The Lizard Beaches

The Lizard is mainland Britain's most southerly point, a wild, wind-scoured peninsula of serpentine cliffs, working fishing villages and some of Cornwall's most dramatic and least crowded beaches. This guide covers ten of them, running roughly west to south to east around the peninsula's coastline: Gunwalloe Church Cove, watched over by its storm-battered medieval church; Poldhu Cove, the unassuming beach where Guglielmo Marconi sent the world's first transatlantic wireless signal in 1901; the quiet neighbours Polurrian Cove and Mullion Cove, the latter a picture-postcard National Trust harbour; the exceptional Kynance Cove, with its turquoise water and towering serpentine stacks; the still-working fishing village of Cadgwith, beside the collapsed sea cave known as the Devil's Frying Pan; the broad family sands of Kennack Sands; the unspoilt harbour village of Coverack; and, sharing the notorious Manacles reef between them, the quarrying-and-diving villages of Porthoustock and Porthallow, the latter marking the exact halfway point of the South West Coast Path.

Several of these beaches have no accommodation listings of their own - Poldhu, Polurrian, Kynance and Porthoustock all borrow the nearest genuine hub (Mullion, the wider Lizard Peninsula, or Coverack) rather than being left without a suggestion, and each page says so honestly. None of the ten currently holds Blue Flag or Seaside Award status.

Every page in this folder has a full visitor guide to its beach - parking, facilities, disabled access information, a precise map, nearby things to do and places to stay - researched and kept up to date.