The basalt columns at Reynisfjara, and why they came out hexagonal

Access update, checked 25 September 2026: SafeTravel currently restricts Reynisfjara visits to the designated viewpoint. The descriptions below include features that may be inaccessible; follow current closures and on-site instructions.

People walk straight past the sea stacks to get to the wall. The columns at the western end of Reynisfjara, called Gardar, are the single most photographed thing on the beach, and every visitor has the same first reaction: someone built this. Neat black pillars stacked in tight rows, flat tops making a natural staircase, the whole face too regular to be an accident of rock.

For a visit without the Reykjavik drive, the 10-hour small-group itinerary includes a scheduled 30-minute Reynisfjara stop. See the Reynisfjara day-trip itinerary

It is an accident of rock. A very specific one.

How does lava turn into hexagonal columns?

Cooling basalt contracts and cracks, and hexagons are the shape that relieves the most stress for the least crack, so the fractures drive downward into six-sided pillars.

The columns are basalt, cooled from a lava flow that once spread across this part of the South Coast. The trick is in how it cooled. When a thick sheet of molten basalt loses heat, it contracts, and contracting rock has to crack. The cracks start at the cooling surface and work inward, and as they propagate they tend to settle into the shape that relieves the most stress for the least crack length.

That shape is a hexagon. Not always a perfect one, and you will spot five- and seven-sided columns mixed in at Reynisfjara if you look, but the system trends toward six because six-sided cells tile a surface efficiently. The cracks then drive down through the flow as it keeps cooling, extruding those hexagonal outlines into long vertical columns. What you are looking at is a map of how heat left the ground, frozen in stone.

The flat "steps" are where columns snapped across, roughly perpendicular to their length. That is why the whole formation reads like a giant's staircase: you are seeing the tops of broken columns at different heights.

Where is the giant's steps photo spot?

It is the low tier of broken column tops at the western end of the wall, where you climb a few steps and the black basalt rises straight behind you.

The lower steps are where everyone climbs for the classic shot, one person perched a few tiers up with the black wall rising behind them. It is a genuinely good frame because the geometry does the work. Straight lines, hard shadows, that impossible regularity.

A few honest notes from watching hundreds of people do it. The stone is often wet and the sea spray keeps it slick, so the low steps are more slippery than they look. People queue, so patience gets you a cleaner background than shoving does. And the temptation is always to climb higher than is sensible for a better angle, which is where the day goes wrong.

How high is it safe to climb the columns?

Do not climb or approach closed areas. Reynisfjara is currently restricted to the designated viewpoint; dry footing does not establish safe access.

The low steps are a familiar photo spot, but their appearance does not establish that climbing is safe or permitted. Higher than that and you are on wet, uneven basalt with a drop, and I have watched more than one person get stuck up a column they climbed easily and could not climb down. Follow barriers, warning signs and instructions from safety officers.

Stay in the permitted viewing area and do not let a photo draw you past a closure.

How do Reynisfjara's columns compare to other famous ones?

The physics is identical to the Giant's Causeway, Svartifoss and Fingal's Cave, but Reynisfjara stacks a wall, a cave, offshore stacks and a black beach into one short walk.

Columnar basalt shows up in a handful of famous places, and travellers often ask how Reynisfjara stacks up. The physics is the same everywhere; the setting and scale differ.

Site	Where	What sets it apart
Reynisfjara (Gardar)	South Coast, Iceland	Columns meet a black beach, sea cave and sea stacks in one spot; access restrictions apply
Giant's Causeway	Northern Ireland	Around 40,000 columns forming a causeway into the sea; the most famous columnar basalt on earth
Svartifoss	Skaftafell, Iceland	A waterfall framed by dark columns; the columns hang overhead rather than standing as a wall
Fingal's Cave	Staffa, Scotland	Columns forming the walls of a sea cave, reached by boat, known for its acoustics
Reynisdrangar stacks	Off Reynisfjara	The same basalt eroded into offshore towers rather than a standing face

Reynisfjara's advantage is not the columns alone. It is that you get the wall, the cave behind it, the stacks offshore and the beach all in one short walk, no boat and no hike. Svartifoss and the Causeway each do one thing beautifully. Those features share one setting, but access and conditions determine what visitors can see.

How can you see the columns yourself?

Self-drive the 180 km from Reykjavik in summer, or take the guided South Coast coach in the darker months so someone else handles the road.

Reynisfjara sits about 180 km east of Reykjavik near Vik, roughly two and a half hours on Route 1. Plenty of people self-drive it, and in summer that is a fine plan. If you are visiting in the darker months or simply do not want to manage the road, the guided South Coast day trip from Reykjavik includes a Reynisfjara stop, subject to the access restrictions in force, and rolls in Skogafoss, Seljalandsfoss and a glacier viewpoint on the same day.

The Gardar wall makes the geometry of cooling basalt tangible. The rock is cold and the edges are cleaner than anything you would expect nature to draw freehand. That is cooling and cracking, millions of years of it, and it is one of the few places you can read that process with your own eyes.

What is the short version?

The Gardar columns are cooled basalt that cracked into rough hexagons and extruded into pillars, with the flat "steps" being broken column tops.

The Gardar columns at Reynisfjara are cooled basalt that fractured into rough hexagons as it contracted, then extruded downward into vertical pillars. The flat "giant's steps" are broken column tops. Respect current closures and remain in the designated viewing area, and remember the same rock forms the Causeway, Svartifoss and Fingal's Cave elsewhere. Reynisfjara's edge is having all of it in one place.