Iceland Part 2: Sleeping & Eating

May 4, 2016
6 min read

In Part 2 of my Iceland series (check out Part 1 here) I'm going to blabber on and on about my personal experience regarding the following three major points of any vacation: where to stay, what to eat, and how to not self destruct from lack of connection with the outside world. I'd love to throw my two cents (2.45 krona) in.

The Land of Fire and Ice: Part 2

Accommodation, Dining, & Wifi

Accommodation

Tourism is becoming more and more common in Iceland and standard hotels are popping up around the country. In my experience, hotels are often quite.. bland. I wasn't sure I wanted to go the hotel route on this trip, but during my internet explorations I stumbled across a hotel with a lot of interesting history located in Icelands Eastfjords. IT was an old french fisherman hospital-turned-hotel in a small mountain town. I couldn't pass up how unique it was, so we totally stayed there.. but man was it a hike!

As unneccsary and inconvenient as this place was, it was amazing and we had a blast. The hotel had a pretty creepy "museum" in the basement which was modeled after a french fisherman boat. The exhibit came complete with life-size wax models of fisherman that scared the crap out of me. Still not 100% convinced they weren't alive.

So yes, hotels (both boring and unique) are always an option, though they are few and far between once you get further from the capital of Reykjavik. Luckily, Iceland offers another option: Guesthouses. Lots and lots of guesthouses.

For a really good price you can stay in a hostel. Grab a bed in a dorm style room with a shared bathroom and have the chance to make some life long memories with new friends. To that I say, nope!

I've never stayed in a hostel or shared a room with strangers. Call me what you will (prude! boring! loner!) but I don't think I'd be comfortable with it for a number of reasons which I won't get into. If you're into that sort of thing, Iceland will be you're best friend! Hostels seem to be everywhere. Thankfully, Iceland offers (for just a few extra bucks) private rooms and cottages as well. We opted for the private room. We also went for the private cottage.

The private room we booked was at Vatnsholt and was really perfect. It was a last minute booking where we decided it was just too cold to camp. The room had a bunk bed, full bed, tons of comfortable and pretty blankies and pillows, a cute private bathroom, and a view overlooking a snowy field with mountains in the distance and the best sunrise I've ever seen.

The grounds had numerous guest houses with private and shared rooms, a restaurant which served farm-grown food and fruit-fed meat, and tons of friendly animals to pet. We saw Icelandic horses and a cool parrot, but we didn't hang around long enough to find the fox or pigs.

Then there's the cottage, Gardar on Reynisfjara Beach. Just freakin' beautiful. A lumberjack style cottage a few cartwheels away from the famous black sand beach in Vik. It included a kitchen and bathroom, living room and bedroom, and a fun guest book which I water colored the northern lights into to thank our host.

His name was Ragnar. We chatted a bit (he learned english watching TV) and he explained how he got into the cottage biz. "I had a lot of sheep. But then I sold some sheep to build these cottages. Now they make me more money than my sheep do." He then proceeded to explain why all the walls of the cottages had windows except for the one facing the mountains. Turns out avalanches are a normal-ish thing in Iceland, sometimes so bad Ragnar has to shovel snow into his house in order to shovel his way out. So badass.

On our last night we stayed in the capital at one of the many Airbnbs offered. It was a well located and nicely decorated apartment with a huge couch and netflix, which was a big plus after 5 nights without a TV. (the french hotel-turned-hospital had a TV but the only thing we could seem to find was conan the barbarian).

It was definitely a great experience being in walking distance to basically everything in the capital, and the bed was super comfortable.

If you're not up on the latest- Iceland is known for being a big camping destination. People rent camper vans all the time and just sleep and drive (I don't think at the same time but I'm not sure). Wild camping is also permitted- read up on that before you do it- but there are also a ton of camp sites around the country. In the summer it's a few bucks to secure a tent spot, so I hear. In the winter, I can only assume it's free. We did camp one night, it was freezing, but we didn't pay a dime! Nothing a little zero-degree sleeping bag and some heated gameboy competition can't handle.

Dining

Yikes. Feeding ourselves was kind of tough, but also kind of fun. Chances are you aren't going to Iceland for their world renown foodie scene, so I recommend stocking up on power bars and beef jerky before you get there- they proved very handy on long drives. (Buffalo Bobs Beef Jerky <3)

When you're out and about, don't be ashamed to stop into a gas station for some snacks or a full meal. We tried some interesting icelandic candy bars and Doritos- "cool american" flavor, along with two or three sit down meals in various gas stations, and they were incredibly satisfying. We got hot dogs, cheeseburgers, chips, candy, grilled sandwiches, etc. It's not a bad option! All hail the N1. The best part had to be their unique take on salt and pepper, a sort of mixture that reminded me of Old Bay. I also had about 4 cappuccinos per day.

I had my first Icelandic meal at the black sand beach cafe, and I opted for the weirdest thing I could find because.. when in Iceland eat as the Icelanders eat? Raw herring, boiled egg, and mayonaise on some dense rye bread. Try it because why wouldn't you? It was a actually kind of delicious until the last bite when I realized I was eating raw herring, boiled egg, and mayonaise on some dense rye bread.

The night we stayed in the cottage we decided we should use the kitchen. So we drove into town and bought dinner to cook in our cottage kitchenette. We tried really hard to find whale meat, but we couldn't read the labels! We ended up cooking ground beef in pasta with garlic bread and it was a LOT of food for $15. (seriously though, how do you say whale in Icelandic?!)

At the french fisherman hospital-turned-hotel we ate at the restaurant and were not disappointed. Lamb and cod I believe. Fancy, fresh, and delicious! Two Icelandic beers on the side and it was a great meal.

We also ate at the guesthouse restaurant at Vatnsholt, really hoping to get an idea of what exactly fruit fed beef tasted like. Unfortunately it wasn't on the menu that night, but our chicken and lamb were fantastic.

In the capital, we really hoped to finally catch some whale, but couldn't seem to find a walkable restaurant that served any. We were pretty done with driving at this point. Instead, we had some delicious icelandic tea at the walkable loki cafe.

For dinner, we headed over to an American style restaurant called roadhouse right around the corner from our airbnb. I guess not a lot of tourists go there, probably because they are busy eating puffin and stuff, so to our amusement everyone thought we were Icelandic. No, seriously, they did. The host, two waitresses, and the cashier all spoke in Icelandic before realizing we couldn't understand them one bit. It was amazing. So was the food (we got mac and cheese burgers and milkshakes).

To end the dining blurb, it might be worthwhile to buy a bottle of alcohol at the duty free. It'll last two people a few nights, keep you warm when camping, and be a fun addition to just about every part of your trip. Bonus tip: before your flight home, pick up some mini bottles at the airport duty free for yourself or your friends back home. The options include Icelandic vodka, birch snaps, and bitters filtered through lava.

Wifi

Iceland is basically one giant wifi zone, at least that's the impression I was given before being there. And ok sure, the capital of Reyjavik probably does have free wifi in just about every corner (or passwords posted on cafe walls), but if you're exploring the country side you'll be living under a rock for most of your time. But that's what traveling is all about- getting away from that little tiny screen and checking out the great big world!

That being said, if you want some peace of mind in terms of directions and such for emergencies ...you know, like googling how to say whale in icelandic...opt for an international data plan from your phone carrier. I signed up for a $25 100mb data plan from Verizon and it lasted me the entire week. It helped get some quick answers on directions, google nearby sites and gas stations, and even look up a fun fact or two during long stretches of open road (it's hvalur). But for real - only use it for emergencies! Get off your phone!

..I was very thankful for the music we had though- bring an aux cable for sure.