Honeymoonin' Iceland: Hotels

Jan 2, 2013

While in Iceland, we stayed at a wiiiiiiiiide variety of places.
. . . from 4 star resorts to a room in a hostel the size of a walk in closet, we experienced it all.
Our first stop was Hotel Odinsve in Reykyavik.
Thankfully, we arrived to town on a gorgeous cloud free day (during the 5 hours of daylight!) just in time for a free continental Icelandic breakfast (so basically I ate cheese and bread and loved it)
The staff was wonderful and the beds were terribly comfy.
It was the perfect location to walk to the main strip of restaurants, shops, and bars (and close enough to the 24 hour hot dog stand for Josh)
The view from our room was pretty gorgeous as well.
Our second home, and probably our most favorite, was our one splurge: Hotel Ranga
Thank goodness for our honeymoon registry (which, btw, worked out absolutely perfect), or else we would have never been able to stay at a place like this.
Their big claim to fame was that it provided the best location to see the Northern Lights.
Well, that definitely didn't happen (darn clouds) but we didn't seem to mind because we were just living up the luxurious lifestyle that we rarely seem to experience in history of finding cheap hotels across America.
They even had outdoor hot tubs overlooking the river for guests to enjoy.
. . . or try to enjoy, in below freezing weather.
It was challenging to hold our wine without getting frostbite.
The hotel sits near the Ranga River, where you can go salmon fishing in the summertime (I was pretty upset about missing that opportunity)
I didn't manage to get any pictures from our third hotel, in Vik, because we kinda just drove around and picked a hotel last minute at night time, but after dinner at the hotel restaurant I did snap this lovely image:

Our fourth and final living arrangement was at Reykjavik Backpackers, a hostel.
Josh has experienced hostel life before, in Turkey, Egypt, and Isreal, but I was a hostel newb.
Seeing plenty of young people and a pretty crowded bar downstairs helped ease my stress regarding the situation.
The location was prime (on the main shopping and dining strip) and so was the price.
Then we found out that since we requested a private room (what the heck is a public room?) we were on the fifth floor (no elevators).
Meh.
My main concern was that we had to request towels and bed sheets.
. . . oh and the whole public bathroom thing.
You forget how convenient it is to have a bathroom in your hotel room, where you don't have to get dressed and put shoes on to go pee.
But hey, we had a awesome view of the city from the balcony of our closet room.
The staff was awesome, super laid back and helpful.
Now I've stayed at probably the worst of the worst of American hotels in order to save money, but this was truly an experience unlike any other.
. . . and I kinda liked it.
BUT I was so pumped to get home and take a real bath my own personal real bathtub.
The view from the balcony kinda made it all worthwhile.
More Iceland posts coming soon:
The nightlife, The Imagine Peace Tower, and The Blue Lagoon

4 comments:

Unknown said...

OH MY GOD I LOVE THIS POST. This is like the coolest thing ever. I'm a huge fan of traveling, so this just makes me want to pack up and GO. Thanks for finding my blog dearest. Can't wait to become blog friends!!!

Lindsey Louise Bales said...

oh my gosh, what pretty views! i adore the first view from that hotel! ah, the joys of travels!

lindsey louise

hellomrrabbit.blogspot.com

A and B said...

I love to see hotel photos! That's one of my favorite parts of traveling is staying at a bunch of different places!

Anonymous said...

Aaah, that looks amazing! I've never been to Iceland but after seeing your photos I want to!

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