Lossiemouth West Beach

North facing beach with pebbles at high tide and sand at low tide.

Submitted by:
IainO
Updated:
23rd Jun 2004

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Located on the Moray Firth 40 miles East of Inverness Lossiemouth is one of Scotlands hidden windsurfing treasures, provided the wind is in the right direction. Follow the signs to Lossiemouth, then West Beach. The carpark is on a small road next to the Golf Club and tha Skerry Brae pub (good steaks)

From a windsurfing point of view this beach works best in any wind with a Northerly direction. Easterlies combine with swell from the North Sea and can give excellent starboard tack jumping with plenty of space to recover for the next attempt. Westerlies will still generate some swell for port tack jumping but the period is much shorter as the swell has only built up from the Moray Firth. As for wave riding backside is good on both tacks, frontside - I'm not that good at so I couldn't comment. The only Southerly direction that works is South Westerly though it is very off shore, any other Southerly direction is too sheltered by the hill that Lossiemouth village sits on.

Dangers to look out for are rocks, loads of them, check out the beach at low tide. Also the local fishermen put out lobster pots but don't always mark them too well (I hit one at full pelt and the resulting catapult broke my mast extension and disintegrated my harness). There is also a noise hazard from low flying Tornados, the beach is directly under the main runway of RAF Lossiemouth (local kitesurfer Ben always rings Air Traffic Control at RAF Lossiemouth prior to launching as a matter of courtesy).

This is a beautiful area of the country to windsurf though the wind stats are nowhere near the West Coast so I wouldn't plan an exclusive windsurf only trip. It is common to be the only one on the water sharing the waves with dolphins and seals.