Reykjavík to Vík is 187 kilometers. Two and a half hours if you never touch the brakes, which nobody does, because this stretch of the south coast of Iceland has more reasons to pull over than any other road I drive.
And that’s exactly the problem. Waterfalls you can walk behind, a glacier to hike on, an ice cave under a volcano, black beaches, and two very good volcano exhibitions. All of it sits along one road and none of it fits into a single day together.
So after a few hundred of these days as a guide, here’s how I split it. Five versions of the same drive, each built around a different priority. Pick the one that sounds like you.
One thing before the list: every itinerary below works in any month. Winter doesn’t close this road or these stops. What it changes is the clock, which I’ll explain further down.
The five itineraries at a glance
| # | Itinerary | Best for | Time on your feet |
|---|---|---|---|
| 1 | Classic sightseeing | First visit, all ages | Light walking |
| 2 | Glacier hike | Active travelers | About 3 hours on the hike |
| 3 | Katla ice cave | Ice cave fans, any season | Short walk on crampons |
| 4 | Educational day | Families, curious minds, bad weather | Light walking |
| 5 | Waterfalls | Photographers, repeat visitors | Several short walks |
Each one is a full day from Reykjavík. Count on 10 to 11 hours door to door.
Summer light, winter light: what changes
In June the sun barely sets. You can leave at 8:00, take your time everywhere, and still be photographing Skógafoss in soft evening light on the way home. Some travelers even choose to use the endless night to do their visits, far less crowds, and better light for pictures.
December is another story. Around the solstice Reykjavík gets roughly four hours of proper daylight, with sunrise after 11:00 and sunset around 15:30. There’s usable twilight on both sides, but not much.
The itineraries stay the same. The schedule doesn’t. In winter we leave Reykjavík in the dark so the first stop coincides with first light, we keep stops tighter, and the drive home happens after sunset. Sometimes one stop gets dropped or shortened. I’d rather give you four stops in good light than five where the last one is a silhouette. If you’re still weighing the two seasons, our winter versus summer comparison goes into more detail.
There’s a consolation prize for the dark drive back. From September to April it’s also when the northern lights come out, and I’ve pulled over on the way home from Vík more than once. More on that in our northern lights guide.
1. Classic sightseeing
Stops: Seljalandsfoss, Skógafoss, Sólheimajökull, Dyrhólaey, Reynisfjara
This is the route most people picture when they think of the south coast, and for a first visit it’s the one I’d choose. It’s the backbone of our South Coast Complete Adventure private tour.
Seljalandsfoss comes first, about an hour and 45 minutes from Reykjavík. It drops 60 meters off an old sea cliff and a path loops behind the curtain of water. You will get wet. Bring the rain jacket even on a sunny day; our packing guide explains what else earns a place in the bag.
Skógafoss is 30 minutes further. Same height, far more water, and you can walk right up to the base on flat gravel. There’s a staircase of 500-odd steps to a platform at the top if your legs want it.
Then Sólheimajökull. A 15 to 20 minute walk from the parking lot takes you to a viewpoint over the glacier tongue and the lagoon in front of it. No equipment needed. You’re looking at an outlet of Mýrdalsjökull, the ice cap sitting on top of the Katla volcano.
Dyrhólaey is the big rock arch and the lighthouse above it, with a view along the black coast in both directions. From roughly May to mid-August it’s also where I take people to see puffins; our puffin season report tells you when they arrive. During nesting season in late spring, access is sometimes restricted to certain hours.
Reynisfjara closes the day: basalt columns, the Reynisdrangar sea stacks, and the most dangerous waves in Iceland. Respect the warning lights and stay well back from the water. The beach has also changed recently, so older guidebooks are out of date. Our Reynisfjara update has the current situation.
In winter: the path behind Seljalandsfoss is usually closed because of ice, and the upper road at Dyrhólaey can be too. We often visit the lower viewpoint instead, or skip Dyrhólaey so Reynisfjara gets the last good light.
2. With a glacier hike
Stops: Seljalandsfoss, Skógafoss, Sólheimajökull glacier hike, Reynisfjara
Same road, but this time you don’t just look at the glacier. You put on crampons and walk up it. This is the day we sell as the South Coast and Glacier Hike private tour.
The hike on Sólheimajökull takes about three hours from gearing up to getting back to the car. A certified glacier guide leads it and provides the crampons, helmet, harness and ice axe. You need sturdy hiking boots, warm layers and reasonable fitness. Nothing technical. The pace is slow and there are plenty of stops to look into crevasses and at the bands of black volcanic ash trapped in the ice, some of them from Katla’s eruption in 1918.
Minimum age is usually 8 or 10 depending on the operator, so this one doesn’t work for very young families.
Those three hours have to come from somewhere, which is why Dyrhólaey drops off the list. You still get both big waterfalls and Reynisfjara, but the day gets closer to 12 to 13 hours.
In winter: the hike runs all year and the ice is at its best, harder and bluer than in summer. Departures are fixed and there are fewer of them, so the whole day is planned around the hike slot. We’ll usually book a late-morning departure so you’re on the ice during the brightest hours, with the waterfalls on either side.
3. With the Katla ice cave
Stops: Seljalandsfoss, Skógafoss, Reynisfjara, Vík and the Katla ice cave tour
Most natural ice caves in Iceland are a winter-only affair and a long way from Reykjavík. Katla is the exception. It’s reachable on a day trip, and tours run twelve months a year.
The tour leaves from Vík in a super jeep and drives across the black sand plain of Mýrdalssandur to Kötlujökull, another outlet of the same ice cap. From there it’s a short walk on crampons to the cave. The whole thing takes about three hours. Minimum age is usually 6.
Don’t expect the bright blue cave from the postcards. Katla’s ice is striped with black ash, and the mix of blue, white and black is what makes it so different from anything further east. The caves also shift from year to year as the glacier moves, so the one you visit won’t be the one in last year’s photos.
The waterfalls and Reynisfjara fit around the tour, and you get a little time in Vík itself. The red-roofed church on the hill is worth the two-minute drive up.
In winter: we book the cave departure first and build everything else around it. A midday slot is ideal. That can mean seeing one of the waterfalls at dusk on the way back, which is less of a compromise than it sounds because Seljalandsfoss is floodlit after dark.
4. The educational day
Stops: Lava Centre, Seljalandsfoss, Skógafoss, Sólheimajökull, Víkurfjara, Icelandic Lava Show
This is the day for people who want to understand what they’re looking at. It’s also my favorite for families with curious kids, and my first suggestion when the forecast is rough.
It starts at the Lava Centre in Hvolsvöllur, about an hour and 20 minutes from Reykjavík. It’s an interactive exhibition on Iceland’s volcanoes and earthquakes, with a floor that shakes and live monitoring of the volcanic systems you’re about to drive past. Give it 60 to 90 minutes. On a clear day the roof platform shows you Eyjafjallajökull and Hekla in one sweep.
After that, the landscape makes more sense. Seljalandsfoss and Skógafoss both fall from cliffs that used to be the coastline. Sólheimajökull shows you a glacier in retreat, with a lagoon that didn’t exist a generation ago.
In Vík we go to Víkurfjara, the village’s own black sand beach. It looks at the Reynisdrangar stacks from the other side and gets a fraction of Reynisfjara’s visitors.
The day ends at the Icelandic Lava Show, where real lava heated to around 1,100°C is poured into the room in front of you. You feel the heat on your face from the back row. The show lasts under an hour and seats sell out, so it needs booking ahead. If you want to know where else molten rock can be seen, read how to see lava in Iceland.
In winter: this itinerary handles short days better than any other. The two indoor stops sit at either end of the day, in the dark, and all the daylight goes to the outdoor ones.
5. Focused on waterfalls
Stops: Urriðafoss, Gluggafoss, Seljalandsfoss, Gljúfrabúi, Skógafoss, Kvernufoss
Six waterfalls, no two alike. This one turns around at Skógar and doesn’t go all the way to Vík, which buys time for the falls most visitors drive straight past. Several of them also feature in our list of the 25 best waterfalls in Iceland.
Urriðafoss is first, a few minutes off the Ring Road east of Selfoss. Only about 6 meters high, but it carries more water than any other waterfall in the country: roughly 360 cubic meters a second from Þjórsá, Iceland’s longest river.
Gluggafoss means a 20-minute detour inland from Hvolsvöllur into Fljótshlíð. The name means “window falls”. The upper part has cut tunnels through soft tuff rock, and the water shows up through openings in the cliff before the final drop. Often there’s nobody else there.
Seljalandsfoss you know by now. Gljúfrabúi is its neighbor, a 10-minute walk along the cliff, hidden inside a narrow canyon. You step up a shallow stream for a few meters to stand at the bottom of a 40-meter fall in a roofless cave. Waterproof shoes help a lot.
Skógafoss, then Kvernufoss right next door. The path starts by the Skógar museum and follows a small gorge for 15 to 20 minutes to a 30-meter waterfall you can walk behind. Half the people at Skógafoss have no idea it’s there.
In winter: six stops in four to five hours of light is tight. I usually see Urriðafoss in the morning twilight on the way out, and decide on the Gluggafoss detour based on road conditions that day. The paths at Gljúfrabúi and Kvernufoss get icy, so we carry microspikes for guests.
Which one should you pick?
First time in Iceland, one day for the south: the classic. If you want to earn your dinner, the glacier hike. Ice cave on your list and you’re here outside winter: Katla. Traveling with kids or in doubtful weather, the educational day. And if you’ve done the south coast before and want something else from it, the waterfalls. Repeat visitors will find more ideas in our Iceland for repeat visitors article.
These are starting points. On a private tour nothing stops you from swapping Dyrhólaey for Kvernufoss or adding the Lava Show to the classic route in winter, when it fills the dark hour before the drive home nicely. If one day feels too short, our 2-Day South Coast Discovery sleeps near Vík and continues east. For the full stretch beyond Vík, all the way to Höfn, see our south coast guide.
Frequently asked questions
Can you visit the south coast from Reykjavík in winter?
Yes. The Ring Road to Vík is kept open all winter and all five itineraries run year-round. The days are short, so departures are earlier and stops are tighter. Storms occasionally close the road for a day, which is where a flexible private schedule helps.
How long is the drive from Reykjavík to Vík?
187 kilometers, about two and a half hours without stops. A full day trip with stops takes 10 to 11 hours, more with ice cave or glacier hike.
Is the Katla ice cave open in summer?
Yes. Katla is one of the few natural ice caves in Iceland with tours all year. Tours leave from Vík and take about three hours.
Can I combine the glacier hike and the Katla ice cave in one day?
In summer it’s possible on a long day, but you’d give up almost everything else. I’d pick one and enjoy the rest of the coast properly.
Plan your south coast day
We run all five of these as private day tours from Reykjavík, in a Mercedes V-Class with your own guide, and we handle the bookings for the glacier hike, the ice cave and the Lava Show. Tell us your dates and which version sounds right, and we’ll work out the timing for that time of year. If you’d rather stay in Vík for a night, we also run a private transfer from Reykjavík to Vík.
And if you can’t decide, ask for the classic with a late start in June. Skógafoss at ten in the evening, low sun, almost nobody on the gravel.
