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Comment by pishpash | Hacker News Reader

Wasn't that because of WOW Air?

It's definitely a big factor, the financial crisis also played a huge role.. and there are a number of other factors such as the government really not doing anything or being able to reach conclusions about things and basically letting the tourism industry run amok.

People are upset, but with the amount of hotels that are still under construction, the problem looks to get much worse before it gets better.

In part, yes. WOW and IcelandAir both run substantial tour programs, allowing split tickets for those heading from Western Europe to the US, bundled with discount lodging and tours to popular sites.

That, along with Instagram, make Iceland a desirable place to visit.

this is largely incorrect. wow air does not run any tours, tour groups, transport, lodging, etc. it's just a budget airline and they are only interested in transport.

They do allow "stopovers". Where you can stay in Iceland for few days between the flights. Those are heavily marketed during the flight too.

All of the legs of the flight are the same price regardless of whether you book them together or separately.

They're not really selling a "stopover" so much as just convincing you to buy plane tickets for what they already cost.

IcelandAir definitely has a tour package subsidiary or formal partnerships. I assumed WOW did the same.

I believe so. I live in Calgary and you can fly to Iceland for less than the cost of a flight from Calgary to Toronto. From Toronto, you can sometimes get there for less than $200. I'm not even sure you could fly Toronto to Montreal for less than $200.

This is not as shocking as it sounds if you look at a globe though

Calgary to Toronto is 1675 miles. [0]

Calgary to Reykjavík is 3211 miles. [1]

It's often cheaper for me to fly 3211 miles than 1675 miles.

0 - http://www.gcmap.com/dist?P=yyc-yyz

1 - http://www.gcmap.com/dist?P=yyc-rkv

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