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Based on the places you like, you're more of a temperate/tropical preference person and enjoy the wildlife and greenery associated with those places. For others like myself, beauty is in the desolate solitude of places like Alaska, New Zealand's south island, and Iceland. To your point, though, you definitely pay a price to get that kind of environment and it's not for everyone.

> Once you've seen it, you've seen it. The views don't change that much. Even on the golden triangle, looking out the window tends to get boring.

The golden circle isn't a long trip. There's a lot more to see.

> For a country constantly emphasizing the need for safety on the road, I was surprised to get a very beat up Toyota with worn out brake pads, no working charger in the car and the guy just saying "you get what you pay for".

Car hire services have been under scrutiny by the media here recently for unsafe cars, bad service and selling their old cars with the odometer rolled back. Unfortunately there still hasn't been a proper crackdown on them. I recommend to everyone to use the global brands.

> It's incredibly expensive. Two sandwiches (and I mean 2x slices of bread with some cheese and lettuce) and soft drinks was like 20EUR or more.

It's infuriating. Reykjavík and the bigger towns are OK but the price gouging that happens all around cannot be justified.

From my experience, the glory in Iceland is absolutely not found in the golden circle. The rest of the country is mind-boggingly empty and gorgeous. The interior looks like a complete different planet, the western fjords are stunning, and then when you do eventually come across another human; they are incredibly nice and welcoming.

I visited Iceland two years ago and loved it. It was a short visit and I did the usual tourist things, like the Golden Circle tour. I would like to go again and see other parts of the country, outside the basic tourist areas. A friend drove around the entire perimeter of Iceland and had a great time.

Absolutely! I went there many times, but first time was in 2014 with my teenage daughter to do the Laugavegur trail from Landmannalaugar to Þórsmörk. It was a 4 day hike thru lava fields, skirting glaciers, hot vents and fumarolas. Over tourism is only a problem if you stay in the well known circuits!

Interesting. I visited in the same time-frame (Jan 2017) and the main tourist sites were crowded. Not uncomfortably so, but there were definitely 3-4 busloads of tourists at each site. And KEF was packed (standing room only) when we departed. Immigration inbound at KEF was busy but efficient.

Reykjavik itself didn't feel any more crowded than any other major European city. Far less so than London or Paris. Probably more like Amsterdam, but with a smaller overall footprint.

Our rental was a Golf Polo (the small hatchback) from a name-brand agency (Hertz or somebody like that) and it was in fine condition.

It was expensive, no question. But, that's also fairly well documented in travel brochures (online or otherwise). So, it shouldn't be a surprise. We opted to rent a flat and cook for most meals. The only problem that caused - the grocer has a wall of milk of varying degrees of "sourness" and we grabbed something that, to my American palate, was rotten. Oops.

Blue Lagoon was definitely touristy. We went at dusk in a snow storm, so the atmosphere was nice (the mist and snow made it less obvious we were swimming with a few hundred other tourists). We enjoyed it, but there's no need to go twice unless you really like a spa experience.

We went snorkeling in Silfra Fissure, which was neat. Nothing at all like snorkeling on a coral reef.

I'd love to go back and do the whole ring road around the island, with a bit of hiking and camping mixed in. We only had a long weekend, so stayed in the city and all the sites we visited were fairly close. We didn't get to the northwest or southeast.

For anyone looking for a place to stay, I just wanted to recommend this place we stayed in late August (sorry about the Hotels.com link): https://www.hotels.com/ho679197/105-a-townhouse-hotel-reykja...

It was about half the price of other places at the time. I was fully prepared to be disappointed, but it was excellent — and had a full kitchen, which helped because food in Iceland is insanely expensive ($20 for an 'authentic' Icelandic hot dog at an outdoor stand is real ). Groceries were only(!) about 20% more than New York (still high, but not unreasonable for a remote island).

Also, I think Iceland is missing an oppertunity to export high-quality room-darkening blinds. Vampire-approved.

wow. In contrast I've been all over Iceland, esp. the middle and east. Loved it. Have been to the canary islands too. Hated them.

Unless you specifically stayed in the resort areas with the Brits, which I could understand hating, I don't see how anybody could hate the natural beauty on Tenerife. There's 2 biospheres on one island!