16 Aug Happy Campers Iceland Road Trip – Part 1: Camper Van Tour
When visiting Iceland this summer, we made a home for ourselves in a Happy Campers camper van. Our 10-day rental would see us road tripping through the Westfjords and around the Ring Road before making our way back to Reykjavik. We have a ton to share about our road trip, but we thought we’d start out by giving you a tour of our digs. Welcome to our crib!
We partnered with Happy Campers for this epic road trip, and we were provided with a Happy 3 rental. The Happy 3 has room for five people and it includes everything you need for sleeping and cooking. Happy Campers also has several other van categories that are perfect for 2-4 people. While the campers come with most everything you need to head out on your trip, you can also add on several “extras” such as a BBQ grill, camping chairs, table, car seats, GPS, inverter and sleeping bags. Also, the vans all have a manual transmission, so make sure whoever is planning on driving knows how to drive a stick shift.
Since we were road tripping with our friends, Evan and Hilary, we were happy to have the largest van. There were four of us in total, and we rarely felt cramped, which after 10 days is pretty amazing to me. We even had six people comfortably inside the van at one point! Standing up fully on the inside wasn’t a problem, even for Micah who clocks in at 6’1”.
Sleeping
The back of the van had two fold out beds and all bed linens were included. There was room for five people to sleep in the van: two on the top bunk and three on the bottom. Even with the 24-hour daylight, we found that we slept pretty well thanks to the comfort of the beds. The window curtains helped block out quite a bit of light, but it would be wise to bring along eyeshades, as well.
When the top bunk was “put away” one half would be pushed up and over the other. You just had to pull the top half out and it slid down to make a full size bed. The upper bunk was fairly close to the ceiling and you definitely couldn’t sit up when laying up there, but that also means that it was much darker on the top because there wasn’t as much room for sunlight to seep through the windows.
To make the bottom bed, you just had to flip out the bottom of the back seat and fold the top of the back seat down flat. This created a full bed on the bottom, as well, with enough room for two to three people. While there is certainly enough room for three people on the bottom bunk, I think three adults would be a bit too cozy for me—I think it would be more appropriate for three children or even two adults and one child.
There was enough room to sit up on the bottom bunk, which I appreciated since I’m a night owl and stayed up late to work every night after everyone else went to bed. The only issue with the bottom bunk was the sunlight snuck in between the curtains once in a while. We had a good chuckle when Micah woke up in the middle of the night feeling like he was getting a sunburn!
Kitchen
The “kitchen” of the van was located right behind the front seat. There was a large cooler that kept its power through a generator.
We also had a sink and countertop, which was nice and convenient for cooking and washing dishes.
The water tank was stored under the cooler and it was very easy to refill. All you had to do was unhook the hose and lift out the tank to fill it.
The rental came with a fully stocked kitchen—we had five plates, bowls, cups and sets of silverware, plus a pan, cutting board, cooking utensils and small gas stove for cooking. There were five drawers to hold all the kitchen gear as well as our food.
To complete our kitchen, we also grabbed a fold out table and four chairs. The table and chairs were set up outside for most of the trip because thankfully we had gorgeous weather, but when it got too buggy or chilly to sit outside, the table and two chairs fit inside and we were able to use the backseat as additional seating.
Storage
We weren’t sure how much storage the van would have, especially for four of us. Would there be enough room to store all of our suitcases and camera gear? Well, I’m happy to report that there was plenty of storage and lots of room!
In addition to the kitchen storage, we had several other areas to stash our goods. The trunk had two levels of storage—items could be placed on the bottom of the trunk and on a shelf area, which was created from part of the lower bunk bed laying flat.
There was storage in the glove box, center console, mesh pockets on the wall in the back seat, above the front seat, and under every seat, both in the back and in the front. In addition to all of this space, we had room to store our blankets and pillows on the top bunk during the day.
We had such a great time road tripping in our camper van. There was plenty of room for all four of us to spread out, and the van was very comfortable. To see a video walk through of the camper van, check out this video tour from Pure Adirondacks. So, now that you have the lay of the land, we will be getting into our itinerary and the fun we had road tripping around the island in our next couple of posts!
Stay tuned to learn even more about our adventures in our Happy Campers camper van:
Happy Campers Iceland Road Trip – Part 1: Camper Van Tour
Happy Campers Iceland Road Trip – Part 2: Our Itinerary Day 1-5
Happy Campers Iceland Road Trip – Part 3: Our Itinerary Day 6-10
Happy Campers Iceland Road Trip – Part 4: Cooking on the Road
Happy Campers Iceland Road Trip – Part 5: What to Pack for a Camper Van Road Trip
Happy Campers Iceland Road Trip – Part 6: Logistics, Expenses and FAQ’s
Special thanks to Happy Campers for providing us with a complimentary rental. As always, all opinions are our own.