A person of the initially items you might think about when scheduling a vacation to Iceland is whether or not to travel the whole length of the ring highway that goes about the entire place – recognized as Route 1, and not to be perplexed with the Golden Circle which is shut to Reykjavik and provides you effortless obtain to some important sights that can be witnessed in a solitary day.
To assess this, we needed to initial know how far it was and how prolonged it would get. The remedy to that issue is that Iceland’s complete ring street covers 1,317 kilometres and, in theory, can be pushed in just 16.5 hrs (albeit by way of non-cease driving – but even if sharing the driving, you would nevertheless will need to end to adjust motorists and to re-fuel!). This also assumes no targeted visitors in any way.
Given that you can, in idea, comfortably get all the way all around in just two typical-but-extended times of driving (8-10 hrs), this leaves numerous people today considering how achievable it is for a circumnavigation of the full nation by road, specifically if they are remaining in the nation for for a longer period.
So how very long do you really will need to adhere to the overall length of the ring street? The basic suggestion that I have read through for this is that realistically you need to have to allow at minimum 6 days to travel the route in Summer months or at least 12 times if driving in Winter season.
We experienced just 8 days – 9 if you bundled the day of our departure but, given that we had an early morning flight, it really was just 8 times. So, in theory, since we have been traveling to in Summer months, we had extra than ample time to do a so-called 6-working day street excursion.
But the additional and much more I analyzed the maps and examined what there is to see and do alongside the way, I critically questioned irrespective of whether 6 times is at all reasonable. There are so a lot of normal wonders to see in Iceland that, if you ended up to travel all the way all over in just 6 days, I really don’t consider you would do any of it justice. Your stops would have to be hurried and you would have to overlook out many matters that you may or else want to see. In brief, it just wouldn’t be entertaining, in my belief.
Let us just take some of the attractions as an case in point. If you required to see Jökulsárlón Glacier Lagoon and Diamond Seaside, which lies on the ring road… are you actually telling me you’d be satisfied to stop listed here, see it and hop back in the auto once more 20 minutes later on? No, I hope not! You want to choose it all in… admire the watch, possibly wander all around the lagoon minor, maybe even go on a single of the boat rides. You will want to wander from the lagoon to the shore and see the significant blocks of ice on the seaside, glowing in the sunshine. You could easily invest at least an hour or two listed here, and likely substantially extended.
Equally, there are sights this sort of as the airplane wreck which, though regarded to be on the Route 1 ring road, are likely a 45-minute walk away. You in all probability need to allow at the very least 2 hrs to check out the plane wreck, perhaps for a longer time relying on your walking velocity and how extensive you want to devote there.
Waterfalls these as Seljalandsfoss and Skógafoss are the very same. They are pretty close to the ring road so, in concept, you can hop out of your vehicle, acquire a photograph and be on your way… but the place is the enjoyable in that? At Skógafoss, you will want to climb the techniques to the proper which basically takes you together a route you can adhere to for miles, having in however extra waterfalls. At Seljandsfoss, you are going to want to abide by the route that will take you round the back again of the waterfall and maybe even check out the significantly lesser-recognised and far more complicated to entry nearby waterfall of Gljúfrabúi. All of this can take time, but it is time very well expended and I’d faster be executing things like this than investing most of my time in a automobile.
It’s also truly worth mentioning that quite a few of Iceland’s important points of interest – significantly for initial time people – like in the south and west of the region. Provided that your vacation will no question start from the south-west, possibly from Keflavik Airport or Reykjavik, you will locate the best focus of points of interest do not necessitate you driving all the way close to the region.
Then there are personal tours that you could like to consider – for illustration, we did a Katla ice cave tour that took up an total early morning and a snowmobiling tour that took up most of an afternoon. If your goal is to get all over the region in just a handful of days, you are heading to have to forego a ton of these kinds of alternatives.
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And I have not even talked about stopping for meals. Would not you favor to end, sit down and rest with some Icelandic food stuff, rather than just grab some treats from a company station and push on? Some of Iceland’s famous red warm lava soup, possibly?
In brief, letting you much more time to get all-around the country, or knowing your constraints and deciding upon not to try it if you do not sense you have ample times, is a really vital choice to make. It is the difference in between have a rushed and frantic stay in Iceland or acquiring a a great deal more leisurely a person that you can thoroughly love.
Returning to the suggestion of at the very least 6 days to push the route in Summer time or at least 12 times to generate it in Winter…. it all would seem considerably also frantic and rushed to me. I believe it’s more reasonable to counsel 10-14 days in Summer season and 20-25 days in Wintertime, and preferably selecting a little something at the latter end of each individual of these ranges.
For this purpose, considering the fact that we had just 8 times, we chose not to attempt to drive all the way around. Of course, it could have been performed. But I’m happy we made that final decision – there was continue to so much for us to see and do in the time we had offered without having driving extreme distances. It is easy to think that you will see extra by masking extra ground, but in this instance I really don’t believe this would have been the scenario.
Have you driven the full ring road? How very long did you allocate and did you truly feel it was adequate?
Scheduling a trip to Iceland you? You can enjoy a video from our vacation to Iceland below:
Disclosure: This article is sponsored by Icerental 4×4. Our trip to Iceland was also sponsored by Helly Hansen.