My friend Josh and I didn't say much as we loaded our bags into the rental car at Keflavik Airport. We had just landed in Iceland and already the landscape silenced us. “This looks even more amazing in person!” Josh said as we took it all in. Ever since we met at a reunion at an old friends house, Josh and I had dreamed of traveling the world together a lot, from the canals. from Venice and Amsterdam to the mountains of Austria and Italy, but Iceland was our main place of excitement to visit. The surrounding lava field looked like something you'd only see in your wildest dreams, with huge moss-covered boulders clustered haphazardly on the ground. , and funnels of steam rising to meet low gray clouds in the distance. It was a formidable and alien landscape, without trees, grass or shrubs. We had heard that Iceland was nothing like any other landscape God has provided us with, and now we understand why. With the suspiciously simple verbal instructions given by the rental car attendant, "Just follow the road to Reykjavik." The employee wasn't kidding, there was literally a road leading out of the parking lot with a sign saying Reykjavik. Despite the barren landscape of volcanic rock that greeted us, we were already warming to Iceland. Iceland has a reputation for being an isolated country, but it is in fact North America's closest European neighbor, located relatively halfway between the United Kingdom and the United States. There are many misconceptions. about Iceland, and the name of the country surely doesn't help anyone. Far from freezing or being covered in ice, Iceland has a relatively average climate, averaging 60 degrees in summer and 32 in winter. We were visiting in April and the temperature during our stay was around 40 degrees, requiring winter clothing, but nowhere near a scarf and gloves. Jumping on the tourist bandwagon, our first trip was to Iceland's biggest tourist attraction, the Blue Lagoon. . The instructions we received from our hotel attendant seemed vaguely familiar: “Follow the signs to “The Blue Lagoon.” We passed through gruesome lava fields, but were getting closer to the wisps of rising steam we had seen from the airport. Suddenly, the Blue Lagoon appeared, offering a visual thrill of electric sky blue water in dramatic contrast to the surrounding steep black lava hills. If the moon had lakes, I imagine they would look like the Blue Lagoon.