One of the most stunning tourist attractions in Iceland is Jökulsárlón glacier lagoon. The lake is situated – and made by – the glacier Breiðamerkurjökull, a branch from the enormous Vatnajökull. If you can imagine a threshold fjord that never reached the sea, then you have the concept. Jökulsárlón is Iceland’s deepest lake (300 m), and it covers an area of 25 km2. The glaciers in Iceland are in rapid decline, including Vatnajökull. As the glaciers retreat, a lake may form where the glacier has dug deep – before the end moraine. When icebergs break off the glacier to a glacier lagoon, the icebergs become trapped in the lake. This is a beautiful sight.
Jökulsárlón is a young lake, formed after the glacier Breiðamerkurjökul began to retreat after 1933. The depth comes from the erosion by the glacier during the ‘Little Ice Age’, which had it’s maximum around 1740. The unique thing about Jökulsárlón is that it is connected to the sea via a river/channel (Jökulsá á Breiðamerkursandi), which is deep enough for the water to go both out and in. Seawater enters the lake when it flows, and out again together with melt water when approaching low tide. In this seawater seals are swimming, which give birth to their cubs here. The seals experience visitors every day, and you can see them quite close, they are both charming and curious. Do not go close to the cubs, they are used to lying alone while mother is searching for food.
At Jökulsárlón, a bath is NOT right. There are danger signs all over the place and they have some good points there.
One is the danger of being caught by the current. Since the water goes both out and in, the current can be treacherous, that’s probably right. The other issue is the icebergs. The relatively warm sea water makes the ice melt faster under water than above. Only 10% of icebergs stick up in the air, and you can’t tell when they have melted so much below water that they might capsize. This is very dangerous, don’t even consider swimming out to climb icebergs! It is perfectly fine, in fact absolutely wonderful, just to stand on the beach and enjoy the sight of icebergs, seals and water!
But then there were these urges and dreams. And the defiance. And ‘we are so careful‘. And the problem with always following the rules. And… well, you know what happened, right? We drove over the bridge to the other side of the lake. There we found no seals, (almost) no people, (almost) no current, (almost) no icebergs and (almost) no prohibition signs. There it’s (almost) right with a bath.
A bath in Jökulsárlón is (almost) right.
But then came these urges and dreams again. This bath was so far away from the icebergs that there was almost no point. And how forbidden is it really to swim in Jökulsárlón? After following countless discussions around the great Internet, we have come to the (possibly wrong) conclusion that there is no legal background to initiate processes against those who break the swimming prohibitions announced with signs à la those we find at Jökulsárlón. So they are not legally binding prohibitions, only warnings. Drone bans, however, are legally based and also strictly followed up with fines. Be as it may, we decided to try a bath again the following year. This time while raining cats and dogs.
The advantage of rainy weather is that there will be no visitors, you might think. But at Jökulsárlón there are always people! We went back and forth a bit. Should … shouldn’t. There was also quite a bit of wind and a rather harsh bathing weather. Suddenly a boat came, it was going to cruise around with tourists. We changed our minds – almost – but decided to give it a try anyway as the boat quickly turned around. It was great! The rain stopped just before we finished changing clothes. Most of the tourists around us disappeared and we had our swim in Jökulsárlón. Without bothering anyone. No seals were disturbed, no guards came running with prohibition signs. We didn’t go further out than we could stand, no big icebergs nearby and there is no stream in this part of the bay. A great bath, slightly cold, but not dangerous, as we see it!
Swimming in Jökulsárlón was a “just right” – for us. But of course, we would NEVER have recommended it to anyone!