Web: www.cornwallbeachguide.co.uk
Web: www.cornwall-beaches.co.uk
Web: www.cornwallbeaches.org.uk
Lots of places to get wet
Cornwall with 300 miles of Coastline has beaches that meet every need. From a quiet safe family beach with gentle slopes such as Perranporth, Porthtowan and Holywell to huge surfing waves that come thundering in from the Atlantic at Widemouth Bay, Bude, Newquay, Polzeath, Rock, Mawgan Porth, Watergate Bay and Gwithian on the north coast. Then there are the gentler beaches around Trevose Head including Trevone, Harlyn Bay, Booby's Bay, Mother Ivey's Bay, Treyarnon Bay and Porthcothan. And on the south coast there are many tiny coves and harbours, some with sandy beaches such as Looe, Par, Porthpean, Pentewan, Porthscatho, Porthleven, Praa Sands, Marazion and Whitsand Bay.
Look at this way: Cornwall has nine beautiful estuaries and more than 300 public beaches - quite apart from scores of coves, creeks and inlets which the tide obligingly disgorges each and every day. That's an awful lot of sand! Look to the north coast for the great Atlantic rollers, for majestic cliffs and for towering sand dunes (towans in Cornish). Look to the south for the mellower fishing village image, where all the contours of the countryside slip languidly down to the sea.
There are beaches associated with Sir John Betjeman, Daphne du Maurier and Virginia Woolf, there are beaches familiar to the great and powerful, there are beaches named after shipwrecks, pirates and smugglers, and there are beaches where youngsters can fish for stickleback or shrimp in countless rock pools. There are beaches where the surf is so consistently turbulent that they host competitors from Miaimi to Bondi, there are beaches from which fishing boats depart, and there are beaches where grandma, up to the ankles in white water, can keep a weather eye on the frolicking youngsters.
There are beaches which are virtually inaccessible except from the sea, there are beaches where the thrift and mesembryanthemum teeter to the water's edge, there are beaches where the cliffs rise sheer to the sun.
Then there are The Isles of Scilly with miles of unspoilt sandy beaches lapped by the fresh clear waters straight off the Atlantic.
In short, when it comes to beaches - whatever your preference - Cornwall can provide. Take your time. Look around. You'll find you're spoiled for choice!
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