Reykjavík is where you sleep. The ice starts two hours east.
Which Golden Circle bus stops at Kerið. What a Vatnajökull ice cave costs in January. Whether the South Coast beats Snæfellsnes when you have one spare day. Reviews of every tour you can book in Iceland.
Four ways onto Icelandic ice, and what each one asks of you.
Crampons, a snowcat or a boat between the floes. The difference is fitness, season and about a hundred dollars.
Six stretches of Iceland, and the best day out in each.
A capital you can walk in an afternoon, a loop of geysers and rift valley, a coast of waterfalls and black sand, a peninsula with its own small ice cap, the country's deepest ice, and the whale harbours of the north.
The days out more travellers book than anything else in Iceland.
Every Icelandic tour we have reviewed →One loop, one coast road and one clear night take most of the traffic on this site.
1
Golden Circle Full-Day Tour with Kerid Crater
See Iceland’s Golden Circle from Reykjavik, including Gullfoss, Geysir, Þingvellir, and Kerið, with practical tips on timing and value.
From · $82
Read our review →
2
Reykjavik Food Walk – Local Foodie Adventure in Iceland
from $146
3
Northern Lights Bus Tour from Reykjavik
from $73
4
South Coast Waterfalls, Black Sand & Glacier Tour
from $126
5
Whale Watching and Marine Life Cruise
from $87
6
Sky Lagoon Entrance Pass With 7-Step Spa Ritual
from $111
7
Golden Circle, Kerid, & Secret Lagoon Tour
from $132
8
Iceland South Coast Full Day Small-Group Tour from Reykjavik
from $139
Whales, puffins, and a fissure you can swim between two continents.
Faxaflói bay in a hard-shell suit, Skjálfandi from an oak schooner, and thirty metres of visibility in glacial meltwater at Silfra.
The lights are a weather forecast, not a booking.
September to April, the coach leaves at nine and drives until it finds a hole in the cloud. Most operators run you again for nothing if the sky closes in.
Iceland is expensive. Here is where the money actually goes.
Every tour on the site, grouped by price. The bands are cut for this country: half the catalogue sits between seventy-five and a hundred and seventy-five dollars.
Museum entries, city walks, lagoon admissions and the lava tunnel out of Hveragerði.
The coach standards: the Golden Circle, the South Coast, whale watching and a northern lights chase.
Ice caves, glacier walks with a super jeep, Landmannalaugar and anything with a private driver.
The Golden Circle is three stops. The buses differ on the fourth.
Þingvellir, Geysir and Gullfoss are on every itinerary sold in Reykjavík. What separates them is whether Kerið, the Secret Lagoon, a tomato farm or a snowmobile gets bolted on the end, and how long you stand at each stop.
- 1Golden Circle Full-Day Tour with Kerid Craterfrom $82
- 2Golden Circle, Kerid, & Secret Lagoon Tourfrom $132
- 3Small-Group Golden Circle, Blue Lagoon with Ticket & Kerid Craterfrom $249
The South Coast is a twelve-hour day and a two-hundred-mile round trip.
Seljalandsfoss you can walk behind, Skógafoss at sixty metres, the basalt columns and killer surf at Reynisfjara, and a glacier tongue at the far end if the operator pushes past Vík. Leaving at eight is not optional in winter.
- 1South Coast Waterfalls, Black Sand & Glacier Tourfrom $126
- 2Iceland South Coast Full Day Small-Group Tour from Reykjavikfrom $139
- 3South Coast Day Tour Black Sand Beach & Waterfalls from Reykjavikfrom $109
Three things this island has that nowhere else does.
Waterfalls and mountains are everywhere. A rift you can swim, a tube left by a lava flow, and molten rock poured indoors are not.
The gap between two plates
Silfra is a flooded fissure in the rift where the North American and Eurasian plates pull apart, filled with meltwater that has spent decades filtering through lava rock. Visibility runs past a hundred metres and the water sits at two degrees all year, which is why everyone goes in a dry suit. The narrowest section is close enough to touch both walls at once.
- 1Silfra: Snorkeling Between Tectonic Plates – Meet on Location★★★★★★★★★★ 5.0 · 5,001 reviews
- 2Silfra: Fissure Snorkeling Tour with Underwater Photos★★★★★★★★★★ 4.9 · 2,731 reviews
- 3Silfra Fissure Snorkeling between Two Continents★★★★★★★★★★ 4.7 · 1,712 reviews
A tube the lava left behind
When a lava river crusts over, the molten core keeps running and drains out, leaving a tunnel. Raufarhólshellir runs more than a kilometre under the moss an hour from Reykjavík, with the original flow lines still on the walls and iron and sulphur staining the rock red and yellow. It is four degrees down there in August.
- 1The Lava Tunnel Tour – Raufarhólshellir★★★★★★★★★★ 5.0 · 2,373 reviews
- 2Ice Cave Tour and Glacier Hike★★★★★★★★★★ 4.5 · 1,746 reviews
- 3Raufarhólshellir Lava Tunnel: Underground Expedition★★★★★★★★★★ 4.7 · 1,717 reviews
Molten rock, poured indoors
A show in Reykjavík reheats real scoria to eleven hundred degrees and pours it down a chute a few metres from the front row. The heat arrives before the light does. It exists because Iceland gets an eruption roughly every four years and visitors kept turning up between them.
- 1Golden Circle Full-Day Tour with Kerid Crater★★★★★★★★★★ 4.8 · 24,485 reviews
- 2Small-Group Golden Circle, Blue Lagoon with Ticket & Kerid Crater★★★★★★★★★★ 5.0 · 5,631 reviews
- 3Golden Circle, Kerid Crater, & Blue Lagoon Tour★★★★★★★★★★ 4.9 · 4,351 reviews
Four Icelandic bookings that run on a calendar, not on your mood.
Most of this country can be arranged from a hostel kitchen the night before. These four run on ice seasons, dry-suit slots and a mountain road that is shut for eight months of the year.
- 01Katla Ice Cave and Super Jeep TourNatural ice caves are a winter product. They form as the meltwater drops and are closed once the glacier starts moving again in spring.
- 02Silfra: Snorkeling Between Tectonic Plates – Meet on LocationDry-suit groups are small and each slot is timed. Winter mornings and midsummer weekends go first.
- 03Landmannalaugar Day HikeThe highland road over the mountains opens when the snow clears, usually late June, and shuts again in September.
- 04Small-Group Golden Circle, Blue Lagoon with Ticket & Kerid CraterEntry is a timed slot and the late-afternoon ones sell out days ahead in every season.
Four hours of daylight in December, and a wind that cancels boats.
Midwinter gives you a sunrise at eleven and a sunset at half past three, and the gales close harbours at a few hours' notice. Both have the same answer: put the outdoor day in the middle of the light, and keep something indoors in reserve.
By place — the capital, the coast and the north
By kind of day — ice, water, road or table
Reykjavík, the Circle, the coast road, then as far east as your nerve holds.
The newest Icelandic tour reviews.
Everything added since →
Exclusive Snaefellsnes Peninsula Private Day Tour
Read our review →
Tipsy in Reykjavik: Drink with a Viking (Food, Beer, Music)
Read our review →
Volcano Movie – Experience the Latest Eruptions in Iceland
Read our review →
Highland Snowmobiling Tour in Southern Iceland
Read our review →
Airplane flight over glacier lagoons and Iceland’s highest peak
Read our review →
Vestmannaeyjar, Puffins & Volcanoes Small Group Day Tour
Read our review →