Iceland 2026: Fjords, Fosses, and Questionable Financial Decisions
- 2 days ago
- 13 min read
Two years in the making, it was finally time to head back to Iceland, this time with two of my oldest friends, Sue and Nicole, and new friend Hannah.
The drive to Halifax was uneventful, which is exactly what you want from a drive to Halifax. There was coffee and some time with people important to me along the way, so win-win. We picked up Hannah, got some food, dropped the car at the hotel for parking, took the shuttle through the pouring rain and headed to the airport.
We were a little early for the Icelandair desk to open, so we listened to a local musician for a while before officially beginning the airport process. Check-in was easy, security was quick, and Halifax now has those magical security machines where you don't have to unpack half your earthly possessions into plastic bins.
The coffee situation at YHZ is still a bit dire, but I survived.
I tried watching a movie on the flight, but I had reached that special level of overnight-flight tired where you're too exhausted to concentrate on anything but somehow also completely incapable of sleeping. As a card-carrying member of the "cannot sleep on planes" club, I am very familiar with this situation. So, music it was.
We landed in Iceland around 4am, a little early for an arrival that was already very early. Customs was ridiculously quick (especially since I'm already in the EES system), luggage appeared, our driver was waiting, and off we went to Reykjavík.
Day 1: Reykjavik, powered entirely by coffee For our first night, we were staying at Hotel Cabin. It's a pretty basic tourist-class hotel, but pricing around the eclipse was bonkers and we had fixed dates, so clean and fine was perfectly acceptable.
Our room was obviously not ready at approximately dawn, so we paid to store our luggage and headed out into a surprisingly lovely morning.
We watched Celebrity Silhouette, our home for the next week, sail into port and then wandered around waiting for Reykjavík to wake up.
First priority: Brauð & Co for pastries.
Then we walked up to Hallgrímskirkja, where at that hour we practically had the place to ourselves. More importantly, it had comfy benches. We'd been awake for a very long time. Our standards for tourist attractions were temporarily expanding to include quality seating.
We wandered the streets admiring Reykjavík's street art and window shopping until Sandholt opened, where we had a fantastic breakfast and I was happily reunited with Icelandic coffee culture. Iceland coffee culture, how I have missed you.
From there we wandered down to Harpa, eventually made our way back to Hallgrímskirkja and this time went up the tower. We had an amazingly clear day, and the views over Reykjavík's colourful rooftops, mountains and water were spectacular.
Then, because apparently none of us had remembered that we had crossed an ocean overnight, we decided to walk to Perlan.
This was a bit of a jaunt. Some of the trails were under construction, which added a little choose-your-own-adventure element to the proceedings.
At Perlan we did the lava show, wandered through the ice cave, watched the Northern Lights show and had something to eat at the revolving restaurant while looking out over the city.
By this point everyone was exhausted and had lost enthusiasm for putting one foot in front of the other, so we admitted defeat and took a taxi back to the hotel.
Our room was ready.
There may never have been a more beautiful hotel room.
After a rest, we headed back out for food at Borg29 food hall and a grocery-store run. It was still too early to go to bed without completely destroying any hope of adjusting to Iceland time, so Sue and I somehow went for another walk and found the Recycled House before finally calling it a night.
According to my feet, Reykjavík had been thoroughly inspected.
Day 2: Embarkation day
We had a great breakfast at Hygge, involving all the coffee, and did another little walk before packing up and heading for the ship.
First challenge: elevator roulette with our luggage. Nicole won.
Eventually everyone and everything reached the lobby, and we grabbed a taxi for the short trip to the cruise port.
Luggage drop-off was a breeze. Security was surprisingly thorough for a cruise port, with electronics out of bags and watches off, but everything happened in a wonderfully calm, orderly Icelandic fashion.
Then we were aboard Celebrity Silhouette.
We dropped our stuff in our rooms and began the important business of exploring the ship. We wandered around. Ate some food. Unpacked. Ate some more food. Probably played some trivia.
Cruising had commenced.
Day 3: Sea day
A whole lot of absolutely nothing.
I did a little work from the coffee shop in the morning. Food was eaten. Trivia was played. Chats were had.
One thing about cruising somewhere cold like Iceland is that the ship feels much busier than it would in the Caribbean. All those people who would normally disappear onto loungers and balconies are now indoors with you.
The covered pool was always busy. The hot tubs were busy. There were just... people.
The Sky Lounge up top was probably the best place to hang out and watch Iceland slide past the windows, except Celebrity kept scheduling activities there and, on both sea days, actually kicked everyone out for private events.
Rude.
Day 4: Seyðisfjörður and Stuðlagil Canyon
I have a serious weakness for Iceland's little fjord towns, and Seyðisfjörður is exactly the sort of place that causes it.
Mountains rise almost straight up around the water, waterfalls tumble down them seemingly everywhere, and then tucked at the end of the fjord is this colourful little town that looks almost unfairly picturesque. Quiet. Peaceful. I think I could get down with that.
After tendering ashore, we had some time before our tour, so we wandered around the lagoon and into town, eventually making our way to the little blue church with its rainbow pathway.
Then it was time to meet Saga Travel and our guide for the day, Michael from the Netherlands.
Our first stop was Gufufoss.
A note for anyone unfamiliar with Icelandic place names: foss means waterfall. This information is going to become increasingly useful.
Gufufoss sits right beside the road into Seyðisfjörður and is exactly the sort of waterfall that would be a major tourist attraction almost anywhere else in the world. In Iceland it's basically, "Here's another spectacular waterfall. Anyway..."
After that came a bathroom/snack stop.
Then our bus broke down.
So we had a second bathroom/snack stop.
Every great adventure needs snacks.
Eventually another bus appeared and we continued toward the main event: Stuðlagil Canyon.
We visited from the west side, which involved many steps. Many, many steps.
But then you're in a stunning canyon.
The walls are lined with enormous geometric basalt columns, with the river twisting between them below. It's one of those landscapes that doesn't quite look real, even when you're standing there looking directly at it.
And we got lucky. The colour of the river varies depending on conditions and the amount of glacial water flowing through it, but on our visit it was that beautiful blue-green colour you see in the photos, which made the whole place even more spectacular.
For those of you who love a good backstory:
Stuðlagil is one of Iceland's newer tourist attractions, although the canyon itself is obviously anything but new. Until the mid-2000s, those incredible basalt columns were largely hidden beneath the powerful, muddy Jökla glacial river.
When the massive Kárahnjúkar hydroelectric project diverted much of the river's flow, the water level dropped and revealed what had been hiding underneath. Photos began spreading widely about a decade later and Stuðlagil went from a little-known corner of East Iceland to one of the region's most photographed landscapes.
Short version:
Volcanoes created it. A glacial river hid it. Humans dammed the river.
The canyon appeared.
Tourists arrived.
With permission from the landowner.
On the way back we stopped at Rjúkandi, another waterfall, because Iceland, and then finished our day with a beer at El Grillo in Seyðisfjörður before heading back to the ship.
Eating, hanging out and probably more trivia followed.
Day 5: Akureyri and one whale
We arrived in Akureyri early but didn't have anything planned until the afternoon, which meant it was time for one of my favourite travel activities: the good old-fashioned wander.
Akureyri is adorable. It sits at the end of Iceland's longest fjord, surrounded by mountains, with colourful buildings, cute shops and traffic lights with little red hearts.
Even Iceland's traffic lights are trying to charm you.
We popped into Brauðgerðarhús bakery and stumbled across a vegan motherlode of deliciousness, which obviously required investigation.
After more wandering, we headed back to the ship to collect our stuff for whale watching.
We went out with Elding. It was windy. It was cold. It was very Iceland.
We saw one whale.
ONE.
But whales are under absolutely no contractual obligation to perform for tourists, and the scenery out on Eyjafjörður was gorgeous enough that I wasn't exactly suffering.
Then it was back to the ship to warm up, eat again and, naturally, play more trivia.
Day 6: Ísafjörður and the Westfjords
Hooray! Another fjord!
We were originally supposed to tender in Ísafjörður, but the captain was able to bring Silhouette right alongside, which made life easier. With Celebrity, you book tenders in the app and it's a bit of a mad dash when they open, but the process is pretty organized and easy to follow.
Our tour for the day was with Valkyrie Tours, heading out through the Westfjords to Dynjandi and several scenic stops along the way.
And the Westfjords completely stole my heart.
This is Iceland at its wildest and emptiest. Huge mountains drop into narrow fjords, tiny settlements cling to the coastline and every turn in the road seems to reveal another view that makes you wonder why more people aren't here.
Dynjandi is the famous attraction, a huge tiered waterfall spreading across the mountainside.
It was fine.
Yes, I realize how ridiculous that sentence is.
But then we stopped at the white sand beach at Holt.
That was the most beautiful thing I saw on the entire trip.
Soft white sand. Brilliant blue water. Mountains wrapping around the fjord. Almost nobody there.
Iceland is famous for black beaches, volcanoes, glaciers and waterfalls, but somehow this quiet little white beach in the Westfjords was the place that stopped me in my tracks.
We saw a few seals, approximately eleven billion birds, and endless scenery that made me want to come back with a car and spend a a few weeks driving around up there.
Back in Ísafjörður, we wandered around town and stopped for a beer at Dokkan Brewery.
That evening the girls went to a magic show. In a completely random coincidence, it was a magician I had already seen before.
And I don't like magic shows.
So instead I walked around outside in the Icelandic sunshine and watched the captain manoeuvre us out of the harbour.
I stand by my decision. Somewhere along the way, we also crossed the Arctic Circle. I know this because Celebrity gave me a certificate - I will update my résumé accordingly.
Day 7: Another sea day
Yet another sea day.
Normally I don't mind sea days at all, but Silhouette just didn't have enough good places to hang out when everyone needed to be indoors.
I worked for a while and we migrated around the ship throughout the day finding places to chill.
There was almost certainly trivia.
Day 8: Iceland's South Coast
Back to Reykjavík, although we weren't getting off the ship quite yet. Silhouette was docked there overnight, which gave us a full day for a South Coast tour.
First up was Reynisfjara, Iceland's famous black sand beach.
Black volcanic sand, enormous basalt columns, sea stacks rising out of the Atlantic and waves that very much need to be respected. It's moody and dramatic and exactly the sort of place Iceland does absurdly well.
And we got lucky: there were still puffins hanging out on the cliffs.
I didn't have a proper camera with me, so this was more of an admire the puffins situation than a photograph the puffins situation.
Honestly, sometimes that's probably better anyway.
We also visited Skógafoss, Sólheimajökull glacier, Seljalandsfoss and the little church at Vík.
Skógafoss is enormous and thundering and produces rainbows when the sun cooperates. Sólheimajökull is beautiful in a completely different and slightly sobering way, with layers of ice and volcanic ash stretching back toward the mountains. And Seljalandsfoss tumbles off a cliff in one long curtain of water that you can actually walk behind.
Basically, the South Coast is Iceland showing off.
This was a very long day on a fairly uncomfortable bus, but rental-car prices immediately after the eclipse and before the Reykjavík Marathon were INSANE.
My spine made a sacrifice for fiscal responsibility.
Day 9: Reykjavík and Sky Lagoon
See you later, Celebrity Silhouette. It's been a slice.
And hello again, world of excellent coffee.
We disembarked early because the Reykjavík Marathon was happening and we wanted to get ahead of the road closures. Somehow this worked beautifully and we had no trouble getting to Fosshotel Baron, our hotel for the final night.
Another basic hotel, but clean, perfectly located and, importantly, they did not charge us to hold our luggage.
We found a little bakery to tide us over until more places opened and then headed to Wake and Bake for breakfast. Another vegan delight.
We spent the day wandering Reykjavík, looking at street art, cheering on marathon runners and somehow mostly avoiding the rain until we could check into our room.
After some excellent food at Le Kock, again with genuinely delicious vegan options, we grabbed a taxi and headed out to Sky Lagoon.
I'll be honest: expensive lagoons aren't really my thing.
I've been to the Blue Lagoon. It was fine. We used it to kill time before an evening flight, which is possibly not the endorsement their marketing department is looking for.
But the girls wanted to lagoon, and if I was going to lagoon again, I at least wanted to try a different one.
And fine.
Sky Lagoon is pretty damn nice.
The infinity pool looks straight out over the North Atlantic, and watching the evening light over the water while floating around in lovely hot geothermal water is not a terrible way to spend an evening.
I'm still not sold on the whole ritual. Hot pool, cold plunge, sauna, salt scrub, steam room, tea. Apparently relaxation requires an itinerary now.
But the pool? Fantastic.
The views? Fantastic.
The crowberry martini? Delish.
Day 10: One last Reykjavík wander
We had one final morning in Reykjavík before it was time to head home.
Breakfast at the hotel, some last-minute shopping (including a visit to meet one of Reykjavik's most famous cats - Ofelia, much more wandering, and a visit to Café Loki so the girls could try rye bread ice cream.
Then one last meal at Hlemmur Food Hall, where I had a delicious vegan bánh mì, and it was finally time to admit we had to leave Iceland.
The airport had been chaos in the days leading up to our departure thanks to the eclipse and everything else happening that week, so we left ourselves loads of time.
Naturally, everything was incredibly easy.
Our transfer driver was an early bird, security was quick, and we had so much time that most things in our section of the airport started closing hours before our flight left.
The flight itself was uneventful. I watched some random stuff. We landed early in Halifax.
Customs took approximately five seconds.
Our luggage took approximately seventeen years.
We just made the hotel shuttle, and then I went to sleep.
Day 11: Home
Uneventful drive home.
And that's a wrap.
A word about the weather
We got mind-blowingly lucky with Icelandic weather.
As long as we were actually standing on Iceland.
Almost every day we were on land was either sunny all day or turned sunny for at least part of it. Blue skies. Clear views. Actual warmth at times. In Iceland. We knew enough to appreciate just how ridiculous our luck was.
The moment we went to sea, however, Iceland apparently pulled the curtains.
Fog. Clouds. Grey.
We did not see a single sunrise or sunset from the ship.
There were even Northern Lights several nights while we were in Iceland. Did we see them? No.
Icebergs apparently wandered down to visit the Westfjords while we were there. Did we see those? Also no.
Whales from the ship? Nope.
We saw some birds (but I do like birds).
So basically, Iceland was spectacularly generous whenever we got off the ship and completely stopped performing the moment we got back on it.
I'll take that deal.
The usual post-cruise ship-related commentary
Rooms: Sue and I had a balcony cabin. We booked guarantees to save some money and ended up right above the lifeboats. The balcony was a decent size with two chairs and a little table. The room itself was perfectly fine, with lots of storage and everything we needed. Nicole and Hannah had an inside cabin - terrible assigned location, but huge room.
Food: On the first day there was a vegan section in the buffet and a vegan menu at dinner, so I was feeling pretty optimistic. It was all downhill from there.
The vegan buffet section remained at lunch and dinner, so there was always something. In the dining room, however, they repeatedly gave me the vegetarian menu and told me it was the same thing. Since I can read English, I was able to determine that it was not.
Eventually they mostly started making me tofu stir-fries, which was fine. On the last night I ate in the dining room, they actually brought me vegan food from the buffet.
Dessert was reliably some variation of mushy apple or apple-adjacent fruit covered in gluten-free sand.
I lost no weight on this cruise, so clearly I survived.
Entertainment: Not really my thing. We went to a couple of shows. I walked out of one and stayed until the end of the other.
We did, however, play a LOT of trivia. Celebrity clearly gives no fucks about trivia. There were typos. They reused identical questions on the same day. At one point they randomly gave the microphone to a kid who was a passenger.
We kept going back. I'm not sure what that says about us.
Coffee shop: Great staff. Coffee was fine. Occasionally they even had a vegan treat. I worked there most mornings and it became my little home base.
Overall, this was a perfectly good cruise and I have no real complaints. Celebrity just isn't my favourite.
At least this time they did not bring me tempura spinach leaves.
Iceland
Still a favourite. Still bonkers expensive. Still one of the most spectacular places I've ever been.
This was my third visit and somehow I came home with an even longer list of places I want to see. I want more time in the Westfjords. I want to get farther off the main tourist routes. I want more little fjord towns, more weird landscapes, more bakeries, more excellent coffee and apparently more waterfalls, despite pretending I'm blasé about them now.
But the best part of this trip wasn't a canyon, a glacier, a beach or even a particularly excellent vegan pastry.
It was getting to spend eleven days travelling with friends I don't get to see nearly enough.
That part really was priceless.
The rest of Iceland?
Decidedly not priceless.
Go to Iceland.
Ange out. PS: This is my personal blog, not my professional travel-advisor voice. Facts are researched. Opinions, dramatic reactions and unreasonable attachments to specific Icelandic landscapes are entirely my own.
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