Festarfjall

The mountain is a worn volcano that the sea has cut in half. Its seaward side ends in cliffs, and a black beach lies at the bottom of them. Getting down onto the sand is awkward, so most people take the beach in from the slope above. A basalt dike runs down the rock face. The name means mooring mountain, and in the old story the dike is the rope trolls used to tie up their ship. The top opens out in every direction: Grindavik to the west, volcanic fields inland, the Atlantic filling the whole southern horizon.

• No marked path: there is no single trailhead. People walk up from several points around the foot of the mountain.
• No permits: no permit and no landowner permission are needed to walk up.
• The coast road: it is steep and has no barriers. Take it slowly, and pull right off the carriageway before you stop to look.
• The beach below: black sand under the seaward cliffs, with no easy way down to it. Plan on seeing it from above.

Festarfjall stands by the sea just east of Grindavik, directly on the main road, and the asphalt runs all the way to it. Access by car is straightforward. The usual place to leave the car is the gravel pit between Fiskidalsfjall and Festarfjall, at the foot of the slope. From there the rest is on foot. There is no fixed route up: the ground is easy in most directions, and the line you pick decides how steep the climb feels. Allow about 30 minutes to the top, over 1 to 2 km.

Better: late afternoon into sunset, when the low light picks out the cliffs and the coastline. The parking area below the mountain is a good place to wait for it.

Avoid: low cloud. The summit view is the whole point of the climb, and in thick weather there is nothing to see from up there.

The walk is short, so it fits around a clear spell instead of a fixed time.