Interesting facts about this place from our tour guide and from my observations:

1. It’s a land of contrast, thus its nickname – Land of Fire and Ice is very appropriate. It is home to the world’s most active volcanoes (fire) and some of the largest glaciers in Europe (ice).
2. It is also the land of light and darkness. It has 9 months of winter and 3 months of summer. During winter there are some days with just 5 hours of light 🌖 while in summertime, they have days with full 24 hours of precious, beautiful sunlight 🌞

3. To say that the weather is unpredictable is an understatement. It changes every hour – you wake up with the sun shining, a few mins later there’s rain. One of our tour guide said that it’s not impossible to have sun, rain, snow and sleet in a day.

4. Thanks to this unique climate, there are no mosquitoes in this country.

5. Basically all of its electricity come from geothermal water sources and hydro-electricity. Tap water is very much safe for drinking and has passed international water standards.

5. It has a population of 350k, while its land area is as big as the size of Kentucky, making it a sparsely populated country.

6. Reykjavik, which literally means ‘smoky bay’, is the capital city with 184,000 inhabitants.

7. There is no McDonalds in Iceland 😧 There’s KFC and Subway though.

I highly recommend these tours that we took all from viator.com

1. Blue Lagoon and half day Golden Circle tour – soak in the milky, mineral-rich waters of the Blue Lagoon in the morning (i suggest in the morning to avoid the crowd) then continue in the afternoon to see the natural hot springs and spouting geysers of Geysir and Strokkur. Part of the compact tour is a stop at the thundering Gullfoss waterfall and a scenic drive through the UNESCO-listed Thingvellir National Park.

2. Southern Iceland Glaciers, beaches and waterfalls tour – explore the Mýrdalsjökull glacier, admire the black-sand beaches (featured in Rogue One) and dramatic rock formations of Vik, as well as the mighty Skogafoss and Seljalandsfoss waterfalls.

3. Northern Lights tour -this is what I was really looking forward to – chase the famous Aurora Borealis. Unfortunately for us, we weren’t able to witness the beauty of this phenomenon. The tour brought us about 40 minutes away from the city to ensure light pollution free skies. 2 nights we waited till midnight but she was a no show 😔. We were hopeful in our 3rd and last night as the Aurora forecast meter showed a 3 (out of a scale of 9) but it was cancelled around 6 pm – clearly showing how unpredictable the weather is in this place. The tour provider said it was cloudy and there is not much activity thus Aurora forecast went down to 1.
The trip would have been perfect if we were able to see the Northern Lights, but the contrasting, rugged, breath taking beauty of this place made us marvel at His wonderful creations making this trip still a once in a lifetime experience.