Saunton

Long wide sandy beach facing west and nackd by extensive dunes.

Submitted by:
justal
Updated:
30th Apr 2004

Saunton
by: justal

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The long west facing sandy beach of Saunton is a much under-rated as a surfing wave and therefore remains much less crowded than nearby Croyde. This is only relative though as there can still be literally hundreds of surfers out here on a given day. The waves are generally fairly slow, mellow waves, perfect for longboards or for beginners. That said, there can be some nice shortboard waves off the rocks to the north of the beach too. Saunton can get huge on occassions and if you can manage the imense paddle to get out the back you can catch some pretty meaty waves here. The rip along the rocks will certainly help you on your way, but it can be ridiculously strong when the swell is big. Many people jump off the rocks once it gets above about 5 foot to reduce the amount of paddling required. On smaller, crowded days it is definately worth taking a 10 minute walk south along the beach and finding yourself a less populated peak.

Saunton is also the place to head to in North Devon for windsurfing, kite-surfing, kite-buggying, kite-mountainboarding, land-yatching etc. The tide goes out a long way here and it can be quite a walk to the water for the windsurfers, but for the land based activites this provides huge areas of flat, hard packed sand. Easterly winds are offshore, so the prevailing SW's produce good cross-onshore wave-sailing in generally slow breaking, mushy waves.

Parking is plentiful just behind the beach and there are toilets and a shop available in the car park. Professional lifeguards patrol the beach in the summer.

On days when the forces-of-nature aren't being kind to you, then just head off and explore the sand dunes of Braunton Burrows. I've spent many a day wandering around these, jumping off the flag-pole dune etc.