Reynisdrangar

Reynisdrangar are a cluster of dark basalt sea stacks standing off the southern tip of Reynisfjall, the steep headland just west of Vík í Mýrdal on Iceland's south coast. The tallest rises some 66 metres straight out of the Atlantic, and the group stands in the surf like a line of jagged spires, often wreathed in spray and circling seabirds. The cliffs of Reynisfjall above them are home to puffins, guillemots and fulmars, and seals are sometimes seen offshore.

The stacks are what remains of a volcanic rock mass that the sea has cut away over a very long time, and the basalt around them shows the same origin: on Reynisfjara, the black-sand beach to the west, the cliff is made of tall hexagonal columns stepped like a stone organ, which visitors climb and sit on. Reynisfjara has repeatedly been listed among the most beautiful beaches in the world. The name Reynisdrangar is usually explained as "Reynir's pillars", after a settler whose name also passed to the mountain.

Folklore offers another origin. In one version two trolls tried to drag a three-masted ship ashore in the night and were caught by the dawn, turning to stone where they stood; in another, a man whose wife had been taken by trolls forced them to swear never again to kill anyone. The stacks look different from each side: from Reynisfjara they rise as a group beyond the basalt columns, from Vík's own beach they appear as a line of needles, and from the headland of Dyrhólaey they close the view along the shore. The waves on these beaches are dangerously strong and unpredictable, so keep well back from the water.

Getting there

Vík í Mýrdal is 3–4 km away as the crow flies, about 11 km by road to the Reynisfjara side; Reykjavík is about 190 km to the west, roughly two and a half hours' drive along the south coast. International flights arrive at Keflavík International Airport (KEF), south-west of Reykjavík. There is a free car park by Reynisfjara beach.