Trebarwith Strand

Port William at low tide

Lill cove at low tide

Hole Beach

Trebarwith Strand is a sandy surf beach with rocky outcrops and has been awarded the European "Blue Flag" Award for cleanliness and bathing water quality.

There is no beach at high tide but from a couple of hours from high tide onwards you can get down onto the beach (there is sand from mid tide onwards on a Spring tide). A good way to check is to look out at Gull Rock. If you can see a couple of small rocks showing on the left then the tide is out and there will be a beach at Trebarwith Strand. In the event of a "proper" Cornish sea fog, you can check the tide times on the Magic Seaweed website.

Several small beaches make up Trebarwith, which at low tide join to form a mile long ribbon of golden sand:

• Port William round to the left is strewn with rocks except at the lowest point of the tide. It's popular with local surfers but not recommended for novices due to the rocks and strong currents.
• Trebarwith Strand is in the centre and is the lifeguard-patrolled area. It's sandy on the left and to the right side there are more rocks including some good rock pools.
• Lill Cove around to the right. There is a gully between rocks that make it possible to get through to Trebarwith when access is cut off by the sea (though at high tide this route isn't available). There is also a footpath up from Lill Cove joining the coast path that is accessible at all times of the tide.
• Vean Hole further to the right is a continuation of Lill Cove once the tide is a little way out but is technically a separate beach
• Hole Beach to the far right. There is some good snorkelling along the right-hand edge of Hole Beach and due to the large numbers of Sea Bass it's a good spot for beachcasting. Apart from at the lowest couple of hours of the tide, Hole Beach is cut off by the sea.

NB. The only sane way to get on and off Hole Beach is along the sand at low tide. There is a very steep path (perhaps goat track is a better description) that leads up the cliffs to the coast path from Hole Beach which is unsuitable for children and indeed most adults! Unless you are an experienced rock climber and the weather is dry it's not recommended. Also it is not an easy climb over the rocks back to Lill Cove (it involves clambering up some steep rock faces and crossing rock platforms covered in slippery algae).

Hole beach

Kayaking at Trebarwith Strand

Since Trebarwith Strand is a lifeguard patrolled beach, it's quite a good place to go with children in the summer. As with any west-facing surf beach in North Cornwall there can be very powerful waves and currents, so please respect the sea and advice of the lifeguards and swim between the red and yellow flags where there are no rip currents. In particular there are often strong currents around Denis Point. Near low tide on a calm day there are pools along the edge of Hole Beach.

Dolphins can sometimes be seen in the bay at Trebarwith Strand.

Basking sharks also sometimes come into the bay in the Summer. June to early July is the best time to see them.

Surfer at Trebarwith Strand

Body boarder at Trebarwith Strand

For beginners, low tide is best as there aren't any rocks and there are some quite long rides on white water.

For experienced surfers, the waves are best at a quarter to mid tide, ideally on a rising tide. Port William has nice left hand breaks which quite often barrel. There are also often right-handers starting at Lill Cove. Ideal winds are east or south-easterly as the beach faces west.

You can hire longboards and body boards, wetsuits and fins from Trebarwith Surf Shop.

In Summer you can have surf lessons at Trebarwith with Trebarwith Surf School which is run by the local surfers.

More info

• More info about the break
• Latest surf forecast

Bass at Hole Beach

Good spots for snorkelling include:

• Hole Beach - there are a series of boulders (some remnants of slate quarrying and the wharf where slate was loaded onto ships) running out from Hole Beach alongside Penhallic Point which provide shelter for bass, pollock and wrasse.
• Port William - watch out for strong currents around Denis Point. Backways cove round to the left of Denis Point has lots of bass and pollock and an interesting underwater landscape to explore.
• At high tide the rocky area between Trebarwith Strand and Lill Cove is good for marine life but is not recommended when there is a big surf running.

Beachcasting at Trebarwith Strand

With a beachcaster you stand a good chance of catching bass and flounder with the occasional plaice and turbot on the sand off Trebarwith Strand. Hole Beach in particular is good for bass, but be careful not to get cut off by the tide. If you do, there is a track up the cliffs but it is somewhat precipitous particularly if you're carrying fishing gear.

Penhallick point (the headland on the right of Trebarwith Strand is an excellent rock plaform for float fishing and spinning for mackerel, garfish and pollock. There is a natural deep water berth alongside the point that boats used to moor in to load slate from the quarries. You can get there either by walking North along the coast path from Trebarwith Strand or it's slightly closer if you park at St Materiana Church near Tintagel and walk South.

View from the coast path

View from Penhallic Point

There are spectacular views from the coast path behind Trebarwith Strand; the gate is just before the beach shop and cafe on the right. The path also has great views over the old Lanterdan slate quarry near Hole Beach where peregrine falcons can often be seen (and particularly heard) and continues on to Penhallick Point and then St Materiana church

In the other direction on the coast path you can walk to Backways Cove. The walk starts with climb up a couple of hundred steps behind the Port William which is not for the faint hearted!

Some circular walks you might like to try that include Trebarwith Strand include:

• Trebarwith Strand circular walk
• Backways Cove and Trebarwith Strand circular walk
• Tintagel Church and Castle (small diversion if you want to go down to the beach)

Autumn sunset

Port William in Winter

Sunset across Port Isaac Bay

Trebarwith Strand is west facing so the sun sets over the sea and in Autumn and Spring Gull Rock is silhouetted against the sea as the sun sets. In winter the sun set further south over Denis Point

In a winter storm, Trebarwith Strand can be truly awesome with waves sometimes breaking right over the top of Gull Rock and Penhallick point. If you're going for a stormy winter shot, you can usually spot a rainstorm approaching from the West over the sea a couple of minutes before it hits land and you get soaked which should give you enought time duck into the Port William for a quick warm up whist it passes over.

More info

• Some impressive photos

The Port William at Trebarwith

View from The Port William

Open fire in Winter

• The Port William pub is on the cliffs overlooking the beach.
• Next to the beach is Trebarwith Strand Surf Shop sells and hires surfboards/bodyboards, wetsuits and fins and naturally also sells buckets and spades plus good quality ice cream (from Callestick Farm in Truro).
• Alongside is The Strand café who sell freshly prepared food and home made cakes.
• There is a shop that sells fresh doughuts next to the steps that lead up the path from Trebarwith Strand to the Port William
• There are toilets on the right of the steps that lead off the road onto the beach
• The Mill House Inn (a former 18th century corn mill) is set in a leafy spot in Trebarwith Valley (about 10 min walk up the road from the beach).

The Port Willy is a good vantage point for stormy seas in Winter (or in the case of 2008, in August!) and offers a warm shelter when you've had enough of the elements.

West Quarry at Trebarwith Strand

Lanterdan Quarry

There are 9 slate quarries along the coast path between Tintagel Church and Trebarwith Strand. Slate quarrying began here in the early 14th Century and the last of these, Long Grass Quarry, closed in 1937. The Lanterdan and West quarries above Vean Hole and Hole Beach were once some of the biggest in North Cornwall.

In Lanterdan quarry there is a tall, distinctive, pinnacle of rock left behind as the slate in the pinnacle was not of a sufficiently good quality. Shorter pinnacles were left in West Quarry for the same reason. The slate was exported from Tintagel Haven and in the late 1800s a wharf (which has now been taken by the sea) was also constructed at Penhallic Point where the cliff edge was trimmed to form a 100ft vertical face. Ships could lie against this face as there is a natural deep-water berth alongside Penhallic Point. The slate was lowered by crane down into their holds.

Cutting the stone and loading it onto boats was harsh work and could be lethal. A local man - Alan Menhenick - recalled in the 1920s "we worked with the tides, around the clock. I've been at the quarry at four in the morning. When the tide was in, we blasted; when the tide was out, we went down and collected the slate". In 1889 three men vanished into the sea when the face that they were boring sheared off the cliff.

The quarry workings never reached the shoreline as there is a fault along the base of the quarry below which is the Trambley Cove Formation made of volcanic lava which was no good to the quarrymen. Lanterdan Quarry is now owned by the National Trust and is a site of geological interest for its brachiopod (spirifid) fossils and also a rare mineral called monazite.

• Geology walk around Trebarwith Strand
• Slate quarrying at Trebarwith Strand
• Coastal geomorphology of the Tintagel area (quite academic)

• Satellite map of Trebarwith Strand
• Wikipedia page on Trebarwith Strand
• Cornwall in focus page on Trebarwith Strand