After my little engagement announcement post I’m jumping back to the beginning of our Iceland trip. We flew to Iceland for two weeks, last week of April and first week of May. It was the coldest Spring they had experienced in 50+ years …… haha just our luck! Still it never rained once, and we did have mostly blue skies even if it was minus temperatures – which you’ll never guess from the photos (apart from the ones with ice in or me wrapped up like the Michellin Man with 100 layers)!

Tog tech alert ** For anyone interested I took two camera bodies with me (with the intention that my boyfriend might learn to use one), 2 spare batteries, lots of memory, a small tripod which never got used due to being too windy or cold and two lenses only – my 40mm and 85mm. I shot most stuff on my 40mm and only regretted not having my 70-200mm when we went Whale watching.

Iceland is thought of as a very expensive country, but we didn’t really find this to be true. Some things were a little bit more expensive but not hugely and were very comparable to London prices. Clothes, art and presents type purchases we did think were quite expensive, but food, drink and accommodation we felt was pretty reasonable. Or you at least had the option to choose something more affordable.
In case you’re thinking of visiting I’ll include a few prices for things as I blog about them.

Reykjavik needs a post of it’s own.

After the few main touristy things to visit and see we loved just wandering the streets looking at the architecture and the graffiti, stumbling across interesting little shops and cafes.
Reykjavik is great little city for a short break. Lots of bars, restaurants and cafes, plus many day trip activities to keep you busy once you’ve finished shopping.

 We flew with Wow Air and we had one of the smoothest landing I’ve ever experienced!

Our first two nights accommodation was less than a 10min walk into the centre of town and less than 10min walk to the main bus/coach station in the opposite direction. I wish I had taken some photos inside as it was lovely! Very new and very clean, I would highly recommend the Smaragata Rooms if you are looking for self catering accommodation. It cost £43 per night. There are about 3/4 rooms with two shared bathrooms/toilets (which is the norm with self catering accomm) and one small but adequate kitchen. We ate out and never saw anyone else while we were staying there. It might be cold outside (F****ing freezing) but everywhere we stayed was absolutely boiling inside, forever turning down radiators!

We took the bus from the airport to our accommodation and the dropped us right at our door. It cost the equivalent of £40 for the two of us.

I was fascinated by these trees that looked like they were half submerged, we saw these a lot.

Hallgrimskirkja Church- the views are a must! 

I was slightly obsessed by these pretty fire hydrants that came in all sorts of sizes and shapes.

No locks and chains needed in this country! 
Face! Breakfast on our first morning before a two hour walking tour – unbeknown to me the lady in the photo turned out be our tour guide!
N.B – Going our for breakfast isn’t really ‘a thing’ yet in Iceland so it was pretty hard to find a cafe serving breakfast type food, especially for a veggie. The only thing on the menu I could have was a cheese panini with salad. I guess maybe I could have just asked for eggs or fruit maybe?, which as the holiday went on I learnt to do for dinner times and most places managed to bodge something together for me.   

There she is again – lady from the cafe now known as Audur of ‘I Heart Reykjavik’ – THE BEST BLOG on Iceland EVER!! 
Very common to see babies in prams outside shops and restaurants 

Filming something? We couldn’t work out what though?

A really great cafe with lots of veggie options!

 

 

 

Record Shop
Another favourite cafe – gorgeous food!! 
We took the bus to the Blue Lagoon as we weren’t getting our hire car until the next day and it also meant we could both have a drink.

It started snowing!

 

 

 

Laundromat Bar/Restaurant

 Literally had a Laundromat in the basement!

 

Monster! Slightly worried this was our hire car for the next day.

The first day in our hire car, trying to get out of Reykjavik and on the way we were very pleased with ourselves at managing to find a supermarket, actually getting to it and parking!!