Wandering under the deep blue ceiling of an ice cave is an otherworldly experience. Nothing can prepare you for how blue the ice is in real life. Before visiting, I’d seen so many photos and always wondered if the colour had been photoshopped. It hasn’t! It really is that remarkable.
There are several different ice caves you can visit in Iceland, depending on which areas you’re visiting. We opted for the incredible Crystal Cave, also known as Sapphire Cave, which is located on the Vatnajökull glacier, very close to the Jokulsarlon glacier lagoon.
Normally we’re all about independent travel, but all ice caves in Iceland must be visited with a guide.
We’re sharing exactly what to expect on the Crystal Cave tour, from difficulty level to how busy it gets.
What to expect on the Crystal Cave tour
Difficulty
Before we get into the details of the walk to the cave and the experience inside it, I wanted to cover how difficult it is. I’ve had a few glacier walking experiences and sometimes I’ve found it quite easy and sometimes much less so!
The Crystal Cave tour was the easiest glacier walk I’ve ever done. I think partly that’s due to the fact that you don’t have to wear what I would describe as ‘proper crampons’.
Rather than big boots with spikes, you are given a set of chains attached to a rubber band that wrap around your own shoes. This is the first time I’ve been able to wear my own shoes and I found it 100 times easier, and there was never a single moment I thought I might slip.
In addition to the fact the ‘crampons’ are really easy to walk on, you’re almost never actually walking on ice. The walk to the ice cave was on snow and rock up until the last couple of metres.
To enter the cave, you need to walk on ice steps, but it’s not difficult, and once inside there is some ice around, but never anything that felt remotely slippery.
I was surprised and relieved at just how easy it was, particularly as I’d struggled a bit with my last glacier walk!
So conditions aside, the other thing to know is that the walk is almost entirely flat. The terrain underfoot is uneven, but there is only one short section where you have to walk over a couple of rocks. Otherwise it’s straightforward and the lack of hills makes it a breeze.
If you do one of the longer ice cave walks it might be different, but the short tour to Crystal Cave is easy.
The walk
Distance: 1.9km each way
Elevation gain: 7m on the way and 22m on the way back
As you can see from the stats, the walk to reach the cave is almost entirely flat. It took us 25 minutes each way, but we were going at quite a pace because a snow storm was due to roll in a few hours later.
Normally the walk would take around 30-40 minutes and you’d stop for chats about the glacier along the way.
Right from the moment you leave the car park, the scenery is stunning. We’ve done quite a few snowy walks, but this one was on another level. It felt totally wild, with the dark volcanic rock and the pure white snow.
It was absolutely beautiful and I would have wanted to do the walk in and of itself. The fact it leads to a natural blue ice cave is pretty mind blowing, but that’s Iceland for you!
The terrain underfoot is uneven, but it’s small rocks and not difficult to walk on. The route is pretty clear, but as you’re with a guide anyway, it doesn’t really matter.
For the most part you’re walking alongside the stunning volcanic mountains and shortly before you arrive at the cave, you’ll cross a small metal bridge over a crystal clear stream.
This is the only part of the track where you had to walk over a couple of slightly bigger rocks, it’s not hard, but the guide waits to offer a hand if anyone needs it.
Just before you enter the ice cave there is around a minute’s walk on the glacier where you’ll hold onto a rope.
It’s still easy, but this little bit is icy, so I guess that’s why the rope is there - but honestly it’s not in any way like you’re average hike where you know it’s got a bit sketchy when you see a rope!
To enter the ice cave, you need to head down a few steps cut into the ice. There’s a rope here too and you’re walking between the tall icy cave walls.
You’ll be told to sort of stamp your feet into the ice, but again it’s easy and nothing like other much more slippery glacier walks I’ve done.
After you come down the staircase you’ll walk straight through a short tunnel made of dark ice and into the cave.
Walking inside the cave can be a little uneven in places, but easy.
Inside the incredible blue ice cave
Your first view of the ice cave is incredible, but it only gets better the further in you go. There’s a big opening to the left which looked like a proper winter wonderland on our visit.
You’ll have about 30 minutes inside the cave and you’ll visit three sections: the opening, the mid-section and the otherworldly blue section.
After enjoying the first section and having a chat about the glacier and how the ice cave forms, we crossed over a small metal bridge. It’s here you’ll be standing under your first section of blue ice.
It’s an incredible place and unlike anywhere I’ve ever been. The one downside is that as this is a tour you don’t get to stay for hours like I normally would in a place this beautiful!
Everyone is given a chance to have a few photos here before you progress further into the cave.
There’s a little dark section to walk through before you reach the most atmospheric part of the cave. It’s completely magical, with deep blue ice across the whole ceiling.
It glows like bioluminescence above you and it’s hard to believe that it’s real!
You get quite a decent amount of time in this section before you retrace your steps back to the larger chamber.
From here you follow a slightly different exit route, under blue ice that looks like waves. It’s breathtaking, and the ceiling is quite low in places, so you feel really close to it.
I could happily have spent hours taking it all in, but you don’t actually walk too far inside the cave, so most people will probably feel it’s long enough.
You exit the cave via a big opening rather than up the staircase again, and then you follow the same route back to the car park.
How easy is it to take photos inside the ice cave?
This is the tricky bit. As we’re normally used to doing things ourselves, we usually have heaps of time to take photos and tend to visit places early in the morning before crowds arrive. Obviously on a tour this isn’t possible and it does make photo taking harder; more so if you’re really keen on photography, or are a content creator.
If you just want to get some pretty photos of you and, or the ice, it won’t be a problem. Most people are considerate inside the cave, so you can get a picture with no one in it (more so in the bigger chamber).
When it comes to trying to get different compositions etc, it’s not easy because you are limited on time. It’s more like snap what you can, aside from that the bigger chamber where you can take a some pics and everyone basically waits for each other. The photos in this guide are a good representation of what you can realistically take on a group tour.
If we’re lucky enough to visit Iceland in ice cave season again one day, I’d love to return and would look at doing an extended tour, or a photography tour - although these are more expensive of course!
Photography tips for inside the ice cave
Firstly, the weather will make a difference. Whilst you may think a sunny day is ideal for photos, the huge hole in the large chamber will create shadows that make editing difficult. Having cloudy even light will mean you can get good photos without harsh shadows. In addition to this, the final part of the cave with the exceptionally blue ceiling is also best on a cloudy day. Again it’s about the uneven light - luckily cloudy days are pretty common in Icelandic winter!
Secondly, to get the full scale of the cave, you will want to shoot with a wide angle lens. This can be 0.5 on your phone, or a lens on your camera that is ideally between 16-25mm. This will help take in more of that glorious icy blue ceiling.
Finally, the cave is surprisingly dark in a lot of places. Be prepared to take photos in a way that will minimise shake which will cause blur. We didn’t use a tripod because we didn’t think there was really time to set it up. We used a shutter speed at 1/60th second or higher, with a low aperture and a high ISO.
Crowds inside Crystal Cave
Crystal Cave is one of the most impressive ice caves in Iceland and relatively easy to access, so it’s naturally a popular place to visit. The fact the walk is easy and the tour only lasts between 3-4 hours means it will also fit into most people’s schedule.
Depending on which tour operator you use, groups can be small or large, and multiple groups are likely to be in the cave at the same time. I would advise only booking with a company that offers smallish groups. We went with Local Guide, as they try to run at a time that avoids the big bus tours and we asked them ahead of time about crowds.
They’ll be really honest with you and tell you how many people are booked on each tour. If you tell them you want to go at the least busy time they can advise which tour has the most spaces still available (which is what we did).
It was busyish inside the cave by my standards, but that’s because we’re almost always alone at places. I think most people would probably think it’s not overly busy - but a storm was coming the afternoon we visited so some tour companies had less visitors than usual.
Basically my advice would be to ask the tour company ahead of time for the least busy time slot and hopefully it won’t be too crowded.
You can take private tours and if funds allow this would be an amazing experience! Although you won’t necessarily get the cave to yourself as various companies operate tours to the cave, you would have more flexibility and you wouldn’t have to wait for anyone in your own group to take photos.
You can check prices & availability for Local Guide’s tour below:
The jeep ride to the ice cave
The first five minutes of your journey to the ice cave will be on a paved road. After that you’ll enter the volcanic landscape on a dirt track, which goes for about 20 minutes. I was kind of nervous about this bit because I am not a fan of really bumpy rides - dune bashing is basically my idea of hell!
Luckily the journey isn’t bad at all. The guides drive really slowly and though the vehicle rocks a little at points, it’s never like it sometimes is on sand dunes when you feel like the car might go over. It always feels stable and the scenery is gorgeous.
What to wear inside the ice cave
I wore my standard hiking gear plus a few extras. However you could wear a normal top as it’s not very exerting, so you don’t really need special hiking gear. Don’t wear jeans though as you want quick drying clothes that won’t leach your body heat.
For Iceland in winter, I’d recommend buying a good down jacket. If you get a lightweight version like I have, you’ll definitely need a good set of thermals.
Thermals
I’d also recommend thermals and we’ve used Icebreaker for years. Having good quality merino base layers is a worthy investment - I have used cheap ones before, but you do get what you pay for!
I wore a thermal top and bottoms which made a big different and combined with my down jacket, I was actually toasty and the temperature was -7C. By the time I got to the cave I had to take my hat off because I was overheating!
Hand and feet warmers
The real game changer for me though was hand and foot warmers, something I only recently purchased, specifically for Iceland. I can normally keep my core body really warm with thermals, but my hands and feet suffer even with gloves. Hand and foot warmers were amazing and really kept me warm the whole way through.
I only needed my Icebreaker glove liners with the hand warmers, instead of big marshmallow style gloves that I would otherwise have needed in these temperatures.
Other items
Otherwise you’ll want a decent pair of shoes, I wore hiking trainers and a waterproof coat might come in handy (although I didn’t need mine).
The tour company will give you the crampons and helmet. If you don’t have hiking boots or a rain jacket you can rent them (or you could with Local Guide anyway!).
Crystal Ice Cave logistics
The ice cave tours tend to run from October to the end of March, but as they are natural formations it can vary slightly year by year. The season was set to run into April when we visited.
The short tours like the one we did last for about 3-4 hours, but you can do a 6-7 hour tour, which includes more time on the glacier.
Our cave tour began at Jökulsárlón, which is roughly 5 hours from Reykjavík and 2.5 hours from Vik. There is an option to do an ice cave tour from Vik as well, which I’d like to try one day, but based purely on my research, it didn’t look quite as good as the cave at Jökulsárlón.
Most companies tend to have two tours a day in the height of the season, one in the morning and one in the afternoon. Based on companies we spoke to, they do try to avoid having overlapping and having too many groups inside the cave at any one time, but some overlap is inevitable.
Tours start at around USD $135 and up. You might find something cheaper, but this seemed relatively standard from companies I looked at.
Where to stay near the Crystal Cave
Hali Country Hotel
We stayed at the Hali Country Hotel. It was the only hotel we stayed at which didn’t have self catering facilities - but I actually couldn’t find one that did close to the ice cave area. The hotel was really nice, with a big comfy bed and good shower. We also had a great view over the frozen bay.
At the end of the corridor you have a hot drinks area where you can make free tea and coffee. We will admit to also making pot noodles here to cut down on the cost of eating out : ) We actually got caught in a snow storm in this area and had to extend our stay, so also ended up eating at the restaurant. The food was good, but does cost upwards of USD $30 a main.
The staff are very friendly and the brekkie is included in the room rate. You’re a 12 minute drive from the lagoon and ice cave tours.
One downside is that inexplicably they keep external lights on outside the hotel at night and the curtains aren’t thick enough to completely block all the light. This bothered me, but didn’t bother Joe, so it depends how sensitive a sleeper you are!
Check the latest prices & reviews on:
Special thanks to Local Guide of Vatnajökul for inviting us to join them on this tour. All opinions in this guide are our own as always and we would recommend this trip to friends and family, which is our benchmark for anything we recommend in our blog.
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