Forest bathing in Iceland

Forest bathing, the Japanese practice of shinrin yoku, means little more than spending unhurried time among trees with your senses open. No counting steps, no goal, just slow movement and full attention. Iceland may seem an unlikely place for it, yet the island is steadily regrowing its woodlands, and a young Icelandic forest offers something rare: birdsong, soft light through birch leaves, and a stillness you will often have almost to yourself.

Iceland really does have forests

The old saying is that the way out of an Icelandic forest is to stand up. It is a fond joke, and increasingly out of date. Settlers cleared most of the original birch woodland centuries ago, and a long national effort is now bringing it back, planting birch, larch, rowan and pine across sheltered valleys. The result is a growing collection of calm, walkable woods, many with marked paths, that are perfect for slow time outdoors.

Where to walk among the trees

In the east, Hallormsstaðaskógur near Lagarfljót is the largest forest in the country, with gentle looping trails, an arboretum of trees gathered from around the world, and the lake glinting between the trunks. It is an easy, sheltered place to spend a slow hour or two. Closer to Akureyri in the north, the woodland of Vaðlaskógur rises above Eyjafjörður and sits beside the warm water of the Forest Lagoon, so a walk and a soak fold neatly into one outing. In the south and around the capital, Heiðmörk and the woods at Þórsmörk give the same shelter and quiet within easy reach.

How to bathe in a forest

The practice is gentle on purpose. The point is to slow down enough that the forest can reach your senses, which is exactly what tends to settle a busy mind.

• Walk slowly and let your pace drop well below your usual stride. Wander rather than march.
• Use your senses one at a time, the green light overhead, the resin and damp earth, the give of the path underfoot.
• Pause often, stand or sit for a few quiet minutes and simply listen to wind and birds.
• Breathe long and easy, slow exhales help the body settle, and forest air feels clean and cool in the lungs.
• Leave the phone away so nothing pulls your attention back out of the wood.

End the walk in warm water

A forest walk and a hot soak belong together, and Iceland makes the pairing easy. The Forest Lagoon sits right inside the trees above Akureyri, so you can step from a slow woodland loop straight into warm geothermal water with the forest still around you. In the east, the Vök Baths float on Urriðavatn within reach of Hallormsstaður, a fine reward after a morning under the birches. Warm water after time among trees deepens the calm and loosens the body, and it turns a simple walk into a full afternoon of rest.

A young Icelandic wood is small, quiet and unhurried, which makes it the ideal place to be the same.

The best of both seasons

Summer brings the fullest forest, with long light, leaves overhead and birdsong from dawn through the bright evening. Autumn turns the larch and birch to gold and copper and feels gentle and slow, with the warm pools all the more welcome as the air cools. Even bare winter woods have their own hush, the snow muffling sound so that a short walk feels deeply still before you head for the water.

Want more quiet? Read mindfulness in Icelandic nature, try a digital detox in Iceland, and plan the unhurried route in our Ring Road wellness journey.