The Blue Lagoon is a pale blue lake full of mineral-rich seawater heated by underground lava. The lagoon is outflow from the adjacent Svartsengi geothermal power plant, which sounds dangerous but is considered healthy. You can rent towels and bathing suits. There's also a restaurant that serves Caesar salad with salmon and cloudberries. A sauna with a lava-walled interior is cut into the bank of the lagoon.
Lovers float through the water.
Lifeguards in neon yellow talk on cellphones on the banks. I'm sure Iceland in winter can be grueling out there on the glaciers, the snow whipping across bleak vistas. But from my table in the Finnish-style restaurant, with its white ash chairs and steel tables overlooking the lagoon, I only imagined the hardships. I tried to recall the smell of foul air. I ate my cloudberries.