{"id":7095,"date":"2019-06-20T00:00:00","date_gmt":"2019-06-20T00:00:00","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.rent.is\/camperstories\/ice-van-dic-adventure\/"},"modified":"2026-05-19T09:01:43","modified_gmt":"2026-05-19T09:01:43","slug":"ice-van-dic-adventure","status":"publish","type":"camperstories","link":"https:\/\/www.rent.is\/de\/camperstories\/ice-van-dic-adventure\/","title":{"rendered":"Ice-van-dic Adventure"},"content":{"rendered":"

Iceland has been on our to-go list for a very long time. What we knew about it \u2013 and at first it was very little \u2013 turned out to be enough to finally make a decision of risking damaging our 6-months budget and getting soaking wet in unpredictable weather: we booked our flights to ‘the land of fire and ice’. After a very long discussion about the best way we had pictured ourselves moving around the country, we finally decided to rent a camper van<\/a>. Was it worth it? Was it easy? Was it cheap? We had hundreds of questions ourselves. We hope this little guide about “How to do Iceland in a camper van<\/strong><\/span>” is going to be useful for fellow travelers who might find themselves in a similar situation.<\/p>\n

\"Rent<\/a><\/p>\n

Food & cooking in the camper van<\/span><\/h3>\n

\"Eating<\/a>Before we set off, we had obviously heard about the high cost of food and drink in Iceland. Our week in Iceland was just one week out of six month’s travel, so we wanted to stick to as tight a budget as possible.<\/p>\n

Therefore, we planned ahead and bought things like wine, oats, ground coffee, powdered soups, grains and sauces before we arrived (we had plenty of fun trying to keep our one piece of checked luggage under 20kg). Once we arrived, we added to our bounty with a big shop in B\u00f3nus (along with Nett\u00f3, the cheapest and most numerous supermarket in Iceland), where we bought perishable things like fruit and vegetables, milk, yogurt and butter.<\/p>\n

Good luck trying to find beer in B\u00f3nus, but we were able to get some really cheap ones in Nett\u00f3 and a couple of other less common supermarkets, sometimes for as cheap as 90 krona for a 500ml can.<\/p>\n

\"Icelandic<\/a><\/p>\n

Our van’s fridge was big enough to put all of the cold items in, and runs whenever the car is on, so keeping it cool was not an issue. The cooking equipment supplied with the van allowed us to make ourselves a delicious porridge every morning, in general sandwiches for our lunch, and some kind of hot meal for dinner each night, usually pasta or quinoa. It was great to set up the table and chairs when needed, but be aware that the weather often means cooking without some form of shelter is an unpleasant experience!<\/p>\n

One final tip! If you plan on using the ‘outside fridge’, that is, putting your cold items outside overnight (so as not to drain battery by having the fridge on), don’t move the car after you put the stuff out! I of course ran over a brand new carton of milk and four eggs one night!? So, including the food we pre-purchased, we spent around 27,000 kr\u00f3nur. Oh, and if you want to buy a cafe coffee at any stage to supplement your diet, you’ll be looking at 500-600 kr\u00f3nur on average.<\/p>\n

Campsites or ‘free’ camping?<\/span><\/h3>\n

\"Free<\/a><\/p>\n

Before we arrived to Iceland, we really wanted to know about the possibility of ‘free’ camping with a camper van<\/a>. We read various blogs and asked the staff at the rental company, and learned that whilst illegal to camp without permission of the landowner (this effectively means anywhere but a campsite), it is possible to do so, although frowned upon by the locals. After our experience, we suggest asking yourselves the following questions: are you prepared to spend your entire trip without a shower? This will depend on time of year, but a hot shower is quite invaluable if you’re there in the cold months. Are you prepared to cook all of your meals without proper shelter? Not only the cold, rain or snow will at times make it difficult to prepare food on a gas stove, but we found that the wind was the main problem when all we wanted to do was quickly cook our meal.<\/p>\n

\"All<\/a>\u00a0\"Winter<\/a><\/p>\n

Are you prepared to spend a lot of time trying to find a suitable campsite that is out of view of the main road and that has shelter? If you are sticking to the Ring road<\/a>, you will find that most areas that may seem suitable for a place to spend the night have very prominent and obvious signs that state camping is prohibited; plus, these areas rarely have the shelter from the wind that you will crave. Are you prepared to leave no trace of your stay if you do not use an official campsite? Think no toilets, no rubbish bins.<\/p>\n

We quickly found that our answers to the above questions were always no. Therefore, we stayed in the following campsites, all of which included a sheltered space to cook, showers, washing up facilities, and a space to park your van for between 2,800 \u2013 3,500 kr\u00f3nur (price may increase in high season):<\/p>\n