Snæfellsjökull National Park

The beaches here are black sand, and an old shipwreck lies out on the shore. Behind them rises Snæfellsjökull, a stratovolcano about 700,000 years old under a shrinking ice cap: 16 km² of ice in 1946, 10–11 km² by 2008, and in August 2012 the summit was ice-free for the first time in recorded history. The coast road runs past a string of pullouts, and each one opens onto something different — lava field, cliff, beach, crater. The peninsula gets called Iceland in miniature, and the label holds up. Two days spent here still leave most of it unseen.

• Wind: it blows around the clock here, and the weather can turn from pleasant to impossible within an hour.
• Clothing: waterproof, not water-repellent — jacket, over-trousers, gloves, hat and hiking boots with good tread.
• Roads: a warning sign stands at the park entrance, and the roads inside are rocky. A 4x4 handles them better.
• Time: driving the peninsula fills a long day, and two days still leave most of the park unvisited.
• Dogs and children: dogs are allowed, and the park works as an outing with children.

The park sits at the western end of the Snæfellsnes peninsula, and people reach it by car. The peninsula road is the way in, and the sights are reached from pullouts along it. Inside the park the roads are rocky, and a warning sign stands at the entrance — a 4x4 is the sensible choice. Driving the peninsula fills a long day, and that is before stopping properly at any of the pullouts.

Best: early morning or evening; summer, if the glacier is the point of the trip.

Avoid: squeezing the whole peninsula into one hurried stop.

Early and late the light is low and the road is quieter. In summer the saddle near the summit can be walked, and several companies run guided trips during the season. Wind blows year-round and the weather changes by the hour, so how much time you set aside matters more than the date.