Þingvallavatn

Where is Þingvallavatn?

Countries on its shores: Iceland.

Largest lake of: Iceland.

Middle of the lake: 64.19° N, 21.14° W

The story behind it

Þingvallavatn is named after Þingvellir on its northern shore. There, in the year 930, Icelanders founded their parliament, the Althing. The lake lies in a rift valley, where the North American plate and the Eurasian plate drift about 2 cm apart every year. In a crack called Silfra, divers float between the two plates in water of only 2 to 4 °C. This water starts as meltwater from the Langjökull glacier and travels under the ground for 30 to 100 years before it bubbles up from springs. The lake is about 84 km² in size and up to 114 m deep. It is Iceland's largest natural lake. Four active volcano systems surround it, and about 2 000 years ago an eruption created the island of Sandey. Four kinds of char live in the lake, and brown trout of up to 15 kg are its top hunters. The water flows out through the river Sog.

Find it on the globe

Þingvallavatn is there as a small blue dot with its name, right on the water. From far away the planet is only a blue ball; detail arrives as you zoom in, and this one appears once you are close enough. Open it on the globe.

It sits at its real coordinates, not near them — the same numbers listed in the facts above. Switch off the layer for this kind of place and it disappears again; the buttons for that are down the right-hand edge.