Landmannalaugar means "the people's pools," and the name is literal: at the edge of a black lava field, a hot spring and a cold stream mix into a pool that sits between 36 and 40°C. The valley lies deep in Iceland's interior highlands, ringed by mountains made of rhyolite. Iron, sulphur and silica streak that rock, so the slopes run orange, pink, ocher, copper-red and moss green. The dark field below them is Laugahraun, a flow of obsidian-rich rhyolite left by an eruption around 1477, and its glassy edges are still sharp underfoot. Above it steams Brennisteinsalda, the "sulphur wave," often called Iceland's most colorful mountain, with fumaroles hissing gas from its flanks. All of it lies inside the Fjallabak Nature Reserve, a protected corner of the highlands you can reach only in summer, by 4x4, across rivers with no bridges.
This is also where the Laugavegur begins, Iceland's most famous trek. It runs 55 kilometres south to Þórsmörk over three or four days, through coloured hills, black sand and glacier tongues. Most walkers camp on the rim of the obsidian field, spend the day on the blue rhyolite of Bláhnúkur or among the steaming vents, then sink into the warm pool as the cold air settles. The weather changes by the hour: mist drops and lifts within minutes, and the mountains show different colours every time the light shifts. There is no phone signal here, and the nearest village is hours away over gravel.