The 100 Best Coastal Escapes in The World

Oia is the northernmost village on Santorini and the best known, with its white-washed Cycladic architecture, blue-domed churches, and cliffside position above the caldera.

It is particularly famous for its sunset, which draws crowds from across the island to watch the sun sink into the Aegean.

The crescent-shaped caldera of Santorini, formed by a massive volcanic eruption around 1600 BC, is a 12km-wide bay ringed by cliffs that rise up to 300 metres straight out of the sea.

White-washed cube houses and blue-domed churches line the rim at Fira, Imerovigli and Oia, and boat trips run out to the still-active volcanic islets at its centre.

It is one of the world's most recognisable islands, and priced accordingly.

The Maldives is an archipelago of 1,200 coral islands scattered across the Indian Ocean, where pristine white sand, crystal-clear turquoise lagoons, and overwater bungalows create the archetypal tropical paradise.

The islands sit just above sea level, making them one of the world's most climate-vulnerable nations.

Bora Bora is a small volcanic island in the South Pacific surrounded by a technicolour lagoon of electric blues and greens enclosed within a coral reef.

The island's dramatic basalt peak, Mount Otemanu, rises 727 metres from the lagoon and is mirrored in the still waters below.

A rusting shipwreck sits on white sand in a cove ringed by sheer limestone cliffs, reachable only by boat from Zakynthos.

Mineral runoff from the cliffs turns the water a startling turquoise, and boat trips let visitors land and swim beside the wreck itself.

Rockfalls have periodically closed both the beach and the clifftop viewing platform above it, so check what is actually open before committing to a trip.

The Amalfi Coast is a 50-kilometre stretch of cliffside villages, lemon groves, and impossibly blue Mediterranean sea along the southern edge of the Sorrentine Peninsula.

Perched villages like Positano and Ravello tumble down vertiginous hillsides in a cascade of pastel buildings.

The Lofoten archipelago in northern Norway rises dramatically from the Norwegian Sea as a series of jagged peaks and sheltered bays.

Traditional red fishing cabins called rorbuer dot the shoreline against a backdrop of some of Europe's most spectacular mountain scenery, with the Northern Lights frequently visible in winter.

Pink-granite boulders sculpted by centuries of erosion line this powder-white beach on La Digue, shaded by takamaka trees and broken into a series of small coves and rock pools.

Some of the boulders are the size of houses.

The water is calm and shallow enough to wade a long way out, which makes it better for drifting about than for swimming properly.

Getting in means paying to cross a private plantation.

Positano is the Amalfi Coast's poster child: a wall of peach, rose and terracotta houses stacked impossibly steeply between the cliffs and a dark-sand beach.

The classic view, the whole town glowing above Spiaggia Grande, is best from the coast path or from the ferry pulling out.

Below the view it's all lemon groves, boutiques and long seafood lunches.

Mont Saint-Michel is a tidal island commune in Normandy topped by a medieval Benedictine abbey that soars 80 metres above the surrounding tidal flats.

When the sea retreats, the island is connected to the mainland by a causeway; when the tide comes in at one of the fastest rates in Europe, the island becomes a castle rising from the sea.

The Great Barrier Reef is the world's largest coral reef system, stretching 2,300 kilometres along the Queensland coast and visible from space.

Home to over 1,500 species of fish, 4,000 types of mollusc, and 600 types of coral, it is the largest living structure on earth and a UNESCO World Heritage Site.

Tucked beneath sheer cliffs on Fernando de Noronha and reachable only by a steep ladder cut into the rock (or by boat), this beach has topped "world's best beach" rankings for good reason.

Turquoise water, sea turtles visible from the shore, and a protected marine park setting mean it stays close to pristine.

The remoteness that makes it special also caps how many people can visit each day.

Cinque Terre is a string of five centuries-old fishing villages clinging to the cliffs of the Italian Riviera, connected by scenic hiking trails above the Ligurian Sea.

Manarola, Vernazza, Corniglia, Monterosso, and Riomaggiore tumble down their respective cliff faces in a cascade of colourful buildings.

Halong Bay's emerald-green waters are scattered with thousands of limestone islands and karsts rising sheer from the sea.

Traditional junk boats still work the channels between the towering formations, while caves, floating fishing villages and hidden lagoons fill the bay's quieter corners.

The misty, ethereal atmosphere, especially at sunrise, gives the bay an almost mystical beauty.

Scotland's largest and most dramatic island rises from the Inner Hebrides like a dark, brooding giant.

The jagged peaks of the Cuillin mountains, the eerie Quiraing landscape, the ancient Dunvegan Castle, and the famous Fairy Pools make Skye one of the UK's most spectacular destinations.

The Twelve Apostles are a collection of limestone stacks rising up to 45 metres from the Southern Ocean off the Port Campbell National Park on the Great Ocean Road.

Carved from the cliffs by erosion over millennia, they are most spectacular at sunrise and sunset when the low light turns the limestone golden.

Giant pink-granite boulders line the pale sand and shallow turquoise water of Anse Source d'Argent, the best known of a string of coves along La Digue's coast.

The island moves at bicycle pace - there are barely any cars, and the whole place can be crossed in an hour on two wheels.

Development stays low-rise, and the interior is dense palm and takamaka forest.

Highway 1 clings to sheer cliffs for 90 miles along this stretch of California coast, with the Pacific crashing against rock hundreds of feet below the road's edge.

Bixby Creek Bridge, one of the most recognisable bridges in the US, arcs across a canyon right beside the highway.

Redwood groves grow almost to the ocean's edge in places, an unusual pairing within a short drive.

An overnight junk-boat cruise through thousands of limestone karsts rising from emerald water, one of Vietnam's defining landscapes.

Days include kayaking into hidden lagoons, cave visits, and swimming off the boat's stern, with meals fresh-cooked on board.

Traditional red-sailed junks still appear among the modern steel-hulled boats.

Karst silhouettes at sunrise and sunset are the reason most people book the trip in the first place.

Geirangerfjord is a narrow arm of the sea in western Norway, walled in by near-vertical cliffs over a kilometre high and threaded with waterfalls such as the Seven Sisters.

A UNESCO World Heritage fjord, it can be seen by sightseeing boat, from a hairpin mountain road, or on foot along old farm paths.

Cruise ships call through the short summer season, but the scale of the cliffs and water still dominates.

Six hundred miles off the Ecuadorian coast, the Galápagos archipelago is a living laboratory of evolution where wildlife shows no fear of humans.

Charles Darwin's observations here inspired his theory of natural selection, and today visitors can snorkel with sea lions and walk alongside giant tortoises.

The Cliffs of Moher are a 14-kilometre stretch of sea cliffs on the Atlantic coast of County Clare that rise to 214 metres at their highest point.

The view from the clifftop path, looking south towards the Burren and north towards Galway Bay, with the Aran Islands in the distance, is one of Ireland's most iconic.

A cruise through Norway's steepest fjords, where waterfalls drop hundreds of metres past cliffside farms into water so still it mirrors the mountains.

Geirangerfjord and Naeroyfjord, both UNESCO-listed, narrow to barely a ship's width in places.

Small villages like Flam and Geiranger appear suddenly at the fjord's end, framed by snow long into summer.

Midnight sun in June extends the scenery well past a normal evening.

Sheer limestone karsts rise straight out of turquoise lagoons around this Palawan town, often ranked among the world's most beautiful island landscapes.

Hidden lagoons reachable only by kayak or narrow swim-throughs open onto still, mirror-flat water walled in by cliffs.

Island-hopping boat tours string together beaches, lagoons, and reefs that are rarely anything less than spectacular.

Table Mountain's flat-topped silhouette looms directly over the city bowl, often capped by a rolling cloud locals call the tablecloth.

A cable car reaches the summit in minutes, but the classic view is looking back at the mountain from Bloubergstrand or Signal Hill, with the city spread out beneath it.

Penguins waddle across a public beach at Boulders just outside the city.

The Golden Gate Bridge has been San Francisco's calling card since 1937: 2.

7km of International Orange suspension bridge strung between the city and the Marin Headlands.

It's that rare landmark that looks better in bad weather - the towers rising out of rolling fog are the classic view.

Walk or cycle the deck, then take it in from Baker Beach, Fort Point or Battery Spencer.

Bora Bora's only public beach, a tapering spit of pale sand running out into a lagoon clear enough to see reef fish and passing rays from the shore.

Palms back the sand, and Mount Otemanu rises across the water behind it.

It is the free counterpoint to the island's resort strips, and the calm, shallow lagoon makes it one of the safest swimming beaches in the Pacific.

Raja Ampat's four main islands and hundreds of smaller limestone islets sit at the heart of the Coral Triangle, the most biodiverse marine environment on Earth, with reefs holding far more coral and fish species than the Caribbean.

Above water, karst islands draped in jungle ring turquoise lagoons; below, divers and snorkelers find manta rays, reef sharks, and dense coral gardens largely undamaged by mass tourism.

Reaching it takes real commitment, but few marine destinations compare.

Jorn Utzon's Opera House is the building that gave a whole country its silhouette.

The white shells, actually more than a million cream and white tiles, change character constantly: blinding at noon, golden at sunset, glowing like lanterns at night.

Shoot it from Milsons Point on the Harbour Bridge side, from a ferry, or up close where the tiled geometry turns abstract.

Dubrovnik is a medieval walled city on the Adriatic coast of Croatia, its terracotta rooftops and imposing limestone walls rising directly from the sea.

The medieval Old Town, a UNESCO World Heritage Site, was the backdrop for King's Landing in Game of Thrones, bringing global fame to what was already one of the Mediterranean's most beautiful cities.

Volcanic islands rise steeply out of turquoise water in this remote Indonesian archipelago, the only place on Earth with wild Komodo dragons.

Padar Island's ridge walk looks down on three separate curved bays at once, and Pink Beach takes its colour from crushed red coral mixed through the sand.

The surrounding waters are among Indonesia's best for manta rays and drift diving.

Fiordland National Park in the South Island of New Zealand contains some of the world's most dramatic fjord scenery, carved by glaciers over millions of years.

Milford Sound, the most famous fjord, features vertical granite walls rising 1,200 metres directly from the water's surface, with waterfalls cascading down their faces.

Pfeiffer Beach in Big Sur is a dramatic California coastline beach famous for its purple-tinged sand, caused by manganese garnet washed down from the surrounding hillsides, and for Keyhole Rock — a sea arch through which the setting sun shines in spectacular alignment during November and December.

The Great Ocean Road hugs 243 kilometres of Victoria's coastline, curling past golden surf beaches, sheer cliffs, and the wind-carved limestone stacks of the Twelve Apostles.

The route swings from crashing Southern Ocean views to fern-draped rainforest in Otway National Park.

Koalas doze in roadside eucalypts near Kennett River, and small surf towns like Lorne and Apollo Bay make easy overnight stops.

A volcanic archipelago 350km off Brazil's coast, this is regularly ranked among the world's best beaches, with clear water that reveals reef sharks and sea turtles from the shoreline.

A strict daily visitor cap and environmental tax keep the beaches close to empty even in high season.

Morro Dois Irmaos, twin volcanic peaks rising from the sea, anchor the view from almost every beach.

A small-ship cruise through the Galapagos archipelago, landing daily by dinghy on islands where sea lions, marine iguanas, and blue-footed boobies show no fear of visitors.

Charles Darwin's living laboratory looks much as it did when he arrived, thanks to strict limits on visitor numbers and permitted routes.

Snorkeling brings penguins and hammerhead sharks within arm's reach.

Each island differs sharply from the last in wildlife and landscape.

Highway 1 traces roughly 650 miles of California's Pacific edge, from Orange County's beach towns through the cliffs and redwood-backed switchbacks of Big Sur to the rugged Mendocino coast.

Bixby Bridge, McWay Falls, and pullouts over crashing surf make nearly every mile worth slowing for.

The road narrows to a single lane clinging to cliffside in Big Sur, and landslide closures are common enough that checking conditions beforehand is routine.

Elafonisi, on Crete's southwestern tip, is known for sand that turns pale pink where crushed coral mixes with white quartz, and a shallow lagoon warm and calm enough to wade across to a small offshore islet.

The water is startlingly clear and turquoise even by Greek island standards, and the beach's gentle slope makes it one of the easier stretches of coast for families with young children.

A two-kilometre arc of white sand on Havelock Island backed by dense rainforest, with water that shifts from pale turquoise to deep blue at the reef line.

Time magazine once named it Asia's best beach, and sunset here - sun dropping straight into the Andaman Sea with no development in sight - remains the main draw.

It takes real effort to reach, which keeps it far less crowded than its reputation suggests.

Terracotta-roofed houses stack up the steep riverbank of the Douro in Porto's Ribeira district, a tangle of narrow lanes barely changed since medieval times.

The double-decked Dom Luis I Bridge, engineered by a student of Gustave Eiffel, carries a metro line across the top and traffic below.

Port lodges line the far bank at Vila Nova de Gaia, where the wine is still aged, blended and tasted.

Golden limestone cliffs riddled with sea caves and arches line this stretch of southern Portuguese coast, best known for the Benagil Cave's near-perfect circular skylight.

Small boats and kayaks squeeze through narrow rock archways to reach hidden beaches accessible no other way.

The cliffs shift from ochre to deep orange depending on the light.

Limestone cliffs plunge into an impossibly turquoise bay at Maya Bay, made famous by the film The Beach and now managed with timed entry after years of coral damage.

The viewpoint above Tonsai village looks down on two curved beaches meeting either side of a single narrow isthmus.

Snorkelling among the karsts, longtail boat trips and a loud late-night bar scene make up the rest of the island.

Mykonos built its reputation on whitewashed alleys, the row of windmills overlooking the harbour, and a nightlife scene that runs from beach clubs by day to bars in Chora by night.

Little Venice's balconied houses sit almost in the water, and beaches like Paradise and Psarou draw a see-and-be-seen crowd through the summer.

Away from the party scene, quieter coves and Cycladic villages inland offer a calmer version of the same island.

Railay is a small peninsula near Krabi cut off from the mainland by sheer limestone cliffs, reachable only by longtail boat despite technically being attached to the mainland.

Towering karst formations ring beaches of soft white sand and clear water, and the cliffs themselves have made Railay one of the world's best-known rock-climbing destinations, with routes for complete beginners up to experienced climbers.

Regularly ranked among Europe's best beaches, this small Algarve cove sits below golden limestone cliffs riddled with arches and sea stacks.

A clifftop walking trail runs the length of the coastline above, and a flight of stairs drops to a narrow strip of sand that fills quickly once the day gets going.

The sheltered, clear water makes for excellent snorkelling around the rock formations.

A week-long sail through Southeast Alaska's fjords, where tidewater glaciers calve into the sea and humpback whales breach beside the ship.

Ports like Juneau, Skagway, and Ketchikan mix gold-rush history with float-plane flightseeing over ice fields.

Bald eagles, sea otters, and porpoises are common sightings from the open deck.

Weather shifts fast, turning misty mornings into golden evening light on snow-capped peaks.

The Giant's Causeway is an area of approximately 40,000 interlocking basalt columns on the Antrim coast of Northern Ireland, formed by an ancient volcanic fissure eruption.

The hexagonal columns, which fit together with extraordinary geometric precision, were created around 50-60 million years ago and have inspired countless legends.

A volcanic island in the mid-Atlantic nicknamed the "floating garden," Madeira packs cloud forest, terraced vineyards, and sea cliffs over 500 metres tall into an area smaller than greater London.

A 19th-century irrigation network of levadas laces the interior with walking trails through laurel forest and past hidden waterfalls, while a glass skywalk cantilevers out over Cabo Girão, one of Europe's highest sea cliffs.

Bryggen is the old Hanseatic wharf on Bergen's harbour, a row of narrow, brightly painted wooden warehouses rebuilt after fires since the 14th century and listed by UNESCO since 1979.

The buildings now hold workshops, galleries and restaurants behind their tilted timber frames, and the wharf sits at the centre of a lively harbour city ringed by seven mountains.

Compact enough to explore in an hour, longer with the Hanseatic Museum.

Bay of Islands is a sheltered stretch of Northland coastline scattered with around 144 subtropical islands, sandy coves and clear, sailable water.

Paihia and Russell serve as bases for game fishing, dolphin cruises and trips through the natural archway at Piercy Island, and the nearby Waitangi Treaty Grounds mark where New Zealand's founding document was signed in 1840.

It rewards a slower visit by boat rather than a quick stop on shore.

A glass-towered harbour city wedged between the Coast Mountains and the Pacific, where downtown ends abruptly at the seawall and North Shore peaks rise directly across the water.

Stanley Park's rainforest and shoreline path wrap the downtown peninsula, while Granville Island's public market sits a short ferry hop across False Creek.

Vancouver pairs an outdoor-focused lifestyle with skiing, hiking and beaches within a short drive of downtown.

Golden limestone fortifications ring this entire harbour city, built by the Knights of St John in the 16th century to withstand a siege that never came again.

Baroque church domes and balconied townhouses in faded pastel line streets laid out on a strict grid, unusual for a city of its age.

The Upper Barrakka Gardens offer a sweeping view over the Grand Harbour, with warships once anchored where cruise liners now dock.

A dramatic clifftop on Vágar island overlooking Lake Leitisvatn, which appears from this angle to float 30 meters above the Atlantic Ocean — a famous optical illusion.

Sheer 300-meter drops, sheep-dotted grass, and constantly shifting Nordic light make it one of Europe's most striking viewpoints.

Ölüdeniz's Blue Lagoon is a sheltered curve of turquoise water pinched off from the open Mediterranean by a long sand spit, backed by pine-covered mountains rising straight from the shore.

It's one of Turkey's most photographed beaches and also its paragliding capital — hundreds of tandem flights launch daily from Babadağ mountain and drift down over the bay.

The beach itself is calm and shallow, better for swimming than surf.

A pristine 7-kilometer beach in the Whitsunday Islands with powder-soft white sand made of 98% pure silica, and turquoise water shading a coral-fringed shoreline.

Reachable only by boat or seaplane, it remains genuinely remote despite its fame, with almost no development along its full length.

The Sa Calobra climb switchbacks up 26 hairpins through the limestone Serra de Tramuntana, including a spiralling loop where the road passes beneath itself, before dropping to a hidden cove on Mallorca's northwest coast.

Wider routes through the range link terraced olive groves, the monastery at Lluc and the ridge-top village of Deia.

The road is a pilgrimage climb for road cyclists and one of Europe's most celebrated stretches of tarmac.

The Atlantic Road links a scatter of skerries and islets off Norway's west coast on an 8km run of bridges and causeways, built to look like it dives straight into the sea.

The Storseisundet Bridge is the famous shot, but the whole stretch is a slow, low-lying drive between open ocean on both sides, with fishing hamlets and pull-offs for scrambling over the rocks.

Storms send waves over the road, which locals treat as a spectator sport in autumn.

Marketed as the southernmost city in the world, Ushuaia sits on the Beagle Channel in Tierra del Fuego, snow-capped peaks rising directly behind its harbour.

It is the main departure point for Antarctica cruises, and shorter boat trips from the same harbour pass the red-and-white Les Eclaireurs lighthouse and islands crowded with sea lions, cormorants and penguins.

Tierra del Fuego National Park lies a short drive west for subantarctic forest and coastal trails.

This 95-mile stretch of Dorset and Devon coastline exposes 185 million years of rock layers in its cliffs, with fossils regularly still washing out after storms.

Durdle Door, a natural limestone arch stepping directly into the sea, is the coast's single most famous landmark.

Lulworth Cove's near-perfectly circular bay sits just a short walk away.

A signed cycle path links Onomichi on Honshu to Imabari on Shikoku across six small islands in the Seto Inland Sea, crossing seven bridges over open water.

Riders follow dedicated blue lane markings past citrus groves, fishing harbours and turquoise straits, with the cable-stayed Tatara Bridge and the towering Kurushima-Kaikyo suspension bridge as centrepiece crossings.

Rental terminals at either end let you start and finish where you like.

Four kilometres of powder-fine white sand lined with resorts, beach bars, and sunset boat cruises, split into three "stations" by how developed each stretch is.

It's the Philippines' most famous beach and one of Southeast Asia's busiest, powdery enough that the sand squeaks underfoot.

A government-mandated cleanup and visitor cap in recent years has kept water quality noticeably better than its reputation from a decade ago.

A domed sandstone chamber on the Algarve coast with its own crescent of beach and a circular hole in the roof that drops a column of sunlight onto the sand.

It can only be reached from the water, by kayak, paddleboard or tour boat, since swimming across from the neighbouring beach is now restricted.

Powder-white beaches and turquoise Indian Ocean water ring this Swahili Coast island, while Stone Town's maze of coral-stone alleys and carved wooden doors holds centuries of trading-post history.

Sandbanks appear and vanish with the tide, and traditional dhows still work the horizon at sunset.

Spice farms, seaweed cultivation and a distinctive Omani-Swahili food culture fill out the days between beaches.

Tulum is the only major Maya city built directly on the coast, its stone temples and watchtowers standing on a low cliff above a beach of white sand and turquoise water.

The site is small compared to Chichén Itzá, but the setting — walled ruins on one side, Caribbean Sea on the other — is unmatched.

Visitors can walk the perimeter path in under an hour, then head down the wooden stairs to swim below the cliffs.

Umluj sits on Saudi Arabia's northern Red Sea coast, where a scattering of uninhabited islands and sandbars sit in water shallow and clear enough to earn the coastline the nickname 'the Maldives of Saudi Arabia'.

Boat trips out to islands like Jabal Hassan reach coral reefs largely untouched by mass tourism, and the coastline remains quiet even as new mega-resort developments rise further south along the same coast.

An island-hopping cruise from Piraeus through the Aegean, passing whitewashed clifftop villages, ancient ruins, and volcanic caldera views without repacking each night.

Santorini's caldera and Mykonos's windmills are the classic stops, though smaller ports add quieter beaches and tavernas.

Many sailings overnight at an island for sunset views from the water.

It's an easy, accessible way to see several Greek islands in a single week.

Ireland's Wild Atlantic Way follows roughly 2,500 kilometres of coastline from Donegal's Inishowen Peninsula to Kinsale in County Cork, tracing sea cliffs, white sand beaches, and stone-walled fishing villages.

The Cliffs of Moher and Skellig Michael sit along the route, alongside quieter stretches like the Sky Road near Clifden and Achill Island's beaches.

Weather turns quickly, and headlands are as often shrouded in mist as lit gold at sunset.

Ringed by limestone cliffs and turquoise lagoons, Coron is best known for some of the world's best wreck diving — a dozen Japanese naval ships sunk here in a single 1944 raid now sit intact on the seabed, accessible to both certified divers and snorkelers.

Above water, Kayangan Lake's cliff-top viewpoint and the island's hot springs round out a destination built around striking limestone-and-water scenery.

Chapman's Peak Drive carves along sheer cliffs between Noordhoek and Hout Bay, the scenic centrepiece of a wider ride around the Cape Peninsula past Boulders Beach's penguins and the fynbos slopes near Cape Point.

The full loop, ridden each March by 35,000 cyclists in the Cape Town Cycle Tour, mixes ocean-cliff drama with quiet vineyard roads on the return leg.

Wind and open cliff edges make it a serious ride outside the closed-road race day.

A sailing cruise through 74 islands scattered across the Great Barrier Reef's inner waters, anchoring off Whitehaven Beach's swirling silica sand and turquoise shallows.

Days mix snorkelling on fringing reefs, a walk up to the Hill Inlet lookout, and sunset drinks at anchor.

Multi-day catamaran and yacht trips are the standard way to see the outer islands, since most are uninhabited.

Conditions stay calm and tropical almost year-round.

Isla Holbox is a car-free sandbar island off Mexico's Yucatán coast, reached only by boat, with sandy streets, pastel-painted guesthouses, and a slower pace than the resorts of Cancún.

Whale sharks gather in the surrounding waters from roughly June to September, drawing snorkel trips out to swim alongside them, and the island's shallow lagoon glows with bioluminescent plankton on dark nights.

The Farasan Islands are a low-lying Red Sea archipelago off Saudi Arabia's southern coast, ringed by coral reefs that draw divers and snorkellers to waters that see whale sharks pass through seasonally.

The main island holds crumbling coral-stone merchant houses from an Ottoman-era pearling boom, now mostly abandoned, alongside mangrove channels sheltering gazelles found nowhere else, with ferries from Jazan the only way in.

At the southern tip of the Sinai Peninsula, where the Gulf of Suez meets the Gulf of Aqaba, Ras Mohammed protects some of the Red Sea's most vivid coral reef, with underwater visibility regularly exceeding 20 meters and walls that drop dramatically into deep blue water just offshore.

The Shark and Yolanda Reef dive sites are considered among the best in the world for the sheer density and variety of reef fish.

The Ring of Kerry is a 179-kilometre circular route around the Iveragh Peninsula in County Kerry in southwest Ireland, passing through some of the country's most dramatic coastal, mountain, and lakeside scenery.

The route takes in the colourful town of Kenmare, the spectacular Killarney National Park, and the ancient stone forts of Skellig Ring.

A dramatic rocky island 12km off the Irish coast, home to a 6th-century monastic settlement perched 200 meters above the Atlantic.

Narrow stone stairways climb to beehive-shaped huts where monks lived in near-total isolation for centuries, and the island later appeared in Star Wars.