Stand where a lake hangs above the ocean

Sørvágsvatn is the biggest lake in the country and it sits thirty-two meters above the sea, held up by the cliff at the end of it. From the headland at Trælanípa the water appears to be hanging in the air hundreds of meters up, level with the horizon and about to come down.

The walk in follows the shore for something like an hour and a half, rising the whole way but even underfoot, with the lake on one side and not much on the other. It is the flattest approach to anything on this trip and for most of its length it is the least interesting, which is a large part of why the end of it works.

Then the ground stops. The illusion is angle rather than geology: from the clifftop the lake and the ocean line up so that thirty-two meters reads as three hundred. It works on absolutely everyone, including people who have just been told what it is.

At the far end the lake empties over the edge as Bøsdalafossur, straight into the Atlantic. Nobody can agree what the lake is called, incidentally. Sørvágur says Sørvágsvatn, Miðvágur says Leitisvatn, and most people say Vatnið, the lake, and change the subject.