Beach in Tyne and Wear

Alnmouth is a small estuary village on the Northumberland coast at the mouth of the River Aln, a settlement of considerable charm whose elevated position above the river estuary, the excellent sandy beach extending north along the coast and the character of a traditional Northumberland coastal community make it one of the most attractive small villages on this exceptionally beautiful stretch of coast. The village developed as a grain exporting port in the eighteenth century, its position at the river mouth providing the sheltered anchorage needed for the coastal trade. The beach north of the estuary, accessible by the footbridge from the village, is a broad and largely deserted stretch of Northumberland sand backed by dunes that extends northward toward the Boulmer coast in a walking destination of considerable quality. The sands here are some of the finest on the Northumberland coast and the combination of the beach, the estuary wildlife and the views across to the dunes on the far bank create a coastal experience of great beauty that is less visited than the more celebrated destinations of this county. The village itself, with its colourful painted cottages on the ridge above the estuary, the old granary buildings converted to new uses and the estuary views from the village green, provides an excellent complement to the beach visit. The golf course on the dunes north of the village is one of the finest links courses in the northeast, and the Northumberland coastal path connecting Alnmouth with Alnwick and the wider Northumberland heritage landscape provides excellent onward walking.

Bamburgh is one of the most spectacular and well-known beaches in the whole of Britain, a long sweep of pale sand on the Northumberland coast that is dominated by the enormous silhouette of Bamburgh Castle rising from its basalt outcrop at the northern end of the bay. The castle, one of the most imposing coastal fortifications in England, and the beach below it together create a scene of extraordinary visual drama that has made Bamburgh one of the most photographed locations in northern England. The beach extends for several kilometres to the south of the castle and provides wide, uncrowded sands even in the height of summer, when the relative remoteness of the Northumberland coast keeps visitor numbers well below those of the more accessible resorts further south. The beach is backed by dunes and coastal grassland within the Northumberland Coast Area of Outstanding Natural Beauty, and the views offshore to the Farne Islands provide constant interest. The Farnes, a cluster of low rocky islands lying just offshore, support one of the most important seabird colonies in Britain, with tens of thousands of puffins, guillemots, razorbills, kittiwakes and Arctic terns breeding on the islands each summer. The National Trust operates boat trips from the nearby harbour at Seahouses that allow visitors to land on Inner Farne and observe the seabirds at very close quarters, and the grey seal colony that hauls out on several of the islands is among the largest in Europe. The village of Bamburgh is one of the most attractive on the Northumberland coast, its quiet streets of stone cottages clustering around the castle mound with a church that contains the tomb of Grace Darling, the lighthouse keeper's daughter who became a Victorian national heroine for her role in rescuing survivors from the wrecked Forfarshire steamer in 1838. The Grace Darling Museum in the village tells her story in full. The wider Northumberland coast provides miles of additional walking and beach exploration, with Holy Island (Lindisfarne) accessible by causeway to the north and the dunes and nature reserves of Druridge Bay extending to the south.

Dunstanburgh Castle on the Northumberland coast is the most dramatically positioned and most romantically evocative ruined castle in northeast England, a massive fourteenth-century fortification standing on a great basalt outcrop above the sea whose substantial remaining towers and walls can be reached only on foot along the beach from Craster to the south or Embleton Bay to the north, the absence of road access preserving the sense of remoteness and dramatic coastal situation that has made it one of the most painted and most photographed castles in England. Turner painted the castle on several occasions and the view across Embleton Bay to the silhouetted towers remains one of the finest in Northumberland. The castle was built in 1313 by Thomas Earl of Lancaster, a rival of Edward II, as a statement of power and as a refuge against royal displeasure. The subsequent turbulent history of the castle through the Wars of the Roses, when it changed hands several times, and the progressive decay of the buildings following the Tudor period have reduced it to ruins that are nonetheless still substantial enough to convey the enormous scale of the original fortification. The gatehouse-keep, the largest and most impressive surviving structure, rises to considerable height above the basalt cliff. The beach walk from Craster to the castle of approximately two miles along the rocky foreshore and the coastal grassland provides one of the finest short coastal walks in Northumberland, the growing drama of the castle profile as the walk progresses being one of the great approach experiences available at any English castle.