Press

But tourists visiting Iceland in the spring and early summer may be disappointed to find that one of the island's most beautiful locations, the Fjaðrárgljúfur canyon, is off-limits. In recent years, Fjaðrárgljúfur has become too popular for its own good. The number of visitors to the canyon rose from 150,000 in 2016 and to 282,000 in 2017, forcing the site to close for recovery a few times since then. Iceland's overall number of foreign visitors quadrupled between 2010 and 2017, thanks in part to cheap airfare and innovative tourism campaigns. Fjaðrárgljúfur is just one example of how the small island nation has struggled to accommodate the influx of tourists. "It's just a natural wonder that wasn't meant to be that popular," Inga Hlin Palsdottir, the director of Iceland's tourism agency, said. "We need to build a better infrastructure there so we can invite people all year round." - Mentalfloss -