Hvalsnes Church

Built of hand-cut basalt and consecrated on Christmas Day 1887, the church stands almost alone between grazing land and the sea near the tip of Reykjanes. Two centuries earlier the parish belonged to Hallgrímur Pétursson, Iceland's great hymn poet, and inside lies the gravestone of his small daughter Steinunn — by tradition carved by the poet himself. The door is usually locked, but the stonework and the old graveyard are worth the short detour off Road 45.