ExpatSomchai

Make sure you go to the Fish Market for dinner one evening. Best to make a reservation.

corporate-wage-slave

And Grayline does as well actually. Personally I'd just turn up and take the first one to leave, but you're unlikely to be waiting too long with either company. Grayline will also do other packages / Blue Lagoon and what not.

Both ticket desks, which are next to each other, are on the lower arrivals level, and the coach pickup point is just outside the door there.

garethlewis

It's a wonderful hotel that's in a pretty crappy position for those wanting to experience the capital or be close to amentities

MissJ

With this in mind, any advice for me? I'm booked at the Hilton, but the Canopy is opening before I arrive. In the winter, is it worth being in the city center if we have a car? We are perfectly willing to drive in and park and walk around the city unless that is not reasonable. I know plenty of places I would never want to deal with parking, but Reykjavik doesn't look all that large.

Zurich

I have been working for a year and half in Reykjavik back 35 years ago and many things will have changed meanwhile. However, I know the position of today's Hilton hotel very well and the Canopy location appears to me much more favorable. It is downtown and as such, Reykjavik has urban character here. And it is always interesting to experience a brand new hotel.
On the other side, the Hilton Nordica is not out of this world, offers good views and represents a solid piece of today's Reykjavik. It has an executive lounge (with Iceland's prices in mind -unless that has changed totally in the past- and especially for alcoholic drinks), this counts a lot. The Canopy might have teething trouble. These can be disturbing and I try to avoid a hotel's potential for teething trouble a lot.
If Icelanders have not changed their being-in-the-world totally there will be teething troubles. Many.
On Iceland in winter going by car? This is predominantly rough nature and weather can be unpleasant. The road net work does not compare to Central European standards and you need a very solid car. One huge advantage of winter time (it is quite dark then, at Christmas time sunrise in Reykjavik is 11.15 or so, sunset 15.15 - provided that the weather is sunny and not clouded. Then it is just grey dark.) is the aurora borealis (fair weather provided). That is a breathtaking experience. And day light is, fair weather provided, very special. There is a "golden" hour at sunset which does not appear during spring/summer/autumn time.
I am overdue to visiting Reykjavik again and all the inputs here make me wanting to go soon.

bennos

Driving into Reykjavik from the Hilton was pretty easy, and parking usually wasn't that difficult (plenty of paid carparks), with everything pretty walkable from wherever you drop the car. IME the one down side of this approach was that since I'd have to drive back to the hotel after dinner I couldn't do wine pairings. (Food options were way, way better city center than out by the Hilton.)

ExpatSomchai

Guys it's a 20 min walk from the Hilton to downtown. Go to the new Fos Hotel for a drink first, about 10-15 mins then it's only a 5-10 min walk to the start of the bars and restaurant sof downtown. A taxi was only $15 so we are not talking miles away.

MissJ

I'm good on winter driving (years working in New England) and lots of darkness (used to work for a Finnish company) so the rest sounds fine to me. I was mainly concerned about being really isolated. I know 15 minutes isn't much when the weather is nice, but we will be there in winter. We will have a car so we can go out and look for the Northern Lights at night.

The lounge definitely sounds like an added bonus. We do very much like to drink.

For now, I'll stick with the Hilton since the $$ savings are pretty large. I may switch to the Canopy if I see a sale. But walking 15 minutes or driving for 5 is not an issue for me at all.

corporate-wage-slave

I can see the car may help a bit for the Northern Lights - but you can still walk to darker areas, they don't have too much light pollution there. Or take a boat trip out, there are several providers for thsi. But it wouldn't even occur to me to hire a car purely for Reykjavík, it's not that large a place, you can walk or get a cheap reliable bus service, and finding parking in the centre of town is going to take away many of the advantages. Taking a taxi once in a while tactically is going to cheaper than car hire. On the other hand if you wanted to get out of town to see some of the rest of Iceland, well even then the bus network is quite good except right at the far end, but for things like Blue Lagoon and the smaller towns away from the capital, then yes I guess a car may well be useful. If this is essentially a city break then it's just a bit eccentric.

MissJ

No, we are going to see both the city and the surrounding country. We are both pretty avid photographers so the freedom is valuable. If the weather is looking really bad as the time for the trip nears, plans may change and we may use other methods of travel that are better prepared for the elements. Just having our own car is helpful with camera gear. It can be a pain to not be able to take a break from holding onto the bag and tripod.

A boat trip to see the lights sounds interesting. I will look into it.

ExpatSomchai

Here's a starter

https://www.re.is/day-tours/northern-lights-by-boat

MissJ

Fantastic. I just realized that I will be able to enjoy a lot of glögg while I'm there. It was always one of my favorite little touches to trips to Finland in the winter.

bennos

Absolutely get a car. There's so much of the country to see outside of Reykjavik (even without doing the grand tour) that's difficult or impossible to get to without your own wheels, and it's really a very easy country to drive around.

Well, except for buying gas. That can be a challenge if you don't have a pin card (US style chip + sig cards are insufficient) at unstaffed stations, including at the gas station closest to the airport. No problems at staffed stations (just pay inside), or buy some prepaid cards for later use.

Zhaunk

Taking reservations for stays starting August 31. $420+, 70k, points and cash available

channonc

Just returned from a 2 night stay booked on points, husband is Diamond. We were upgraded to an Executive level room with lounge access. Room was great with an absolutely beautiful view of the mountains. We arrived at the hotel around 9am and had no problems checking in that early. Lounge was nice, standard hot breakfast with usual offerings. There was a happy hour every night in the lounge from 5-7pm. We noticed that they usually didn't lock up the alcohol until 7:15 or so, and the staff was very nice about going up to everyone and letting them grab another drink before it was put away for the evening. Staff was very friendly. As others have said, the hotel is about a 20-25 minute walk to downtown Reykjavik, but getting a cab was very easy (several sit right outside). We weren't there long enough to bother with the city bus, but they did advertise that they provided a free bus pass. We didn't find the location to be a problem for our stay.

Overall, a great property, and we would definitely return on our next trip to Reykjavik.