather and temperature. The latter in mind, we contacted various travel agencies to see if traveling to Iceland in September was still a good idea. Luckily all replies were very reassuring and we sat down at the drawing board to plan our trip.

Normally I don't rely on travel agencies for planning trips, but because September is autumn in Iceland and winter is usually not far behind. This brought up some questions that needed answers from experts. For example: we really wanted to visit the highlands with a 4 wheel drive, but most of these routes close around this time. Whale watching tours are also one of Iceland's favorite tourist attractions. When registering for a tour we wanted to check if there was still a high chance of seeing them in September. Google is your friend, but sometimes it's better to not take too many risks.

After a couple of weeks we finished our travel itinerary. It looked like this:

• Day 1: Keflavik airport to Reykjavik
  Pick up rental car + grocery shopping
• Day 2: Reykjavik to Vík
  Geyser Grýla, Gluggafoss, Seljalandsfoss, Gljúfrafoss, Skógafoss, DC3 plane wreck, Dyrhólaey
• Day 3: Vík to Skaftafell National Park
  Hjörleifshöfði, Fjaðrárgljúfur, Svartifoss, Sjónarnýpa
• Day 4: Skaftafell to Kirkjubæjarklaustur
  Svínafellsjökull, Hangandifoss, Fjallsárlón, Jökulsárlón, Systrafoss, Kirkjugólf
• Day 5: Kirkjubæjarklaustur to Hrauneyjar (highlands)
  Landmannalaugar, Lakí, Eldgjá, Ófærufoss
• Day 6: Hrauneyjar to Mývatn 
  Sprengisandur (F26), Aldeyjarfoss, Goðafoss, Mývatn Nature Baths
• Day 7: Mývatn area
  Dettifoss, Selfoss, Hafragilsfoss, Ásbyrgi, Hverir, Krafla (Víti), Hverfell, Dimmuborgir
• Day 8: Mývatn to Dalvik
  Vindbelgjarfjall, Akureyri
• Day 9: Dalvik to Sauðárkrókur
  Whale watching tour, Siglufjörður, Hofsós, Grettislaug
• Day 10: Sauðárkrókur to Laugarvatn (highlands)
  Kjölur (F35), Hveravellir, Kerlingarfjöll, Gullfoss, Geysir/Strokkur, Brúarfoss
• Day 11: Laugarvatn to Reykholt (highlands)
  Thingvellir, Kaldidalur (F550), Hraunfossar & Barnafoss, Deildartunguhver
• Day 12: Snaefellsnes peninsula
  Grábrók, Kirkjufell, Bæjarfoss, Skarðsvík, Djúpalónssandur, Hellnar, Búðir, Ytri-Tunga
• Day 13: Borgarnes to Reykjavik
  Glymur waterfall
• Day 14: Reykjavik 

As you may notice from the itinerary we planned for a pretty busy trip. After all, we didn't go to Iceland to sit in the sun on the beach. The overall route was obtained from the travel agency based on our requests (certain landmarks we wanted to visit). The final plan, as shown above, took quite some preparation and research to find out what was possible to do within a single day. 

Now that you're all prepped up about the journey we're going to take: let's go!