Overview
Southern Peninsula is an administrative unit and part of Reykjanesskagi, or Reykjanes Peninsula, a region in southwest Iceland. It was named after Reykjanes, the southwestern tip of Reykjanesskagi.
Description
The Reykjanes Peninsula expands in drama as you move away from the highway between Reykjavík and Keflavík International Airport. You’ll find not only the Blue Lagoon, Iceland’s most famous attraction, but numerous other gorgeous and interesting sights, many of them based around active volcanoes. The busiest towns are amenity-rich Keflavík and nearby Njarðvík, but the sweet, windswept fishing hamlets of Garður and Sandgerði – great for whale watching – are just minutes to the west of the airport on a small northwestern spur. The rest of the Reykjanes, from dramatic Reykjanestá in the southwest to the Reykjanesfólkvangur wilderness reserve in the east, is an untamed landscape of multihued volcanic craters, mineral lakes, bubbling hot springs, rugged mountains and coastal lava fields. The region has a population of 27,829 and is one of the more densely populated parts of the island.