Myvatn Nature Baths

Myvatn Nature Baths sit above the village of Reykjahlid on the edge of the Krafla volcanic system, using warm alkaline water piped up from the National Power Company's borehole 2.5 km deep. The main lagoon is a series of stepped pools filled with milky blue water at around 36-40°C, and thanks to its distance from Reykjavik it draws a fraction of the Blue Lagoon's crowd. It opened in 2004 and remains the go-to hot-soak stop on any Diamond Circle or ring-road trip through the north. The source is the Bjarnarflag field immediately west of the site, where the water surfaces far too hot to touch and is held in a cooling basin before it reaches the pools. It is naturally alkaline and heavy with silicates and sulphur compounds, and because the basin turns over continuously there is no chlorine in it at all. The trade-off is a faint eggy smell that clings to swimwear.

The visit is straightforward: shower, walk to the lagoon, and choose your pool. There are hotter and cooler sections, an in-water bar and two steam baths built over natural fissures where 50°C vapour rises directly from the ground. Views west across Lake Myvatn are spectacular at sunset in summer and, on winter nights, the northern lights often appear directly overhead — the light pollution is negligible. Bring flip-flops; the stone underfoot can be sharp. Changing rooms are gender-separated, lockers open with the wristband you are given at reception, and the naked pre-swim shower is compulsory and enforced by an attendant, as it is in every pool in Iceland. From the changing-room door a short decked walkway takes you to the water; in January that thirty-second dash at minus ten is the coldest part of the day, so leave your towel on the hooks by the steps, not in the locker.

Tickets are ISK6900 in high season and around ISK5900 in low season, less than half the Blue Lagoon. There is a good on-site restaurant serving lamb stew and Arctic char. Book online for evening slots May-September; midday is usually walk-in. Combine with a morning at Dettifoss or Hverir mud pots and finish here at sunset — an easy ring-road day. The village of Reykjahlid has petrol, a supermarket and a small selection of hotels. Because the doors do not open until noon in either season, the baths can only ever be an afternoon or evening fixture — plan the driving and the waterfalls for the morning and treat this as the reward. Most visitors staying in the north base themselves in Akureyri, where options such as Hrimland Cottages or the Akureyri cabin with an amazing view put you around seventy-five minutes from the car park.

Getting here needs a car. The turn-off is signposted on the north side of Route 1 about 3 km east of Reykjahlid, at the Jardbadsholar hills, just before the road climbs to the Namaskard pass; the car park is free and rarely full except between 15:00 and 17:00 in July. From Akureyri it is 100 km and roughly an hour and fifteen minutes on Route 1, from Husavik 55 km and about fifty minutes on routes 87 and 1, from Egilsstadir 165 km and two hours, and from Reykjavik around 470 km, or six hours the northern way. Strætó's long-distance coach between Akureyri and Egilsstadir calls at Reykjahlid on a limited timetable, but it stops in the village, not at the baths, so you still need a taxi for the last 3 km. Walking that stretch along the shoulder of Route 1 takes about forty minutes and is not enjoyable in wind.

Costs are simple and there are no tiers to decode. Adults pay ISK6900 in high season and about ISK5900 in low season, children aged 12-15 pay half, and under-12s go free when accompanied by a paying adult. The locker is included in the ticket. Towel and swimsuit rental are each in the region of ISK1000-1500 and cheaper as a pre-booked combo online, so add them at checkout rather than at the desk. Everything you buy inside — a beer or a smoothie at the in-water bar, lamb stew or Arctic char in the restaurant — goes onto the wristband and is settled by card on your way out; nowhere on site expects cash. There is no silica mask bar, no algae treatment and no spa menu, which is precisely why the ticket costs what it does.

Timing decides how good this is. The gates open at 12:00 and the first hour is genuinely quiet, then day-trip coaches and cruise passengers bussed up from Akureyri fill the lagoon between roughly 15:00 and 17:00. From about 19:30 it empties again, and the last ninety minutes before closing — 22:00 in summer, 21:30 in winter, with last entry half an hour earlier — are the best water of the day. Season matters more still. June and July bring the midnight sun and the midges the lake is named for; late August and September give warm evenings, dark skies and the first aurora. February and March are the quietest months with the strongest northern lights odds. Christmas Day is the only closure. Skip the week between Christmas and New Year if you want space, and skip midday July entirely.

It suits families with small children better than most Icelandic attractions: the shallowest steps sit at bath temperature, under-12s are free, and nobody minds noise. It suits couples on a winter aurora hunt best of all. It suits anyone who has just driven the gravel of Route 862 from Dettifoss and wants their spine back. It does not suit teenagers looking for slides, lanes or a wave machine — this is a soaking lagoon and an hour is their limit. It does not suit a one-hour gap in a schedule either; with changing, showering and drying, two hours is the honest minimum. Anyone wanting a proper swim, or a cheaper dip at around ISK1000, should use the municipal pool in Reykjahlid instead, which has lanes and hot tubs. If you need step-free entry to the water, telephone ahead before you drive out.

Everything worth folding into the same half-day is within twenty minutes. The Hverir mud pots and fumaroles at Namaskard are 6 km east over the pass, ten minutes by car, and best in flat morning light. Grjotagja, the flooded lava fissure used as a Game of Thrones location, is a five-minute drive and two minutes' walk from its parking area — you can look, but bathing there is not permitted. Hverfjall's black tephra crater is about 8 km away, with a twenty-minute climb to the rim, and the lava pillars of Dimmuborgir 10 km south. Krafla and the Viti crater lie 15 km north, though the mountain road up is shut through winter. For food, Vogafjos farm restaurant outside Reykjahlid does smoked trout and geothermally baked rye bread. Godafoss is 50 km west, an easy stop on the drive back to Akureyri.

The honest caveats. In June and July the lake's non-biting midges swarm in clouds around your head the moment you leave the water, and no amount of geothermal serenity fixes that — a cheap head net from the supermarket in Reykjahlid is a better investment than a robe. Sulphur tarnishes silver, so leave rings and earrings in the locker, and the mineral load leaves long hair straw-stiff unless you condition it before and after. The site is smaller and plainer than photographs suggest: two lagoons, two steam huts, one bar, and a changing-room bottleneck at 12:00 sharp. The steam baths are near-zero visibility and few people last more than ten minutes. And the claim that nobody comes here is only true off-peak — a July afternoon with three coaches parked outside feels every bit as busy as the south.

The view is the thing people undersell rather than oversell. From the west edge of the main lagoon you look across the lava field to Myvatn itself, with the pseudocraters of Skutustadagigar low on the far shore, and in clear September weather the whole basin turns copper for about forty minutes before the sun drops. Stand there, not at the bar. If the aurora forecast is above about three and the sky is clear, stay past 22:00 in winter — staff begin clearing the water fifteen minutes before closing and the last stretch of dark sky is usually yours alone. If the forecast is bad and the cloud is down to the lake, go anyway: warm water in horizontal sleet is a specifically northern pleasure, and at ISK5900 in the low season it remains the best value hot soak in Iceland.

Hours & entry

Not free

Summer daily 12:00-22:00 · Winter daily 12:00-21:30 · Last entry 30 min before closing

What to see

• Main lagoon and view over Myvatn — West-facing pool, closest to the lake
• Natural steam baths — Wooden huts built over fissures near the changing rooms
• In-water bar — North side of the main lagoon

Tips from the ground

• Go at 8pm in summer for sunset over Myvatn and near-empty water
• Winter aurora often appear from the pool between 10pm and midnight
• Buy the towel + swimsuit rental combo online; on-site rental is more expensive