Iceland wild camping?

Jacana851

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Hi

Anyone been camping with a motorhome in Iceland? We are between vans at the moment and so thought might take the chance to hire a campervan in Reykavik next summer and spend 10-14 days travelling the main route around Iceland. I am sure previously I read somewhere that it is acceptable to wild camp in Iceland. Anyone have any personal experience of this?

Helen
 
Ask Kerry Katona!
Seriously I would certainly be interested in any responses-good luck.
 
my best friend has just spent the summer [ 2 months ] wilding there without problems
spent a night in the camp site in the faroes on the way back when he spent a week there

only problem was he likes to fish , and one day a week provided more than he could eat
 
Its pretty easy to wildcamp in iceland but often not nessesary as towns / villages often have free campsites, and they have good swimming facilities too which you can use the showers / changing or go for a nice thermally heated swim

For some insperation try here

Iceland 2004

Mine was the orange stripey one

Just note - some of the roads we took were 4x4 only and also note the 'next fuel stop 208km' so fill up when you can

Rich
 
What a great trip. Wonderful pictures. Love the trucks too, although I confess to being a sucker for those Austrian beasts.
 
You mean the ones that are now built in the UK , or at least the british forces ones were

Took 2 of them to replace every one tonne landrover - landys were built be overloaded

Rich
 
Six years ago there were a few towns with excellent free camps - heated amenities blocks, camp kitchens and free electricity and dump points but this last time some of those had started charging but even then, provided you use a bit of commonsense, there are plenty of places with fantastic views and great locations. A few of the national parks also have free basic camping.

Another option that suited us this time because we were there for 9 or 10 weeks is to buy a camping card for 100 euro and that allows free camping at 47 camp sites scattered all across iceland.You pay for electricity and the bed tax, but the camping fees are zero. The promoter lost a heap on us because we stayed longer than normal.

Seemed to me that the huge increase in the number of tourists in the 6 years between trips was for the worse as prices have gone up and freedoms gone down - but was still worth a second visit.

Easy to find dump points as few of the municipal campsites had any restrictions on outsiders driving in.

A week in the Faroes?? I was very happy that the schedule had changed this time and we weren't dumped off there for a three day enforced contribution to the economy. Not that we did because even there, it was quite easy to wild camp provided you didn't expect to find shelter in a nice thick forest.

Just get used to pointing one end or the other into the wind when either you camp or pee outside.

LPG is much more available now and many places have swap cylinders. One type had a valve and POL fitting and the other type didn't have a manual valve. I took enough in the fixed tank and German cylinders so didn't have any problems with having to match the local ones. Did ask if they sold the tanks and that was no problem and no contract or ID was needed.
 
Last edited by a moderator:
Can't beat a bit of Humour!

sasquatch said:
Ask Kerry Katona!
Seriously I would certainly be interested in any responses-good luck.
Click to expand...



Nice one Sasquatch, good to have a bit of humour at 02:45 hrs! Keep it coming...


And good luck to our intrepid adventurers, I look forward to reading more! :have fun:

Captain Biggles
 
Update- wilding in Iceland

Just an update for anyone who may be interested. We have just come back from 2 weeks in Iceland and can now answer my own question. Iceland is brilliant for wild camping!!
We rented a fiat ducato with pickup near the airport. At 103 Euros per day it seemed pretty reasonable (for Iceland) and was much less expensive that summer prices. There is a reason for the low prices of course- the weather is still a bit nippy. We took the ring road and had one nigth at minus 7 C with snow, but the van has a heater and gas was included so we used it!

We wild camped for 12 nights with the last night spent at a free camp site north of the airport (Gardur)/ The free campsite was more of a carpark with toilets, water and WC disposal -which we needed as the van needed to be returned empty, but only one other van in the campsite whearas we had passed the paying campsite at Grindavik which was pretty full- more fool them!

It was easy to find places to stop overnight. We mostly used the plentiful picnic sites. The only restrictions were arourd Lake Myvatyn and in the national park areas. One place we did not stop at night because we did not think it would be allowed was the Jokursson glacier lake but in fact there were no restrictions whatsoever and it would have been a fab place to stop overnight. Even Geyser had a carpark with no overnight restrictions.

Being early in the year some roads were still closed and so we kept mostly to the main roads although in S Iceland they say they hardly get any snow so no problems there.
Virtually every fuel station has a hosepipe and they freely allow campers to fill up with water + 3 N1 fuel stations and one Ollis fuel station had WC dumps so there was never a problem.
There is also the option of using the local swimming pools/ hot tubs with shared showers. I did this the once but actually prefered to shower in the van which had a decent shower cubicle (one of those that enclosed part of the corridor when you want abit more space to shower in).
We went round clockwise, preferiing to leave the best bits to last so we could take our time, total 2400 km travelled.
Being mean we did not eat out and shopped in the Bonus supermarkets for best prices.Cost of whole trip with rental, flights and food and fuel was £1700 which I thought was not bad.

H
 
Was that £1700 each or for the both of you, got to admit, Iceland is on my to do list.!

jt
 
Late reply

Sorry for the late reply- not having a motorhome at the moment I don't log in very often!
Yes that was £1700 for both of us, so a cheap way to visit Iceland but only out of season- price hike++ beginning of June but May was a great time to visit Iceland.

H
 
Wild camping in Iceland

Jacana851 said:
Just an update for anyone who may be interested. We have just come back from 2 weeks in Iceland and can now answer my own question. Iceland is brilliant for wild camping!!
We rented a fiat ducato with pickup near the airport. At 103 Euros per day it seemed pretty reasonable (for Iceland) and was much less expensive that summer prices. There is a reason for the low prices of course- the weather is still a bit nippy. We took the ring road and had one nigth at minus 7 C with snow, but the van has a heater and gas was included so we used it!

We wild camped for 12 nights with the last night spent at a free camp site north of the airport (Gardur)/ The free campsite was more of a carpark with toilets, water and WC disposal -which we needed as the van needed to be returned empty, but only one other van in the campsite whearas we had passed the paying campsite at Grindavik which was pretty full- more fool them!

It was easy to find places to stop overnight. We mostly used the plentiful picnic sites. The only restrictions were arourd Lake Myvatyn and in the national park areas. One place we did not stop at night because we did not think it would be allowed was the Jokursson glacier lake but in fact there were no restrictions whatsoever and it would have been a fab place to stop overnight. Even Geyser had a carpark with no overnight restrictions.

Being early in the year some roads were still closed and so we kept mostly to the main roads although in S Iceland they say they hardly get any snow so no problems there.
Virtually every fuel station has a hosepipe and they freely allow campers to fill up with water + 3 N1 fuel stations and one Ollis fuel station had WC dumps so there was never a problem.
There is also the option of using the local swimming pools/ hot tubs with shared showers. I did this the once but actually prefered to shower in the van which had a decent shower cubicle (one of those that enclosed part of the corridor when you want abit more space to shower in).
We went round clockwise, preferiing to leave the best bits to last so we could take our time, total 2400 km travelled.
Being mean we did not eat out and shopped in the Bonus supermarkets for best prices.Cost of whole trip with rental, flights and food and fuel was £1700 which I thought was not bad.

H
Click to expand...

Hi there!
I know this is a few years late but we want to be known that wild camping in Iceland in campers, caravans and RV's is now forbidden. You can read about it here: Changed camper laws
Lets hope it wont deter you from traveling around here for it is truly stunning! :)
Happy Camping!
 
CampersIceland said:
Hi there!
I know this is a few years late but we want to be known that wild camping in Iceland in campers, caravans and RV's is now forbidden. You can read about it here: Changed camper laws
Lets hope it wont deter you from traveling around here for it is truly stunning! :)
Happy Camping!
Click to expand...

Thank you for the update - I am off there at the end of April, so will bear this in mind.

How does this law apply to, for example, carparks such as those at Jökulsárlón - are there now 'No Overnighting' signs? How do you find out who the landowner is to ask permission?

As far as I can tell, the majority of campsites will still be closed in April (though I am aware many simply let you 'camp' for free), so is this change only likely to be enforced during the more popular summer months?

Morph
 
iveco4x4 said:
Its pretty easy to wildcamp in iceland but often not nessesary as towns / villages often have free campsites, and they have good swimming facilities too which you can use the showers / changing or go for a nice thermally heated swim

For some insperation try here

Iceland 2004

Mine was the orange stripey one

Just note - some of the roads we took were 4x4 only and also note the 'next fuel stop 208km' so fill up when you can

Rich
Click to expand...
HHMMM! , my Computer says I am Forbidden to open your link, tried it several times with same response ??
 
Morphology said:
Thank you for the update - I am off there at the end of April, so will bear this in mind.

How does this law apply to, for example, carparks such as those at Jökulsárlón - are there now 'No Overnighting' signs? How do you find out who the landowner is to ask permission?

As far as I can tell, the majority of campsites will still be closed in April (though I am aware many simply let you 'camp' for free), so is this change only likely to be enforced during the more popular summer months?

Morph
Click to expand...

Hi there!
As far as I can understand, car parks are off limits too but just ask wherever you are. Many are very liberal and if one asks, I've heard you get a yes at most places. I have also contemplated as how to find the landowner. I guess the easiest way is to ask at the local gas station who the owner is. Gas stations often works as a social hub in the small villages.
There are more and more campsites that are open all year around and we wrote about it in this bog here "Open all year around campsites" but we recently got a comment that a campsite on the list wasn't open. The ones who made the interactive map told me they are updating it all the time so I guess it will be more or less correct at all times.
I hope this helps. Have a great trip!
Cheers
 
Dammit!

Myself and my son in law had planned to camp in Iceland early next year, but campsites were not on the agenda. I had a chat with him last night and we have decided to go for a week in Sweden instead, hopefully it will be easier there.

Unless anybody can tell me any different?
 
CampersIceland said:
Hi there!
As far as I can understand, car parks are off limits too but just ask wherever you are. Many are very liberal and if one asks, I've heard you get a yes at most places. I have also contemplated as how to find the landowner. I guess the easiest way is to ask at the local gas station who the owner is. Gas stations often works as a social hub in the small villages.
There are more and more campsites that are open all year around and we wrote about it in this bog here "Open all year around campsites" but we recently got a comment that a campsite on the list wasn't open. The ones who made the interactive map told me they are updating it all the time so I guess it will be more or less correct at all times.
I hope this helps. Have a great trip!
Cheers
Click to expand...

Thanks - that's a handy map, and I'll certainly add those to my tablet before I go just in case I need them. If for no other reason, I'll need to find a campsite every few days to empty the loo & grey tank.

Morph
 
Wish there was a ferry link from the UK to Iceland - does anyone even know if there is a commercial crossing?
 
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