Your Grand Icelandic Adventure

Snæfellsnes Peninsula

Perhaps explore the Snæfellsnes Peninsula today, around 1.5 to 2 hours drive from Reykjavik. Often called Iceland in Miniature, the peninsula packs an extraordinary range of landscapes into a single day. Your route takes you along the southern coast first, where dramatic lava fields meet the sea and the colourful fishing village of Arnarstapi makes an ideal first stop. Walk the coastal path to Hellnar, a short and stunning clifftop trail above crashing surf and nesting seabirds.

From here, the road curves around the tip of the peninsula and the glacier volcano Snæfellsjökull comes into full view. Jules Verne chose this peak as the entry point to the centre of the earth, and standing beneath it, the mythology feels entirely earned. The Snæfellsjökull National Park offers several short hikes and lava tube walks worth exploring before you continue north.

The northern coastline is quieter and wilder. Stop at Kirkjufell, the arrow shaped mountain that rises sharply from the water's edge near Grundarfjörður, one of Iceland's most photographed landmarks and best seen in the late afternoon light.

Hotel Budir | Junior Suite | Breakfast Included

On the westernmost tip of the Snaefellsnes peninsula, set into a lava field beside a black sand beach and a small timber church, Hótel Búðir began life in 1947 as a guesthouse and fish restaurant, drawing the likes of Halldór Laxness and the painter Jóhannes Kjarval before it burned down and was rebuilt in 2003. Its 28 rooms and suites keep a quiet Scandinavian palette of hardwood floors and large windows looking out to the Snæfellsjökull glacier, the lava field, or the Atlantic, while the lounge holds leather sofas, an open fire, and a telescope trained on the seals in the bay. The restaurant, often called the Mecca of Icelandic cooking, works almost entirely from what comes off nearby boats and farms. What sets it apart is its isolation: there is nothing else out here but lava, glacier and sea, so the hotel itself becomes the whole of the experience rather than a base for leaving it.