Southern Peninsula Region

The Southern Peninsula Region exists because volcanoes exist—and because tourism learned to coexist with active eruptions. The Reykjanes Peninsula (Suðurnes) sits atop the Mid-Atlantic Ridge where Eurasian and North American plates visibly diverge, making it 'the youngest part of Iceland' and one of few places on Earth where you can walk between continents. The Blue Lagoon—born accidentally in 1976 as overflow from Svartsengi geothermal power plant—became Iceland's most visited attraction, drawing over 1.3 million annual visitors to bathe in silica-rich 37-40°C waters. But 2024 tested the tourism-volcano symbiosis: Sundhnúksgígar erupted repeatedly (January, February, March, August, November), forcing the Blue Lagoon to close and reopen multiple times. The November 2024 eruption destroyed the original parking lot with lava. Grindavík's 3,400 residents evacuated in late 2023 as ground fissures appeared beneath homes. Keflavík International Airport (Iceland's only major international gateway) sits 20 km from the volcanic zone, making the region simultaneously Iceland's most visited and most geologically active. By 2026, continued volcanism tests whether tourism adapts to geological dynamism or whether infrastructure investment becomes stranded by lava flows.