Daytrip in 5 best museums in Reykjavik – explore the history, culture and lifestyles

Of course, for most of the foreign visitors Iceland firstly is the excitement given by the breathless and unique nature values. However, it is worth paying some attention in exploring the country from other perspectives as well such as the history of Iceland, its culture, society and lifestyles. These matters become particularly interesting taking into account that Iceland has been inhabited pretty recently and since the first settlers arrived, people had to find their own ways in sustaining a good life in such harsh conditions. There is no better way for you to get to know all these facts, stories and information than by visiting local museums. There are numerous great museums in the whole country but some of the best exhibitions are located in the capital Reykjavik and hence I have made this list of how to make a daytrip in Reykjavik based on exploring history, culture and some also more uncommon pieces of Iceland. The day will be pretty intense, if you do not start it early enough, better split this “tour” in two parts in order to manage see and visit all the places properly!
Let’s start the day with visiting the Reykjavik Maritime Museum. The exhibition pays particular attention to the importance of fishing industry and is very exciting to be visited with whole family as real ships and boats are being displayed there!

After that, let’s head to The Settlement Exhibition (Landnámssýningin) in order to explore more thoroughly how the very first settlers arrived in Iceland. This exhibition is based on multimedia and interactive innovations so it certainly is worth a visit!

Further on, let’s move on to probably the most unique of all the museums in Iceland and also Europe – The Icelandic Phallological Museum- Redursafnið. Even though this has nothing to do with history of Iceland, the exhibition actually sheds an interesting light on Icelandic nature involving what seems to be the largest collection of mammal penises!

Once we have had an amusing time in such one-of-a-kind museum to be found, let’s head outdoors and see how traditional Icelandic farms and towns used to look like some centuries ago!

Once you have had some nice time in open-air, let’s finish our day in National Museum of Iceland. This will be pretty time-consuming activity so try not to start it too late!