Møns Klint

Møns Klint is a wall of white chalk cliffs along the eastern shore of the island of Møn, rising out of the Baltic in a line some six to seven kilometres long. The highest point, Dronningestolen, reaches about 128 metres, and in places the cliff face drops a sheer hundred metres or more to a narrow beach of flint and chalk. Above the edge grows a beech forest whose leaves take on an unusually pale, fresh green from the chalky soil, so that from the cliff top the view is of white chalk framed by green woods and open sea.

The chalk is made of the microscopic skeletons of coccolithophores, plankton that settled on the seabed more than 70 million years ago. During the last ice age, glaciers pressing against the chalk bed pushed it up and folded it into ridges and blocks, which is why the strata here tilt and buckle instead of lying flat. When the ice melted, the cliffs were exposed, and the sea has been cutting them back ever since. Falls are frequent: a prominent pinnacle, the Sommerspiret, collapsed in 1998, and a landslide in 2007 pushed a 300-metre tongue of chalk and toppled trees out into the sea. The same erosion keeps exposing fossils, and hunting for them on the beach is part of a visit. The cliffs are geologically linked to the chalk cliffs of Rügen across the Baltic in Germany.

The surrounding area is protected nature, with pastures, ponds, orchid-rich slopes and hills that include Aborrebjerg, one of the highest points in Denmark. The rare large blue butterfly lives here and peregrine falcons have bred on the cliffs. Møns Klint was a favourite subject of Danish Golden Age painters, and in July 2025 it was inscribed on the UNESCO World Heritage List. Around 250,000 people visit each year.

The main facility is the GeoCenter Møns Klint, a museum of geology and natural history opened in 2007 close to the cliff top. From there and other points along the edge, long wooden stairways lead down to the beach, though storm damage in October 2023 closed several of them and some remain shut or partly open. At the northern end is Liselund, a romantic late eighteenth-century landscape park with small thatched buildings. The beach walk under the cliffs is the most memorable way to see the site, but it is rough underfoot and falls can happen at any time, so keep away from the base of the cliff.

Getting there

Møns Klint is on the east coast of Møn, south of Zealand; the island's main town, Stege, is the usual base, and a Movia bus (line 678) runs from Stege to the cliffs in about 45 minutes. The nearest larger town on the listed network, Køge, is about 60 km away. Copenhagen Kastrup Airport (CPH) is about 73 km in a straight line, with the drive south across the bridges considerably longer. The cliffs and beach are open at all times.