This summer my husband and I spent our best vacation ever (and we travel a lot) in Iceland, at a beautiful house, Ferienhaus Stekkholt, that we rented through Sven Strumann of German company Kria Tours. For this trip, to celebrate our tenth anniversary, we did extensive research into various vacation home rentals around Iceland, and we loved Stekkholt right away, we knew we had to rent it (before anyone else booked it!!). We couldn't have made a better choice, the house is gorgeous, brand new, modern, equipped above and beyond what you need, and in the perfect location. Some specifics: Location - Near Selfoss (on Google maps as Arborg), about 45 minutes from Reykjavik, and less than ten minutes to the coast. From here you are close to the "Golden Circle", Thingvellir National Park with the Althing, the famous Gullfoss waterfalls, the Kerith crater, Landmannalaugar, and Thorsmork (rent an SUV for the last two, it's required. We just got an SUV for two days, and a regular car for the rest of the time). The house has two neighbors, but we never saw any, and everywhere in front and behind the house was just open space, beautiful nature. There are horses the live next door that you can pet every day, and a beautiful Icelandic bird guided us up and down the driveway, flying ahead of our car, every time we left or returned. The house itself - Brand new. Literally, brand new. Stekkholt looked like we were the first renters (July 2013). Top of the line, eco-friendly yet efficient, appliances, thoroughly stocked kitchen, huge 3D TV with blu-ray player, an enormous hot tub that you can fill and drain at the push of a button (!!), two large bathrooms, a huge amount of closet space in the master bedroom (we didn't use the other three bedrooms because it was the two of us), nice interior design, lots and lots of large windows with spectacular views of the landscape, and comfortable leather couches. The beds were very comfortable, with fluffy down blankets and pillows. Note that you are required to take off your shoes in the house, so bring some slippers or something. We're not huge fans of taking off shoes indoors, but after seeing all the mud we tracked into the hallway from hiking, we were glad we kept the house nice and clean, shoe-free. The arrangements: We originally found Stekkholt on HomeAway, but decided to contact Mr. Strumann directly instead. We transferred the money to his company's bank account in Germany (easy from America, just went to the bank with the details Mr. Strumann gave us, and they figured out the rest), and had Mr. Strumann arrange a rental car for us too, which was nice. We got a better price through him than we would have gotten otherwise, and the rental was great. Do keep in mind, as in most of Europe, that a rental car will be a stick shift unless you specifically book an automatic! After we transferred the money, it did take a while to get the confirmation, but that ended up being a mix-up, I think because they just started renting this house and were still working out the details. By now I'm sure it's all been streamlined, and we enjoyed dealing with Mr. Strumann. We found him to be very friendly, helpful and polite, and he will give you an email and phone number so you can reach him or his company if you need anything urgently. You will also have the contact info of the neighbor in the very helpful binder in the house, which has all the information in German and in English. The move-in and key transfer were super easy, much easier than most rental house. Usually these things can be tricky, coordinating with a local person, planning arrival times, trying to make phone calls when your cell phone doesn't work abroad, etc. For Stekkholt this was all SUPER easy. On the day we arrived, Mr. Strumann texted and emailed us a code, which we used to get the front door keys from a lock box at the door! Didn't even need to meet anyone, and the binder had all the info we needed. There are so many things to do, we can't wait to come back, but for a two week vacation Ferienhaus Stekkholt was the perfect house in the perfect location. We truly could not have found a more amazing place to stay. In fact, my husband asked if we could buy the land across the road and build an identical house haha. If anyone has any questions, we would be more than happy to answer them. Just send us a message or ask Mr. Strumann for our email or phone number. We speak English, Dutch and German so we'd be happy to answer questions in any of those languages. We give Ferienhaus Stekkholt our highest recommendation, this amazing house was a big contributor to the best vacation of our lives! read more

See all