Every week I share five frugal things that I’ve done during the previous week just to show you that the small things you do all add up to a great frugal lifestyle where you can learn to live a fabulously frugal life.
Hey!
We’ve just got back from a week in Iceland so I thought I’d make today’s post all about the things we did in Iceland to save money – which was very necessary as Iceland is genuinely the most expensive country I have ever visited. Honestly, some of the costs here would make your eyes water!
We had a set budget for our week away and with Christmas and a house move to finance before the end of the year, it was super important that we stuck to our budget and in a country as beautiful as Iceland, we wanted to see as much of it as possible and that was always going to cost money so we decided early on that we wanted our money to go on that rather than food.
We made a conscious decision before we left that there were a few foodie ‘luxuries’ that we wanted to try but for the most part, we wouldn’t be doing anything too fancy.
(Also – before I share, I’m so aware how lucky we are that we could do this holiday and that to many, especially in these difficult times, any holiday is a luxury. I’ve said this so many times but travel is one of the reasons why I try so hard to save money in other areas of our life. After I lost my Mum and Brother, my biggest motivator has always been to free up money to experience life as much as I can because tomorrow isn’t promised.)
1) We specifically picked our hotel outside of Reykjavik as we didn’t want to be in such a beautiful place and be in a city surrounded by buildings and traffic. We wanted a quieter location in a smaller town with easy access to local shops and we 100% hit the jackpot.
We booked a hotel that described itself as ‘a comfy lodge-style mountain-view retreat minutes away from the city centre of Reykjavik’ which sounded perfect to us. We wanted to be guaranteed a mountain view and we wanted a big comfy room and to get that, we had to book a specific room type which was more expensive than the standard room. Rather than spend more than the budget we’d set ourselves, we actually went for one night less which meant that we were paying less for the trip itself obviously but also one day less spending money which meant that we could book the suite with the balcony and the mountain view for the same price as the regular room.
Another reason we really wanted to stay at this hotel was because within five minutes walk there was a supermarket, a local bakery, a takeaway that the locals recommended us and a KFC. There was even a petrol station a minute away with a subway and a salad bar.
So, we actually saved money before we left by making sure we picked a hotel which would really work for us and what we wanted from our holiday.
2) We took a packed lunch most days when we were out and about because most of the places we visited either had no lunch options, or they were ridiculously expensive. This meal was on our last day when we were at the Geysir…
Fish and chips twice with two bottles of pop cost us £48!
This was our last day of exploring and we’d planned to go into Reykjavik and do some of the museums so had bargained on being able to get something in the city at a food stand or in one of the food halls but at the last minute, we changed our mind – literally as we were heading into the city on the morning.
We were in traffic on the road into the city and we both just looked at each other and said we’d much rather be going in the opposite direction to see more of the beauty of Iceland than the city so we turned around and headed out to a waterfall in the National park that we’d missed earlier in the week.
So that’s why we didn’t have a packed lunch that day and how we saved money every other day that week by taking food, snacks and drinks with us on our travels.
Don’t get me wrong, even supermarkets cost a fortune but less of a fortune than eating out. 😁
Bread and a pack of ham came to about £10, some fruit and a couple of other snacks and you’re looking at £25 for a small picnic but that was still less than eating out and we could just eat at any of the beautiful places we visited.
Drinks were another area where we saved money when we were out and about – we could buy a six pack of sparkling, flavoured water for 699 isk (£4.29) whereas the same drink at a stop we made was 500 isk (£3.07) which is only £1.22 less than we paid for all six cans. It was a similar story with fizzy drinks for my partner.
We had a bottle of water that we filled up at every stop too.
3) We hired a car which saved us a fortune.
Public transport doesn’t serve all of the sites that we wanted to see so group tours or a hire car are the way to go if you want to see more than just Reyjavik.
We looked at booking tours but the costs quickly added up over the week to see everything we wanted over the week and we didn’t want to be tied to someone else’s schedule so we decided to hire a car and do it our way. 😁
The car for the week cost the same as what two days of tours would have cost us and meant that not only could we see everything we wanted to see, when we wanted to see it but it also meant that we could go our prepared for our days…
This photo of our hire car back seat pretty much sums up our money saving over the week.
You can see the grey rucksack (bought from Vinted as we wanted lightweight and small to go out and about with – £2.75) that we used to carry our drinks around every day.
There’s the supermarket bag for life that we used all week for our supplies, my pink rucksack with our swimming gear in (in case we found a hot spring), some snacks for the car and our big coats.
In the boot were our waterproof trousers, hats, scarves and gloves.
4) Breakfasts were another area where we saved money.
It was £18 each in our hotel for a cold buffet breakfast which consisted of breads, cheese and meats along with cereal and is actually pretty good considering the prices overall in Iceland but we didn’t want to spend £36 on a meal we wanted to rush as we were ready to get on the road.
We went to the bakery just near our hotel most mornings for breakfast and bought a pastry each or a cinnamon bun to eat instead. They tasted amazing – just look at some of the things we had for our daily breakfasts…
They cost between £5 and £6 each which seems expensive but I can’t stress enough just how expensive it is in Iceland.
We do always try to find local shops and bakeries when we’re away and this is the reason – gorgeous pastries that are freshly baked, tasty and easy.
5) We didn’t buy presents or any of the usual touristy stuff – we don’t need an Icelandic bowl, or a T-shirt to remind us of our trip. We have hundreds of photos and so many memories that will stay with us.
Although, I’d be lying if I said that I didn’t ‘want’ some of the beautiful things we saw on our travels. There were some cute little trinkets that were lovely but they wouldn’t really ‘fit’ with our house and the prices were high. And I get why they were high as all the things I liked were handmade and were clearly valued to include the time spent making and the unique-ness of the products but they were just too much for me to pay to bring something home and not have it front and centre.
We bought our usual fridge magnet (have you even been somewhere if you don’t buy a fridge magnet?) and a couple of small bits and bobs but nothing too much.
Honestly, Iceland is the most beautiful place that I’ve ever been to and if we hadn’t have been careful with our budget then we wouldn’t have been able to go this year and I am so grateful that we could do it.
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