So you want to travel to Iceland and don’t know what to pack? Well I’m here to help you with this post. Alright what you see here is all the stuff I brought on a two week road trip with a car where we were traveling along the Ring Road, we did the Golden Circle, Reykjavik for a few days this is what you’ve all seen in the post series. Season wise we have been there in October and November this means this packing, this is actually appropriate for all seasons because we needed to prepare for warmer temperatures as well as colder temperatures. Regarding all the items I will show you in this post. None of them are paid or sponsored in any way, I actually bought them all myself, and some of these items I have and used for many years. I also prepared a whole packing list for Iceland on my blog which you can find up here if you want to check it out. We start things off with the bags, because we were on a road trip with a car we didn’t need to drag around our whole luggage so this is why I chose to go with a duffel bag, this particular one has about liters capacity and this is the main bag so here goes all like the clothes and some of the cables and all the stuff I don’t need for the day. This goes in here, this particular duffel bag is pretty cool because you also have some pockets over here so you could put some cables in there and it is waterproof which is pretty cool. So if you are on the road on a x and you can put stuff on top of the x everything in here stays dry and for that it also has some really strong straps on the sides so you can strap it onto the car another cool thing is that you can convert this bag into a backpack which is pretty cool.
If you want to carry it around, for example first and last day, for organizing all the stuff in the main bag I usually use these packing cubes, this is pretty handy because then you can just reach in and you know exactly where everything is. The other bag is a day bag, because I’m doing postgraphy photography, I have a drone with me and all the camera gear you will see later on I have a camera bag with me. And this one is pretty cool because it doesn’t only fit in the drone I have it is also good for all the camera gear, you can put the laptop in here. So it’s my choice for the day, if you’re not into photography, postgraphy that much you should go with a smaller day pack where you put the stuff in for the day. The weather in Iceland is pretty unpredictable, this is why you should bring many layers, so in this post we talk about three layers I brought. We have the base or inner layer which is for comfort and to keep your skin dry, then we have the mid layer which is to keep you warm, and then we have the outer or shell layer which protects you from water and from wind. So for the inner layer, I brought underwear, in my case boxers, so one for each day. Hiking socks, two pairs these are actually ski socks but they are really good for hiking as well, keep you warm. Then we have a few pairs of normal socks four t-shirts, and two thin sweaters so depending on the weather situation I was going with one of those. And for really cool days I brought two pairs of thermal underwear. If you’re coming in summer you might only need one but you should bring one because it’s better to be safe than sorry, and in winter I would add another pair to that. For a mid layer I brought two thick sweaters, and a fleece jacket, a fleece jacket is always a good idea because you can just put it on when you need it, I have this now for about six years it’s a really good one.
You should bring it even though you’re in summer there because you never know if it’s getting colder a fleece jacket’s always handy for all the other seasons I would say it’s a must. An alternative to the fleece jacket is a down jacket ah yeah scarf, so if you’re coming in winter, if you’re coming in the shoulder season, summer just one is enough. Last but not least, the shell layer this is where I put in the pants, I’m not sure if they are mid or shell layer, I brought a pair of jeans and a pair of like outdoor hiking pants and actually I use these here most of the time because they’re really hand, it dry really fast so I would actually recommend getting maybe two of them to have like a spare, a spare pair and then of course a jacket. As I said, shell layer is for water and wind protection. I brought this wind and rain waterproof jacket from Marmot, really good and a cool thing is it is orange so this sticks out in landscape in Iceland. So you wanna take photos, really good choice and it was super waterproof so yeah it was really good to have that. If you want you can also bring waterproof pants, totally up to you and then we had some colder days where we needed gloves if you come in winter definitely bring the warmer ones. And a hat, in this case a beanie this is what I used actually most of the time because this one here would fly away in most of the cases because the wind is really strong, so a beanie it is. What else, of course sunglasses. Doesn’t matter which season the sun comes out and you’re driving it’s always good to have sunglasses with you then for all the hot springs you will encounter in Iceland, or you’re going to the Blue Lagoon, bring your swimsuit and bring a towel.
This is a microfiber towel, which dries really fast so good to have, and then of course shoes. I brought these hiking shoes and I always recommend bringing hiking shoes which are waterproof. Don’t matter if you going on a big hiking trip or not even though you would only go to visit the waterfalls it’s always wet and slippery I highly recommend getting a pair of waterproof hiking boots. And for the driving maybe also some sneakers and for city, and then of course also when you going to the hot springs flip flops. In manners of toiletries it’s pretty straight forward just bring a toiletry kit and then have toothbrush, toothpaste, cream, deodorant, floss, medicine, if you need it and yeah of course sunscreen if it’s getting sunnier it’s always good to have sunscreen with you and then all the other stuff you need in particular. Let’s talk about gadgets, this is all the stuff which is not camera gear. So for instance this holder here because we’re on road trip and we needed our phone to navigate. This came in pretty handy, this is a blue tooth speaker I brought with me so we had our own music on the road trip. Then a headlamp not only for night photography but also in shoulder and winter season it gets dark pretty early so it’s pretty handy to have a head lamp with you. A laptop and also a hard disk drive to put your photos on. Then I have a battery pack to keep your phone charged especially when you do like the navigation it runs out of batter really fast so it’s good to have batter pack, and then an adapter if you need it. So in Iceland they actually have the F-type this is this one so if you are from the US you probably need an adapter to keep all your electronics charged.
Camera gear my favorite section, for the serious, Eyeshot on Cyber Cameras one is the A Mark II from Sony. I used it for postgraphy as well as for photography then the Sony RX Mark V mainly for postgraphy together with this stabilizer here, this gimbal so I mounted it on the gimbal and so that is really smooth steady shots going to the waterfall and stuff. Good camera, then a GoPro Hero this will be used for just shots inside the car. We also have a suction cup to mount it onto the car and then of course a drone to get all this cool aerial footage you’ve seen for example from the car driving. And two drone batteries to be safe, of course also extra batteries for the other cameras so I brought like four batteries for the A Mark II, and four batteries for the RX. Also important is SD cards, spare SD cards and I brought also a waterproof SD card holder, really important for Iceland because it’s pretty wet. Speaking of you should also bring a microfiber towel for your lens to wipe it off because when you’re at the waterfalls your lens will get wet. So you need to wipe it off quite often so bring maybe two of them or one big microfiber towel and at the waterfalls you would probably also need ND filters, lens wise I brought a to, this is right now on the camera this is why you can’t see it and we had also a to lens. Then of course some more gear to clean your lens like a lens pan and this rocket to blow out dust in the lens if you’re not into photography or postgraphy as much, just bring your camera bring chargers, extra batteries, and extra SD cards. Camera wise I would say if you’re just on a vacation you wanna get some cool photos the Sony A is a good camera to go with it’s not too expensive but has really really good quality. before you head off you shouldn’t forget to bring also your documents, with that I mean your passport, drivers license and travel insurance. I usually go with the one from World Nomads I link it down below in the description box. Last but not least of course the tripod, and there we have it. If you want to go through this whole packing list I prepared this whole Iceland packing list on my blog it is linked over here, then if you want to see more posts from Iceland you can check out the whole circling Iceland series over here where we travel all around Iceland and show you all the cool stuff to do there and don’t forget to comment to this blog for new travel posts every Thursday I see you next week, bye.
