transportation

March 2, 2016 By Eric Leave a Comment

Planning your Iceland trip – Iceland With Kids

“Reykjavik” by Marco Bellucci is licensed under CC BY 2.0

We’ve written many posts about planning for your trip to Iceland. Here is a summary of our best advice, at least so far.

When to go to Iceland?

There will be several obvious differences in your vacation experience based on what time of year you go:

Temperature. This isn’t as big as you think: Highs in the summer are in the mid 50s, while winter highs are in the mid 30s. See details in this post. Yes, there is snow in the winter, and so you’ll need to make your travel plans less aggressive.
Daylight. This is a bigger deal than you may think. Summer has 24 hours of usable daylight. The middle of winter may only give you 7. More details in the same post. This picture was taken at about 11:30 PM in June:

“Midnight Sun” by Hafsteinn Robertsson is licensed under CC BY 2.0 [Read more…] about Planning your Iceland trip – Iceland With Kids

February 20, 2016 By Eric 25 Comments

Understanding F roads in Iceland

“Iceland” by Moyan Brenn is licensed under CC BY 2.0

If you are planning to drive in Iceland, you need to understand F roads. F roads are mountain roads; Fjallið means mountain in Icelandic.

For lots more about F roads and driving in Iceland, check out our brand new Safe Driving in Iceland Video Course!

Some F roads are hardly roads at all– you might consider them mountain tracks. Here is a picture of F210, for example:

“Iceland” by Moyan Brenn is licensed under CC BY 2.0 [Read more…] about Understanding F roads in Iceland

January 20, 2016 By Lora 16 Comments

Should I bring my child’s car seat to Iceland?

One of the struggles of travelling with children is lugging car seats everywhere you go. So the question is, when you travel to Iceland, do you bring your own child car seats? I think, for the most part, the answer is NO.

As you would expect, Iceland has its own rules about car seat safety. While they are similar to what is in effect in many US states, the rules are not the same. The Icelandic Transport Authority publishes an English-language brochure on Child Safety in Motor Cars that you may wish to read. The main difficulty is that the US organization that certifies car seats has different (not necessarily better, not necessarily worse, but different) standards than the European one. There is no exception in Icelandic law for visitors, so car seats in Iceland are required to be approved by the European rules, not US rules. [Read more…] about Should I bring my child’s car seat to Iceland?

December 30, 2015 By Eric 5 Comments

Choosing a car rental company in Iceland

Photo by http://www.cgpgrey.com/ is licensed under CC BY 2.0

Update: We chose Blue Car rental for our Iceland trip, and we were very happy with them. We also recently partnered with them (in June 2017) to offer a 5% discount on your Blue Car rental!

Choosing a car rental company in Iceland is confounding. There are dozens of companies, each claiming to be the cheapest, or the best, or both.

I found 27 different companies; I’m sure I missed many. At each company’s web site, I ran the same search for the same types of cars for the same rental period. The results are in the graphs below.

Now, before you peek down at the results, it’s important to realize that price isn’t the only consideration here. When I rent a car, I’m looking for the best experience. So: [Read more…] about Choosing a car rental company in Iceland

December 12, 2015 By Eric Leave a Comment

Getting from the airport to Reykjavik

“rainbow at Keflavík Airport” by Jason Eppink is licensed under CC BY 2.0

[Updated in July 2019. Prices increased again!]

Assuming our post about things to do near Keflavik airport didn’t persuade you, you may be looking for the best way to get from the airport to Reykjavik. As with most other decisions you’ll make, you have to balance price against time and convenience. A taxi that picks you up and shuttles you directly to your hotel is convenient, but not cheap. And a bus that forces you to transfer to a smaller shuttle to get to your hotel is cheaper, but not as convenient.