Iceland: Cold, Beautiful & Stunning Skin!

My husband and I recently went to Iceland to see the Northern Lights and to soak in the Blue Lagoon.  The lagoon is man-made and is fed by the water output of the nearby geothermal power plant and is renewed every two days. Superheated water is vented from the ground near a lava flow and used to run turbines that generate electricity. After going through the turbines, the steam and hot water passes through a heat exchanger to provide heat for a municipal water heating system. Then the water is fed into the lagoon for recreational and medicinal users to bathe in.

Although it doesn't sound very lovely soaking in the run off from the local power plant, it is in fact amazing.  The water smells a bit funky, but thats from the natural sulphur.  Sulphur might be a bit stinky, but it's amazing for your skin, especially acnaeic skin.

Throughout the Blue Lagoon there are wooden boxes filled with natural silica white mud.  As you look around at everyone with their white masks its hard not to laugh out loud.  The funny thing is that they will have the last laugh as this mud is AMAZING!

Its so amazing that yours truly broke the rules and did take some home.  A carefully hidden lunch baggie and quick hands were all I needed.  Now I can apply this smelly mud in the privacy of my own home.  After using it my breakout was banished and my skin is extremely smooth.  I think my skin tone is more even as well, but that might just be my mind playing tricks.

If you're thinking of going to Iceland then you should definitely check out the Blue Lagoon.  Even if you're not going you can purchase the mud mask from the Blue Lagoon web store.  The bottled mud mask isn't nearly as smelly as the stuff from the box, but it is a bit pricey (65 euros).

The one major disappointment with the bottled mask is that it contains a LOT of parabens.  Parabens are preservatives and they have been found in breast cancer tumors.  There are natural preservatives that can be used, but parabens are cheap and sorry, but for 65 euros then can more than afford to use something better.  they could also sell it in a dry form, which would inhibit the growth of anything funky and then it could be mixed with water on demand to create a mask.

Hmmm...maybe I should buy this stuff in bulk and add it to my collection of skincare products...

Ingredients List for Blue Lagoons Silica Mask:  Sea water/maris aqua (Blue Lagoon geothermal seawater), silica/silt (Blue Lagoon silica mud), ethoxydiglycol oleate, cetearyl isononanoate, polyacrylamide, C13-14 isoparaffin, laureth-7, phenoxyethanol, methylparaben, ethylparaben, propylparaben, butylparaben, isobutylparaben.