Turns out even the famous hot springs are taking a hit from huge numbers of tourists. PIC globetrotter_rodrigo
T here is a good reason why swimming pools the world over are regularly treated in some ways to combat bacteria and such unwelcome guests. This is not the case with natural hot springs which incidentally turn out to be rather infected in some places in Iceland.
These days, in line with huge and growing numbers of tourists to Iceland, the natural order of things is beginning to break down. Sadly, even our tremendously lovely natural hot springs widely found are no exception.
Turns out, according to a recent study, the amount of serious contamination in three popular thermal springs in the country is quite high. Perhaps you should stop reading if a hot spring in Iceland is on your agenda…
It seems the Landmannalaugar hot springs, Lysuholl hot spring and Hveravellir hot springs are not just crowded by tourists but much less desirable visitors too. Considerable fecal contamination was found in all three places and especially where water flow was low.
Now, you may or may not know what fecal matter is. If you do you might want to take your soaking elsewhere and if you don´t it is closely related to feces. Human feces. Which Wikipedia describes as „also known as stool, is the waste product of the human digestive system including bacteria.“
Before you start cancelling your trip keep in mind that bacteria of some sort is found in all pools everywhere and poses little danger. But what is probably the thing to do is to fast-forward your trip before this becomes a huge problem and authorities start to find something worse than fecal matter. However, this is unlikely since health authorities never check contamination in natural hot springs in Iceland.
In any case, take a long hard shower after soaking in any of these three springs and bear in mind that little is known about contamination generally in all other Icelandic springs.
Note: the study in question was done by a student at the University of Iceland. We do not publish the study itself since it is only found in Icelandic.
