Katla volcano · Vík í Mýrdal · South Iceland
Mýrdalsjökull is Iceland's fourth-largest ice cap, sitting directly on top of the Katla volcano above Vík. Its Kötlujökull outlet holds the ash-streaked Katla ice cave, open all year, while the black sands below carry quad and buggy tours. Compare everything on the glacier below.
Choose your trip
Everything here happens on or below the Mýrdalsjökull ice cap: the year-round Katla ice cave, quad and buggy rides on the black sands, and multi-day trips that take the glacier in along the South Coast. Prices are per person in US dollars, and every tour has free cancellation up to 24 hours before departure.
The cheapest way into the ice cave beneath Myrdalsjokull, meeting in Vík just ten minutes from the glacier. A super jeep runs up onto Kötlujökull to the cave, where ash layers from Katla's eruptions streak the blue ice black. Three hours door to door, and it runs year-round.
Free cancellation up to 24h
By far the most reviewed tour on the glacier, with over two thousand ratings. The super jeep climbs onto Myrdalsjokull to the Katla cave, and you can either meet in Vík for a three-hour trip or add Reykjavik pickup and make a full day of it with South Coast stops along the way.
Free cancellation up to 24h
The highest-rated of the short Vík departures, run by Troll Expeditions in groups capped at thirteen. A modified super jeep crosses the black outwash plain onto the glacier, and the guide walks you into the cave sitting directly beneath the Katla volcano. Gear and helmets are provided.
Free cancellation up to 24h
For visitors without a car, this small-group day tour pairs the Katla ice cave with the South Coast highlights — Seljalandsfoss, Skógafoss and the black sand at Reynisfjara. It is a long twelve-hour day from Reykjavik, but everything is handled and the group stays capped at fourteen.
Free cancellation up to 24h
These are the pick of the cave tours — see the full list, with details on each operator, on the Katla ice cave page.
A superb-rated ride starting at the Mýrdalsjökull base camp and heading down across the black lava sands that Katla's floods laid down, past the famous plane wreck and through river crossings. Note it rides the sands below the ice cap rather than the glacier itself, and there is no ice cave. Hotel pickup and food are included. A few reviewers report groups larger than the stated maximum.
Free cancellation up to 24h
A two-hour buggy run from the same base camp, racing alongside rivers and across the black sands of Sólheimasandur to finish at the glacier's edge where ice meets volcanic terrain. You can drive or ride as a passenger. It stops at the edge and does not enter a cave, and its rating rests on only 6 reviews so far.
Free cancellation up to 24h
An overnight minibus trip covering the waterfalls, Vík, Jökulsárlón and three hours on Mýrdalsjökull, with a hotel room and breakfast included. Worth knowing which cave you get: the operator states it usually visits the Crystal Cave at Breiðamerkurjökull, and the Katla ice cave when that one is inaccessible.
Free cancellation up to 24h
A full ring-road circuit with five nights of hotels, whale watching and an ice cave tour from October to mid-April, swapped for a glacier hike in summer. Be clear on the glacier though: the itinerary passes Mýrdalsjökull rather than stopping, and the ice cave visited is in the Vatnajökull area further east.
Free cancellation up to 24h
Mýrdalsjökull — the name means the mire valley glacier — is Iceland's fourth-largest ice cap, covering roughly 600 square kilometres of the South Coast directly above the village of Vík. Beneath it lies the Katla volcano, one of the country's most closely watched. Ice spills off the cap through several outlet glaciers, chiefly Kötlujökull to the east and Sólheimajökull to the southwest.
The glacier's ice cave sits in the Kötlujökull outlet, and it is unusual on two counts. It is open all year, unlike the winter-only caves in Vatnajökull, and its walls are streaked black and grey with ash from Katla's eruptions rather than the pure blue found further east. Tours reach it by super jeep from Vík in about half an hour. There is more detail on each operator on the Katla ice cave page, and a comparison with the blue caves on the Crystal Ice Cave page.
Below the ice cap stretch the black lava sands laid down by Katla's glacial floods, and these are where the quad and buggy tours run. Both leave from the base camp on Road 222, between Skógar and Vík. The quad route crosses the sands to the Sólheimasandur plane wreck and back through river crossings; the buggy heads out to the glacier's edge. Neither goes into a cave, and neither climbs onto the ice cap itself — they are rides across the volcanic terrain around it.
The Sólheimajökull outlet, reached by a short track off the Ring Road between Skógar and Vík, is the glacier's hiking and kayaking end. It is one of the most accessible glacier tongues in Iceland and a common half-day add-on for anyone already on the South Coast.
Several longer trips take Mýrdalsjökull in along the way, and it is worth checking what you get. The 2-day South Coast tour spends about three hours on the glacier and includes a cave — usually the Crystal Cave at Breiðamerkurjökull, with Katla as the alternative when that is shut. The 6-day ring road tour lists Mýrdalsjökull as a pass-by rather than a stop, and its ice cave visit is further east in the Vatnajökull area, running October to mid-April.
Mýrdalsjökull is about 150 km from Reykjavik, roughly two hours on the Ring Road, and only ten minutes from Vík. That makes it the closest ice cave to the capital by some distance — the Vatnajökull caves are more than twice as far. Everything runs year-round: winter for snow and northern lights, summer for long daylight and easier roads.
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