I'm not here to tell you not to go to the Blue Lagoon.
I love the Blue Lagoon and I think it's great,
but I think it's good to know a little bit more about it
and make an informed decision.
The reason for that is it's expensive.
A ticket to the Blue Lagoon starts at about $100 per person.
If you go early in the day or later in the day,
you might get an $80 ticket or even a $70 ticket,
but plan on spending about $100 per person.
But let me tell you a little bit about the experience
and you can make the decision for yourself.
Icelanders think the Blue Lagoon
is kind of a strange phenomenon.
Most Icelanders wouldn't go here.
First of all, they'd never pay that much.
They see it as kind of a tourist trap.
They also think it's kind of funny
because the Blue Lagoon started as sort of excess water
from a geothermal plant, okay?
They built this plant here in the background.
So they dug holes into the ground,
they pulled up this water,
they realized they couldn't use the water as it was
but they could use that water to heat other water,
fresher water, purer water that they could then
send into communities for drinking water.
But then they had to do something with all the extra water
that they had just extracted this heat from.
It was still pretty hot.
So they would just dump it in the lava plain
next to the plant and suddenly people started showing up
in the middle of nowhere and swimming
in this really warm beautiful water.
And someone had the great idea,
let's turn this into a tourist attraction
and now it's the most popular tourist attraction in Iceland.
(audience laughing)
And don't be grossed out by this, it's all natural water.
It was just used to heat other water,
it wasn't processed in any way.
But just be aware that that's sort of the history of it.
The Blue Lagoon is just a fun experience
to bob around and enjoy swimming.
You can see there's kind of a white film
that builds up on the rocks of the Blue Lagoon.
And you can swim up to this stand in the Blue Lagoon
and they'll give you some white goop
that you put on your face and it's supposed
to have sort of exfoliant properties.
I don't know if it really works, but--
(audience laughing)
When you're in Iceland,
you've got to try putting this stuff on your face.
One interesting thing about the Blue Lagoon
logistically is it's close to the airport.
So the main international airport where you're arriving
in Iceland is about 45 minutes from Reykjavik.
The Blue Lagoon is about 10 minutes from that airport.
So here's a really good tip for efficient sightseeing.
If you're arriving early in the day,
go straight to the Blue Lagoon, enjoy it there,
and then continue from there on into Reykjavik.
If you're flying out late in the day,
you could do the opposite, you could leave
Reykjavik mid-day, go to the Blue Lagoon,
have an afternoon there and then board your late flight.
And that would be the most relaxed flight you'll
probably ever have, coming straight from the Blue Lagoon.
So just be aware of that logistical part of it.
The other thing you really need to know
about the Blue Lagoon, it requires reservations.
And it can book up, the best slots, the most desirable slots
can book up a couple weeks ahead even,
or longer in peak season.
So if you're going to go to the Blue Lagoon,
and especially if you're trying to
coordinate it with your flight time,
be sure to get your booking ahead of time.
It's very unlikely you'll be able to get in
if you don't have an advanced reservation.
I mentioned earlier that Icelanders are a little skeptical
about the Blue Lagoon, partly because of the expense.
The reason why is, be aware the Blue Lagoon
is sort of the ultimate example of the Icelandic
thermal bathing culture but it's not the only example.
There are about a dozen municipal swimming pools
around Reykjavik that have water just as hot
as the Blue Lagoon and a ticket costs 1/10 as much.
Now you might look at this and say
why would I go to a municipal swimming pool in Iceland?
What you might not realize is the water
in the main pool is about 85 degrees
and the water in the smaller pools is about 100 degrees.
So it's not just a normal swimming pool,
and it's all naturally heated water
that comes straight from underneath the earth.
This is also a very Icelandic experience.
As I mentioned, if you're in Iceland for just a few days
you might find you're on a tourist trail
and you don't really break out of that
and have a truly Icelandic experience.
If you go to a suburban Reykjavik thermal swimming pool,
that is an Icelandic experience.
In Great Britain at the end of a busy day of work,
people gather their families and they go down to the pub.
Right?
In Spain and Italy at the end of a long day's work,
people take their families wandering through the streets.
The paseo in Spain, the passeggiata in Italy.
If there's a comparable situation to that in Iceland,
it's that at the end of a school day or a work day,
people gather their kids and take them
down to the thermal swimming pool.
So if you go to one of these,
you'll be surrounded by 90% Icelanders.
If you go to the Blue Lagoon,
you'll be surrounded by 99% tourists.