Nordic glamour in Iceland

Francesca Syz chooses chilled-out spots in Iceland

The best thing about the harbourside Icelandair Hotel Reykjavík Marina, in the centre of the city, isn’t its cosy bedrooms or its hip bar – where you can sit on leather sofas by a roaring fire, sipping liquorice-infused gin and watching rusty boats being washed down in an industrial setting that seems straight from the latest Nordic noir TV series. No, it’s the location. Reykjavík’s top restaurants are a stroll away – be sure to book in advance for the fish tasting menu at 27-year-old cult chef Hrefna Rósa Sætran’s Grillmarkadurinn – and Iceland’s most famous beauty spots are all an easy daytrip.

Which is why breakfast at the Marina hotel is a hive of activity, with fellow guests already decked out in thermals and Sorel snowboots, stocking up on bacon and harofisk – dried fish strips that taste exponentially better than they smell. And how I find myself, in just an hour, quad biking across isolated lunar landscapes to celebrate my wedding anniversary with a candlelit lunch of lamb cooked on an open fire in a cave formerly occupied by ninth-century monks and once visited by Tom Cruise. Yes, really.

This experience is thanks to the Icelandair Celebration Stopover Buddy service – where, if you do a (free) stopover in Iceland on any transatlantic flight, the airline sets you up with a local employee, who is charged with showing you the undiscovered side of this awesome (in the truest sense of the word) country.

Given the vast, lonely landscapes on offer – Iceland has the population of Bristol but is roughly 1,000 times its size – it isn’t difficult to get off the beaten track, but having a local showing you around gives the experience a unique depth. Ours, the delightful Sigrun Bates, whisks us around in her hugely comfortable four-wheel drive. Over just two days we find ourselves gazing out to sea from a three-table café atop Gardskagi, Iceland’s oldest lighthouse (above), side-stepping the two million tourists who sweat it out in the Blue Lagoon every year in favour of the Secret Lagoon in Flúðir, and spotting amazing waterfalls everywhere we go (Iceland has over 2,000). All this before returning to our relaxed, quirky city-centre hotel, where the service is impeccable. Not bad for a destination that’s less than a three-hour flight from London.

I find myself celebrating my wedding anniversary with a candlelit lunch in a cave once visited by Tom Cruise