First Visit to the Geothermal Pools

We made it through a pretty packed first full day here in Iceland, and overslept a bit. The time difference finally caught up.

The weather here seems to change by the minute. Throughout the day, we witnessed rain on multiple occasions, sunshowers, and snow featuring the biggest snowflakes I have ever seen - literally the size of U.S. half dollars. Through all of that, it hovered somewhere in the 30's. Perfect temperature to go swimming.

After hitting up a flea market that featured a selection of fish and meat products (including, apparently, Flicka), we drove to the Laugardalslaug geothermal pool just to see where it was an if anybody was there.

The parking lot was packed and the place was huge.

Without our swimsuits, we decided to head back to the hotel for more information and grab our trunks (the hotel was a short 10 minute drive). While speaking with the front desk attendant, he gave us two passes for a gym/spa called World Class, which shared the pool facilities but maintained a totally separate private-membership area.

Back to the pools we went. Upon registering at World Class, a woman took RETINAL SCANS of our eyes (?!) which were used for admission into the private areas. Very Minority Report of her. She showed us to the locker rooms and explained what was available to us - full gym with more cardio machines than I have ever seen in one room, aromatic steam baths, hot pots - their word for jacuzzis, saunas, showers, and paid massage.

We opted for the outdoor hot pots. I can't say I've ever walked barefoot across wet concrete in ambient temperatures of 2 and 3 degrees celcius before, but yesterday I did. We scrambled over to the hot pot, and enjoyed about an hour of simmering with the locals and some random tourists. While people are quite chatty in these hot pots, we kept to ourselves and took it all in.