A beach a day helps you swim, rest and play!
One of the many great things about visiting Bude for a week’s holiday is the wonderful range of beaches to experience – all within a few miles of each other!
Here are our Magnificent 7 – one for every day of your stay!
1. Summerleaze
The main beach, located adjacent to Bude town, has lovely golden sand, great surf and the famous Bude Sea Pool which combines the safety of an enclosed swimming area, with the natural experience of the sea. Summerleaze is RNLI patrolled from now till the end of September and has many handy facilities including a café/ bistro, toilets, parking, beach shop, beach huts and surf hire. Dogs are allowed (must be kept on a lead between 10am and 6pm from May to September).
2. Crooklets
At the top end of the town, Crooklets beach is home to Bude Life Surfing Club and as you might have guessed, another great surfing beach! It is also where the annual Christmas Day swim takes place which attracts many hundreds of swimmers and a couple of thousand spectators! Again it is a lovely sandy beach with plenty of rock pools for crabbing and facilities which include cafés, toilets and beach huts for hire. Crooklets is a dog free beach until 1st October.
3. Northcott
2 or 3 miles north of Crooklets, your will find Northcott Mouth sheltering below the cliffs and accessible by car or foot via the Coastal path from Crooklets. It is a National Trust beach with fine sand, large pebbles at the top and lots of interesting rocks surrounded by shallow pools – ideal for beach combing and rock pooling and is life-guard patrolled during July and August. There are few facilities other than parking, but about 100 yards above the beach you will find a Rustic Tea Garden which has been run by local character Margaret for over 50 years! Great surroundings to treat yourself with a cream tea, a pasty or a piece of cake! Dogs are welcome all year round.
4. Sandymouth
2 miles further north you will come to Sandymouth, also a National Trust Beach which you approach via a fairly steep track from the car park crossing a band of large smooth stones before you reach the fabulous sandy beach, so we recommend travelling light on the day you go to Sandymouth! It is well worth the effort though and tends to be fairly quiet as a result. During the summer, there are toilets and a great café on the track as you head to or from the beach. Dogs are welcome all year round.
5. Duckpool
A mile further north, is an even more picturesque and quaint beach, again approached by a fairly steep slope. The scenery is lovely but you need to watch the tides, since the beach is quite small and disappears quickly when the tide is coming in. There is a café and toilets in the summer but there is no life guard here. Dogs are welcome.
6. Widemouth
Heading 3 miles south from Bude brings you to Widemouth and Black Rock, a huge expanse of sandy beach – actually 2 separate beaches, stretching around a mile and a half from one end to the other. Widemouth is lifeguard patrolled from now until the end of September and is very popular with surfers – several surf schools operate from here. There is a café, parking and toilets and a great tea rooms and pizza restaurant just across the road. No dogs from Easter to October, but Black Rock (the south end of the beach) welcomes dogs all year round.
7. Millook
Slightly further south from Widemouth you will find the most wild of the local beaches. It is a pebbly beach without lifeguard cover or any manmade facilities and is a great location for photography enthusiasts! It has amazing cliff rock formations above the beach making it popular with geologists and nature lovers – you often see seals, dolphins and birds of prey.
So there we have it, a beach for every day of the week – even one in reserve, as Widemouth and Black Rock are actually 2 beaches!
If you are looking for a great holiday location where you can get closer to nature, learn to swim or surf, go walking or cycling with spectacular scenery – or just relax in the clean, fresh air, then Bude’s beaches could be just what you need for a week away from it all!
You can learn more on our local beaches in the Bude area page with links to dog friendly beaches, local tide timetables and more.
