Iceland’s Blue Lagoon: where a warm spot isn’t a bad thing

When you’re backpacking, and particularly CouchSurfing, small things become luxuries. A bed. A meal in a café or restaurant. Sleeping in. Clean clothes. So to experience something like the Blue Lagoon is, well, wow. 

The Blue Lagoon is THE attraction in Reykjavik. Try and find a visitor to the city that doesn’t go there. It’s a gorgeous geo-thermal pool about 30-minutes from the city. Stunningly blue, steaming and oh so luxurious.

I arrive by bus, along with 90% of the visitors. The Blue Lagoon isn’t a natural geo-thermal spring; the water comes from the geo-thermal power plant next door. Actually the view upon arrival is anything but impressive: This giant plant, steam pouring from its chimneys and the barren volcanic landscape. Inside, it’s a different story. Everything is immaculate and shiny and sparkling.

I pay downstairs and am given a wrist band for entry. This will give me access to a locker and allow me to buy drinks and food so I don’t have to carry cash. They have a 5000ISK limit and you settle the bill when you leave. I change in the locker rooms and shower (without my swimmers, it’s the rules) and cover my hair in conditioner. I’ve been warned (Thanks Adventurous Kate) to protect my hair as much as possible and try my darndest not to let it get wet. Then it’s off to the water.

The Blue Lagoon is an incredible sight: This blue, blue steaming water and all these little heads bobbing out of it. I leave my towel and camera by the side and step in. For the next two and half hours I soak all my aches away. Natalie, a British lass staying at the same hostel as me, and I move around the pool in search of different temperatures. We put silica mud on our face, leave it to dry then rinse it off. We should look years younger. There is a swim-up kiosk where we get ice cream and beer and before we know it, hours have gone by.





As we get out about 5pm it’s starting to fill up – particularly near the bar. Either people coming after work or after other tours. There are several packages where you can visit the lagoon on your way to or from the airport or at the end of other tours. The Lagoon is set up so you could turn up completely unprepared and have everything you need. There is luggage storage. You can hire towels and swim suits and the change rooms have conditioner and shower gel, hairdryers and plastic bags for your wet swimmers. There are even cotton balls and buds. Downstairs I buy postcards AND stamps. These people think of everything.





Somehow doing nothing is quite exhausting. Both Natalie and I doze off on the bus back. I also discover the next day I’m a little sunburnt, largely I suspect from the reflection from the water.

Entry to the lagoon, with a towel rental, is 40 Euro (5600ISK) plus it was about 2000ISK for the bus there. There are other geothermal pools in Reykjavik that are much, much cheaper and easier to get to so you could have a similar experience on a budget.

Meeting the Viking horses

The Icelandic horses aren’t big. They stand at about 13-14 hands. But visitors are warned early on. Do not call them ponies.

More than 1000 years ago, Iceland banned the importation of horses. The island’s settlers required horses of excellent breeding to handle the conditions and terrain and put great effort into protecting their stocks. The result is a country full of pure-bred Icelandic horses. There is no other breed here at all. And once a horse leaves the country, it isn’t allowed back.

Preparing for my ride with Íshestar, the largest riding company in Reykjavik, I was asked several times if I had ridden an Icelandic horse before. It took me a while to understand why they were so interested. Riding an Icelandic horse is very different to any other breed I’ve experienced. I’d like to tell you the basics are the same, and to some extent they are. But don’t expect to trot comfortably.



It had been a long while since I’d been in a saddle. I strained to think about how long, and came to the decision it was probably about 10 years since I’d spent any decent length of time on a horse. Most of the day tours Is Hestar offers are for beginners and most of their customers have never been on a horse before. Not wanting to sit through the absolute basics of horse riding, I signed up for the advanced tour. There was an intermediate tour, but that would include about five to six hours of riding and given I’d flown in to Reykjavik that morning and running on about two hours sleep, I didn’t feel up to that. My tour would involve up to three hours of riding.



I was given Blaze. She had an Icelandic name that sounded similar, but when I was told it meant Blaze, I stuck with that. Icelandic horses are said to have big personalities and I definitely got that. Blaze was impatient, curious, always hungry and eager to take her own route instead of following the others. We were a good match.

Our ride followed a gravel road initially, where we tried the tölt for the first time. It’s a four-beat pace and instead of lifting out of the saddle, you’re meant to sit back into it and ride it out. I was thankful I wore a sports bra. We also did a bit of a gallop, which I was surprised to find felt different to what I was used to. I couldn’t quite put my finger on why but I wasn’t the only one who noticed it. I was a little nervous, mainly because the ground below us was all rocks so if I fell off, it was going to hurt. No nice green grass to soften the blow. No nice green grass anywhere.



We rode through a small river and into the surrounds of an old volcano. The ground was covered in volcanic rock, which the horses navigated with ease. They were as agile going up and over the lava formations as a goat. Our group of give had three customers and two guides. Usually it would only be one but Selina, from Denmark, is learning the route from Tiina. Selina started four days ago and will work here for the summer. Back home she has four Icelandic horses, but of course, can’t bring them here. The breed is popular in the other Viking countries such as Sweden, Denmark and Norway.



We had a few stops along the way - just enough time to stretch our legs and for the horses to have a nibble. The landscape was quite surreal. Very barren and sparse. There was a little touch of green on some of the hills and snow on the top of some in the distance. The ground was dry, dusty and rocky – it has never recovered from the volcano. I was constantly impressed with how the horses handled it. Nothing spooks them.



As we headed for home we picked up the pace. Tiina doesn’t like to let them gallop on flat ground in case they get carried away. Instead
we saved it for when there was an incline. Blaze needed little direction. They are so well trained they just fall in line, although she was always right on the tail of the one in front trying to push up a little bit. Obviously all the horses are trained to handle complete beginners. There are about 60 horses at the centre now but that will grow to about 100 next week in preparation for a busy summer.

Back at the centre we took off the saddles, returned our helmets and boots and jumped on the bus back to the city. Buggered.