The Seventh Wonder of the World

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They say that happiness is a day at the spa, but a few weeks ago, I found myself at one of the strangest spas on Earth.  Billed by Conde Nast Traveler as one of the Seven Wonders of the Natural World, The Blue Lagoon is located at the base of an enormous geothermal power plant in the middle of a fresh lava field. Getting there requires driving for 45 minutes through a desolate landscape filled with black basalt boulders that were vomited up by one volcano or another over the years, leaving huge rifts under the earth’s crust that allowed heat to warm the sea water above it. 

Eventually, people decided to utilize this heat to make electricity, and the power plant was built. A few years after that, someone had the nifty idea to route the effluent run-off into a pool, like a gigantic hot tub, and The Blue Lagoon was born. 

It's impossible to estimate how many people they process through this place on a daily basis, but I would wager a guess that nearly everyone who visits this island considers making a stop here. “It looks just like heaven,” someone next to me commented, as we hung our robes on hooks and descended through a strange portal to an artificial world filled with milky aquamarine water and steam.  And yes, I thought to myself, maybe heaven is slightly like this but without the constant din of what sounded like a pile driver breaking through hard rocks at the neighboring power plant, in combination with the whirring and humming of multiple motors and pumps struggling to bring the water up to the surface. 

On the day I visited, my phone reported that the outdoor temperature was 45 degrees, but with the wind it felt like twenty, so I tried to keep my body submerged as much as possible.  Unfortunately, at 8:00 am, the water was not always that warm – currents moved through it, creating a wide variance in temperature, sometimes only slightly warmer than my body.  Pretending to be a seal, I floated on my back for a while in the murky saline water, seeking the warmest spot.  I eventually heard a loud sound, and realized that I had drifted toward a suction drain in the corner.

I looked down and noticed that I couldn’t see my hands or the rest of my body in the cloudy water, which was filled with something they assured us was not toxic. It was not seagull guano, but silica, a mineral from deep within the Earth that humans now sue to keep their shoes and other leather goods from molding – and here I was soaking in it. The steam was so thick, I had completely lost sight of my friends, and at some point, my glasses had fallen off my head and been sacrificed to the bottom of the lagoon.

I inched my way along the edge until I bumped into into the swim -up bar, where they poured me the first of two free glasses of champagne that came with my entry package, then found myself a spot on the slimy, algae-covered rocks.  I noticed a small army of guards wearing florescent orange vests patrolling the perimeter of the pool.  They didn’t appear to be armed, but looked as though they should be, with their grave expressions.  As I sipped my champagne, a story started to set up in my brain about a strange island prison where they served mind-erasing elixir to the prisoners while they soaked them in hot water like teabags to steal their essence….