Daily swims, power naps and five meals a day – not tips from the latest hit wellbeing podcast, but longstanding traditions that have kept generations healthy in Iceland, Ukraine, France and more …
Iceland: swimming pool culture
There are said to be 160 pools in Iceland. With a population of just over 400,000, this means one for every 2,500 people. Just as well, as swimming is so ingrained in the national psyche. This is a fairly recent phenomenon: in 1940 swimming lessons became mandatory for schoolchildren in response to drownings that were the result of previous poor competency.
“We were brought up in the swimming pool,” says film-maker Jón Karl Helgason, who made the 2022 documentary Sundlaugasögur (Swimming Pool Stories). “They are everyone’s playground. You come with your parents, then later your girlfriend or boyfriend.”
Helgason swims almost every day in Reykjavík and pays 4,000 krona (£25) a year for unlimited access to his favourite public pool, one of 18 in the capital. The majority of pools are outdoors and geothermally heated, making it a more affordable pastime than in countries that have to heat the water, Helgason says.
