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[Iceland] Pre-Trip Planning Guide: Itinerary, Transport, Weather, Aurora Hunting & Accommodation

You can view the full day-by-day route and accommodation on Wanderlog here 🙂

Other Iceland posts:

How It Started & Daily Itinerary

Iceland always comes up in conversations about beautiful places — it wasn’t on my bucket list, but it was on my family’s. So we planned a trip for autumn 2025.

Five of us in total: me, my husband, my younger sister (30s), and my parents (60s). Excluding flights and the arrival night (we landed very late), we had 11 actual days of travel. Our backbone was the Ring Road — we skipped the Westfjords and the northern villages, moved through the east fairly quickly, and spent most of our time in the south, around Lake Mývatn, and the Snæfellsnes Peninsula.

Full route on Wanderlog here 🙂

Transport

Flights

We went with China Airlines because we’re members and didn’t want my parents to deal with too many connections — so we flew through London and transferred to Icelandair. Round-trip tickets came out to around NTD 50,000–60,000 each; it was probably peak season. If you want to save money, check routes with more connections.

A few notes:

Car Rental

Driving yourself is by far the most practical way to get around Iceland. With five people, a car made everything easy. If you can’t self-drive, tours out of Reykjavík can still get you to the Golden Circle and glacier hikes.

We rented from Lotus: a Toyota RAV4 4WD with platinum insurance, from 23:30 on 09/24 to 22:00 on 10/05 — 11 full days, with two additional drivers (three drivers total). Total: NTD 61,184. Not cheap, but Iceland has too many unpredictable situations to scrimp on a rental. Outside summer, you may hit heavy rain or snow, so 4WD is genuinely necessary if you’re visiting in autumn or winter or going anywhere near mountain roads.

Five people plus a Toyota RAV4 means luggage puzzle-solving. The boot isn’t large, so we cut down:

This required Tetris-level packing. If you have more luggage, or plan to self-cater heavily, go with a bigger vehicle.

Insurance

Get the full coverage. Seriously. Iceland’s weather is wildly unpredictable, you can hit loose gravel at any time, and sheep are everywhere.

I looked at third-party add-ons like Rental Cars, but their coverage had gaps and potential post-trip scrutiny. We ended up going with Lotus’s platinum insurance, which in practice meant: no inspection on pickup, and when we returned the car they couldn’t even find it in the lot and just said “all good” 😂

When comparing insurances, check whether they cover:

Also confirm it covers door damage (strong wind can literally rip car doors off in Iceland) and animal collisions. I thought the animal coverage was just marketing — until we actually had sheep running in front of the car multiple times. Not a joke.

Lotus platinum insurance includes: a free pocket WiFi (very useful), 6 free coffees at N1 stations, and an N1 fuel discount card.

Fuel

Fuel in Iceland is fully self-serve. Two main setups:

Our Lotus platinum card gave us the N1 discount. That said, Orkan is often a bit cheaper than N1, so it’s worth checking. Prices also vary by location — keep an eye out when you’re somewhere different.

Some stations are tiny. Others are large enough to have restrooms and a restaurant — great for a mid-drive break on long stretches.

Roads

Always check road conditions at Vegagerðin before heading out — it shows closures and alerts. We actually had a section of the Ring Road close on us during our trip, and that’s how we found out.

Iceland is also much larger than it looks. A comfortable daily driving range is around 3 hours; over 5 hours and it gets genuinely exhausting. Always open Google Maps and check driving time when planning. In winter or early spring, daylight is short and conditions unpredictable — factor in a lot more buffer.

Parking

Parking in Reykjavík and most tourist spots costs money. Download Parka — it uses your phone’s GPS to find nearby lots and shows whether they’re compatible for in-app payment. You can also pay at the physical machine with a credit card if you prefer.

Tourist attraction parking is usually ISK 800–1,200 per visit; one payment covers the full day (until 23:59).

Important: Some parking zones have cameras, and non-payment results in a fine. Pay every time.

One caveat: for attraction-specific lots, I found the physical machine slightly cheaper than Parka. Use your judgment.

Tunnel Toll

There’s only one tolled tunnel in Iceland: Vaðlaheiðargöng, between Lake Mývatn and Akureyri. You need to pay within 24 hours of passing through at the official website — enter your license plate number and pay.

Miss the window and you’ll get a fine.

2025 rates (one way):

Some people take the bypass road to avoid the toll — apparently it doesn’t add much time. But in winter conditions, the tunnel is safer.

Weather

Insane. That’s my entire summary 😄

In autumn, the weather shifts constantly — and I mean constantly. A typical day: torrential rain in the morning → brilliant sunshine at noon → downpour after lunch → sun shower with a rainbow at dusk → heavy rain in the evening, but an hour later you’re looking at the northern lights.

If you learn to read the forecast, you can actually work with this. Except for Day 3 (Yellow Alert, no escaping that one), we used the forecast to move attractions around and mostly stayed dry while in motion. Rain usually only caught us back in the car.

The best weather source: Veður (Vedur.is) — Iceland’s official meteorological service. I find the desktop version more useful than the app.

Most people default to the Weather Forecast view, but I think it’s too broad. Instead, go to Wind, temperature, precipitation forecasts → select a specific region (e.g. Southeast) → choose Precipitation → drag the time slider. Darker areas mean heavier rain. Check what time the rain clears for your location and plan around it.

Northern Lights

We saw aurora three times on this trip. Other nights probably had some too — we just didn’t go out 😄

A few tools that genuinely helped:

Veður (Vedur.is): Under Aurora forecasts, you’ll see a map of Iceland. Greener = more cloud cover, so aim for the white areas. The KP index on the right shows activity strength — higher is better.

That said, KP alone doesn’t tell the whole story. One night we watched a full-sky aurora display when the KP was only ~2 — and it had been pouring rain an hour earlier. So don’t dismiss low-KP nights.

Other tools I used:

Tips for spotting aurora:

Costs & Money

You don’t need cash. Bring none. Iceland is fully card-based.

We didn’t use a single note for the entire trip — not even for public toilets (which only accept cards). Bring a card with good foreign transaction rewards.

Some places might ask for a 4-digit PIN, so activate that before you go. Personally I only encountered signature-only machines.

Iceland is expensive. A sit-down meal is basically NTD 600+ per person minimum; what you’d pay NTD 300–500 for in Taiwan will run NTD 2,000+ here. Staying somewhere with a kitchen and cooking most meals will save a significant amount.

Fuel is also expensive — we topped up roughly every two to three days at ISK 10,000+ each time.

Our total for five people, 12 nights in Iceland (excluding flights but including accommodation, car rental, fuel, food, and activities): approximately NTD 309,000 — about NTD 61,800 per person. Summer would cost more; winter less.

We mostly self-catered breakfast and dinner (two evenings at nicer restaurants), and went for casual affordable options at lunch. Mid-range budget overall.

Accommodation

Traveling with family plus our habits meant consistent requirements:

In Iceland: Booking.com (what we used exclusively), Airbnb, or Iceland’s own Bungalo platform are all options.

Tips for finding good accommodation:

Also: Icelandic accommodation almost never provides a toothbrush. Bring your own.

Clothing

I’m sharing the autumn experience. Personally I run warm — in winter I’m still wearing a T-shirt with a light jacket, even in Hokkaido. Family members who run cold packed differently.

Wrap-Up

This post got long. Detailed trip reports are in the individual posts — see the links at the top!

Thanks for reading :D

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#Iceland

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