Visit Vik

About Vik

Vík í Mýrdal — usually shortened to just Vík — is the southernmost village on the Icelandic mainland, with about 750 residents and a setting so dramatic it almost feels staged: black sand beaches stretching to a stormy Atlantic horizon, jagged basalt sea stacks rising from the surf, and the looming dome of Myðrdalsjökull glacier behind the village (which sits on top of the Katla volcano, overdue for a major eruption that the locals try not to think about). The famous Reynisfjara black sand beach, with its hexagonal basalt columns forming a natural cathedral cliff face and the dramatic Reynisdrangar sea stacks off shore, is just 8km to the west — spectacular but genuinely dangerous, with sneaker waves that have killed multiple visitors (heed the warnings, stay well back from the water). The little hilltop Vík church (1934), red-roofed and white-walled, is the iconic postcard view above the village. Don't miss the puffin colonies at Dyrhólaey promontory (best May–August), the staggering Skogafoss waterfall 30km east, the Fámorði wreck of the US Navy DC-3 plane that crash-landed on the black-sand Sólheimasandur in 1973 (a 90-min walk in each direction from the road), and the brilliantly named Lava Show in Vík itself — the only place in the world where you can safely watch real molten lava being poured indoors.