Kimkim Trip Reviews for Iceland

We had the BEST time! Thanks so much Chris!

We were really pleased with Chris's response time and the trip schedule for making our way around the country. It was clear that Chris was not aware that a few of the sites and one of roads were closed for the winter. I also specifically asked about Glymur falls in the winter and if the log was across the river and what it would be like in March. Chris said the log would be there, however it was clearly marked on the sign at the trailhead that the log is not there in the winter. The hike was very snowy. We were prepared for that. Good hike either way but again some misinformation given the time of year. Our accommodation was generally excellent and very comfortable for our family of four. The OK hotel was good but the "pull out couch" was not long enough even for me to sleep on (I'm 5 foot 5 inches) let alone two 17 year old boys. Just good to know if you are putting a family in there it would work for two young kids.

Chris was very helpful and insightful. Always repsonded promptly.

Loved his suggestions and his possible itineraries he laid out for us. There were options and comments to help us gauge how we can cover all that we intended to see.

Chris was there to help me with everything with a fast response!

The Guides were fantastic and I was impressed Harpa put it together exactly to our needs with so little notice

My itinerary was great overall. Well paced, stopped at many terrific highlights and quite achievable.
It did however feel like it was written quite generically - that is to say, just a copy paste job rather than something tailored. As an example, one restaurant in Hellnar which was recommended (and pretty much the only one for miles) was closed for the winter. This is confirmed with a search on Google, it's not a one off. I would expect this recommendation to be removed for winter trips. Mentions of daily drive distances were a bit off - example, the second last day I had to drive from Skaftafell to Reykjavik (320km, 4hr), not Vik to Reykjavik (180km, 2hr20min) as mentioned in the itinerary. My guess is that Chris used a base itinerary to build mine which is fine, but some of the smaller details were not altered to conform to mine.

My main gripe though is the choice of car hire. I should have looked more closely before agreeing, but I'm generally wary about dodgy operators other than the core Avis, Budget, Hertz, Thrifty. While it might be cheap initially, they do the hard sell at the desk on added insurances, in this case 30 Euro a day (for things like gravel protection, sand protection, reduced excess etc), which still has exclusions. I asked Chris about insurances, he said it included liability and collision and asked if I wanted any additional. Turns out that cover doesn't cover much, and it still includes an approx. $2200AUD excess. Further - the company would put a hold on my card for $2200AUD for going on 10 days after the rental has ended. This is really unsettling and not to mention an inconvenience.

While this isn't strictly Kimkim/Chris's fault, the selection of the car hire company is really important. The discussions online about the chosen car hire company are really worrying.

Chris was very responsive and answered all of my questions promptly.

Our trip to Iceland couldn't have been more perfect. To start with, it is a beautiful country and we were very fortunate to have had perfectly clear weather the entire 5 days we were there in February/March, after what we had been told was a very rainy winter. 18 inches of snow fell just before we arrived, and the Northern lights were out every night, making it a winter wonderland. That part was sheer luck, but on top of that, the trip was as smooth as we could have hoped. Our driver was waiting at the airport and took us right to our hotel which we had booked the previous night because of our very early morning arrival. The first day in Reykavik we planned on our own. The next 4 days were planned by the kimkim operator. We had private tours of the Golden Circle and the south coast, and a group tour to the Thorsmark wilderness area. On the final day we took a quick tour of the Reykjanes peninsula and then a stop at the Blue Lagoon before heading to the airport. We had 2 guides for those 4 days, and both were very friendly and knowledgeable and made everything run so smoothly that we didn't have to worry about a thing. We felt very lucky that our guide for the south coast tour had grown up in the area, and he took us to see places where his family had lived and told us the stories behind them. Although we did some of the usual tourist things, we loved also going to a few places where we didn't see another person. The hike up the mountain where his great-great grandfather had a farm was spectacular. We appreciated his flexibility in changing the plan on the last day when we were tired and wanted to get back to the hotel a little bit earlier than planned.

The only thing I would have changed about our trip was the trip to the Blue Lagoon, but that is in hindsight. We had heard a lot about it and felt like we had to go see what it was all about, but it was too crowded and too touristy for our tastes. The hot lagoon was a unique experience, but if I had to do it over again I would try one of the natural springs out in the countryside instead, and save a lot of money too!

As far as the planning process, I have tried several different online travel planning services, and I really like the way kimkim uses a back and forth conversation to plan the details. It's much quicker than other services that start with a formal proposal, which then has to be laboriously modified if you want changes. For our Iceland trip, the local operator started with a general plan, then narrowed down the details, and then presented a completed proposal. Most of my communication was with the local tour operator, but on 2 occasions when there was a breakdown in communication the Kimkim team stepped in and sorted it out quickly. I hope kimkim adds more locations to their offerings. I will use it again.

A couple of very small details that could have been improved - our trip to Thorsmark was 1-1/2 hours longer than described. It seemed as if our guide added on some things at the end to give us our money's worth, but we were tired and would have been happy to end on time. Part of the reason we were so tired was because on our hike the guide raced ahead of the group instead of going at our pace. We weren't all 20-somethings who hike glaciers in our spare time, and it isn't much fun hiking if you are worried about keeping up! A final small detail - water in the jeep would have been nice. But these were small things. Overall the trip was amazing.

Our trips are never predictable and this trip was no exception! I generally plan my own trips from beginning to end but this time to avoid stress, I went with an agency. Kimkim was fabulous to work with and Matthias was always there to smooth out the wrinkles and make sure we knew what was happening. We absolutely loved our adventure and will definitely consider using the agency again on future adventures!

Matthias was very concerned with making sure our trip went as smoothly as possible. His communication skills are fantastic as well as his knowledge about Iceland and his ability to make sure your vacation is fabulous!

Great organization!

Chris did an awesome job and answered whenever i had a question!

Chris was incredibly responsive and helpful. Great trip, great planning, and great follow-through.

We asked a lot of questions and he patiently got responses to all, and he helped us resolve a dispute that was not of his making.

I admire your professionalism and the attention, was amazing in trusting you guys our trip.

Everything was pretty great about our trip. Details were well drawn up and explained a lot of sites to see on the way as we drove. All very well done.

Only thing that was any sort of a snag was that our Waterfall Ice Cave tour that we booked for Jan 3rd at 10:30am apparently was transferred.... to another tour service without telling me? So as we showed up at 10:15 to the meeting area for our 10:30am tour - with my ticket saying 'paid in full' to Arctic Adventures (whom I had received my email confirmation from) they looked at them and then their lists and said 'you're not on our list'.
So the nice man made a call.
He came back with "Apparently this tour was Cancelled Dec 12th and your money was refunded".....
hmmmmm.
He said his guy was going to make a call and look into it further, but it was now 10:20 and tours were leaving at 10:30 so we were hoping it would be worked out before then...

He then came back and said 'So I guess due to scheduling or booking this tour was booked, cancelled, and then you were transferred to another tour company? So go over there to Iceguide van and they should be taking you now..."

So we did, and a nice man named Oskar said 'Yep, you're with us.' and we went on a tour.

But it was concerning that at no time was any info about us not being with Arctic Adventures was shared... Had the nice man not made a call to try and figure it out we would have just went home and the correct service provider may have just left without us and our two seats being wasted...

Just was bummed I never got any sort of 'your tour has been cancelled, or transferred to another tour service' update...... with another tour companies name to find.

Aside from that everything went off without a hitch!!
So thank you!

Such great input on all questions asked, he really helped make the trip happen.

Overall the trip was fantastic. While I think that it was near perfect, the number of things that were on our itinerary were too many and the number of daylight hours were just not enough.

I think that Chris could have been more clear advising us about the short daylight hours. (I too claim responsibility for not delving further into this) but otherwise Chris did a great job. He was accessible and was quick to respond to any questions before and during the trip. He offered a number of suggestions based on our first discussion.

So we are on our return now from our wonderful yet short trip. Nothing but praise and recommendation for the service and itinerary drawn together here. Thank you so much for the clear communication, ease of service, thoughtfulness and assistance. Everything went so well and with ease. My husband has really enjoyed his birthday surprise.

We were very pleased with the Northern Lights Tour by Amazing Tours. So much better than the mini-bus Tours on offer everywhere else. The guys we had running the evening (Nori? And his brother), were engaging and interesting. They added in a visit to a waterfall. Just really cool; we felt we had lucked out having them as our guides. So thank you, I am quite sure we will use you again. Our trip was outstanding. Best wishes to all involved in working with us.

Only reason I went with not perfect was a couple of days didnt seem busy enough. But given the last minute nature of the trip, Harpa was Awesome!!!

The tour guide Begga was super nice , on time, and we always felt felt and comfortable with her.
A few things that could have been done better:
1- it would have been nice to have received a detailed itinerary before getting there (we had a 5 line itinerary before the trip).
2- more information (geography, history) about the places we were seeing/visiting

Kristin helped organize the trip and all that we decided to do, we did it.
Grimsborgir was pretty desolated so we would have preferred to be in Reyvajvik a few more nights. I understood that Grimsborgir was the best place to be doing excursions from. Unfortunately it rained all week and we did not see the northern lights which was another reason we stayed in Grimsborgir.

This was a very well planned trip. We really enjoyed the first night in Egilsstadir as well as the road trip to Vik. We wish we'd ha done extra day to do a bit more hiking as we ended up spending extra time in Vik.

Joost helped with every single step of this trip and was amazing with returning emails. The one time I reached out on the first day of the trip we received a quick response from one of his team members. Fantastic service!!

We thoroughly enjoyed the trip and appreciated the recommendations for restaurants and hotels. We don't usually use a travel agent, but for Iceland it was hard to know what to fit in for a quick 5 day trip, and Bjorn was great. Very easy to work with and responsive to our requests. He not only arranged airport transfers, he also set up a ride to the rental car, made sure we had a gps loaded with key spots, and gave us a phone to use with his contact info as well as all the other information we needed.

What I appreciated most was how was easy it was to organize and book. When we received the itinerary it was reasonably priced especially when compared to what I saw when I initially tried to book the trip on my own.

I was booking this trip rather late and I turned to KimKim because I was discovering that a number of the hotels I was interested in were sold out. Bjorn was able to get us a reduced rate with view rooms at a beautiful new hotel. He also found us a great "guest house". The activities he suggested weren't one that were found in the guidebooks. Bjorn listened to what we liked and found activities to match.