Download Lonely Planet Iceland Travel Guide eBook Lonely Planet Carolyn Bain Alexis Averbuck

Product details File Size 103590 KB Print Length 424 pages Publisher Lonely Planet; 10 edition (May 1, 2017) Publication Date May 1, 2017 Language English ASIN B06X99W1L6

Lonely Planet Iceland Travel Guide eBook Lonely Planet Carolyn Bain Alexis Averbuck Reviews

• We had another guide book to Iceland for our recent trip in February 2018 and I'm glad we had two. The other guide was an older Rough Guide to Iceland. We were kind of surprised by the often lack of details in the Lonely Planet guide. For example, there are so many museums in Reykjavik and the guide book didn't list many of them. Many of the museums not listed aren't new and are established museums (for example the Kjarval Museum on Flokagata, which is a beautiful art museum that houses many of Johannes Kjarval's works). The book also didn't explain that for many museums, when you purchase the price for one, you get free admission to one of two others for a specific period of time. For example, if you visit the Listasafn (art museum near the harbor area that houses many works by Erro), you get free admission to the Asmundur Sveinsson sculpture museum, and to the Kjarval Museum for 24 hours from the purchase of the ticket. When you purchase a ticket to the National Gallery art museum, you get free admission to two other art museums in the area as well (there are so many wonderful art museums in the Reykjavik area). When you purchase a ticket to the National History Museum you get free admission to the Culture House in downtown Reykjavik that you can use within a week of the purchase of the one. I didn't see the Saga Museum listed, which is a fun Viking museum in the harbor area where you can play dress up with Viking costumes at the end. And I didn't see the Halldor Laxness Museum in nearby Mossfellsbaer mentioned. Laxness is one of the important authors of Iceland and this museum is on the way to Thingvellir National Park from Reykjavik if you have a rental car. While the travel guide explains how to find the Reykjavik swimming pools, it doesn't mention things like that you can purchase a pass for 10 visits for under 5000 ISK to certain pools (Sundhollin for example that we frequented often during our 10 day stay in Reykjavik). I felt that the details on restaurants in the area weren't the greatest. For example the Sea Baron restaurant (saegreifinn) in the harbor area, which was our favorite fish restaurant, with excellent excellent food, didn't have any explanation of the quirky founder of the restaurant. This place has a bit of history that's worth looking up (and they have free coffee which is great and also wasn't mentioned). I realize restaurants are popping up and going out of business all the time, but you'd think some of the established ones with history would have better write ups. While yes, this is a decent guidebook, I just felt they could have done a better job with this one.
• Super disappointed in this book. We spent a week in Iceland and the only place that it had any value for us at all was on the South Coast. Food recommendations were not very good. Many places we went weren't even mentioned, and if they were there were limited directions to getting there. It seemed that the focus was on all of the hottest spots. Lonely Planet used to provide a lot of information for people looking for things off the beaten path as well and that was sorely lacking. Not likely to purchase another Lonely Planet based on this experience.
• Iceland may be a challenging destination to write a guidebook for. Regardless, I found Lonely Planet Iceland to be only somewhat useful in helping to plan a recent trip. This has not been my experience with Lonely Plant guides in the past, which I found to be better.
  
  Most of the information appeared to be accurate and was somewhat useful, and the guide's real value may be more apparent if you are planning a trip that lasts over a week, during the summer (I was only there for 4 days in March); ... Regardless, my issues with the guide came down to this - - Reviews of specific sites or establishments seemed to start with the assumption that everything was awesome, even when it was not. Example - The town of Vik is described as a "booming hub for a very beautiful portion of the south coast". While this may have some truth to it, and every traveler's perception is obviously going to be different, I found everything in Vik to be set-up a way that takes advantage of a HUGE supply and demand disconnect. (e.g. $350/ night for a very basic hotel room, not in the busy season; only 2-3 restaurant choices in town with 45-60 min waits for a table, entree like a basic pizza or Chinese chicken and rice for one @ $30+, etc.. in VERY basic establishments... and really no apparent "local" dishes.) This isn't intended as a review of Vik as a destination.. and I would not necessarily steer someone to another town if they wanted to visit the area... but it is an example where the guide could have done better, ... which seemed to be repeated throughout.
  
  Restaurant reviews vs reality were similar for all of the places that we tried in Reykjavik.
  
  There are also very positive-sounding reviews for the hotels immediately adjacent to the Blue Lagoon (and, by association ,the idea of staying in the that immediate location). In this case, we only visited the area and did not stay overnight; but I can't imagine that a hotel near the Blue Lagoon would good choice for any type of traveler.
  
  Bottom-line - Go to Iceland.. maybe even buy this book.. just modulate your expectations.
• This was more of a book for when you get there rather than planning the trip. Once we were on the road this book was fun to follow along with cause we found some cool stuff in towns we would have normally blasted past.
  Places to stay change daily, and WiFi is everywhere, so use travel apps for that stuff. Will definitely take this book on my next trip to Iceland.
• If you are traveling to Iceland and want to explore on your own instead of taking tours this is a great book to take with you. It covers all regions of Iceland in depth although it does not always have them in a logical order as if you were doing them along the ring road in a circle. There are many travel tips along with meal and lodging suggestions. There are some photos of major attractions although it's not as colorful as their "Iceland's Ring Road Road Trips" book. We bought them both for our upcoming trip to Iceland and we're glad we did.
• Bought this as a companion to all the blogs I researched prior to my trip to Iceland. Lonely Planet books are so thorough that we would be driving through a small town that nobody had blogged about but this guide had information about said town. I highly recommend it as a supplement to using the internet.