Swimming Through Iceland

On a recent visit to Iceland, Jason Wilson decided to swim his way around the country by visiting its countless middle-of-nowhere swimming pools. He had many reasons. As he explains in a terrific story in Sunday’s Washington Post Magazine, he was inspired by Icelanders’ love of water, and by a John Cheever short story about a man who, in a fit of suburban desperation, decides to swim home one day from one pool to another. Wilson was also inspired by memories of the time he spent exploring Iceland as a younger man, when he sometimes found himself basking in a Reykjavik pool at the end of a long night. “It is these visits to the pools that remain perhaps the most vivid—the feeling of dipping from cool air into hot water, settling in, chin deep, as steam rises around my head, and feeling as though the days will never end,” he writes. “In my mind, they are like the elusive fountain of youth. I am not so young and aimless anymore, but for some time I’ve dreamed of swimming around Iceland, of breast-stroking and doggy-paddling from swimming pool to hot spring to swimming pool, slicing through a river of hot water that has gurgled up from the center of the Earth.” Registration is required to view the article.

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