Blackpool & Lytham St Annes
Nowhere else packs such a hedonistic, escapist punch, or has such a genteel escape route”
Modern Blackpool has been on the wrong end of some cutting one-liners over the years. “I like a Blackpool breakfast, me. Twenty ciggies and a cup of tea,” wisecracked the late Paul O’Grady, who regularly brought Lily Savage here in the late 1990s. But it can still pack a hedonistic, escapist punch like nowhere else.
As I visited on a weekend afternoon in April, the dark interior of Ma Kellys North was already well populated and rocking to the sounds of the 70s. Singer Nick Jones took drinkers through loud renditions of the Bay City Rollers, Tom Jones, Abba and the rest, as pints were happily sunk. A dangerously convivial atmosphere was developing that could have kept me there all afternoon.
I decided it was wise to leave before Mother Superior started her set (“She’s here to cleanse our souls,” warned Jones) and headed to the North Pier. The coastline-hugging Starr Gate tram offers the perfect way to view the full gaudy glory of the Golden Mile. Then, in the side streets just off South Pier, I sought out a hidden culinary gem. Bentley’s has a reputation for serving the best fish and chips in town. Perfectly battered cod, crisp chips and optimal mushy peas were the best I have eaten in years.
By then, the evening was cranking up. But as Wham’s Wake Me Up Before You Go-Go blasted out from the Pleasure Beach, and the volume was turned up in karaoke bars, I bowed to the reality of middle-aged stamina. Just a few miles to the south, Lytham St Annes offers a gentler holiday experience: vast beaches, wide grassy dunes and huge skies are an invitation to walk, reflect and rejoice in the peace and quiet.
Staying at the Best Western Glendower hotel on St Annes seafront (doubles from £105 room-only), I was two minutes’ walk from the charming Grade I-listed Victorian pier, complete with a lovingly maintained traditional amusement arcade. Alongside, in the Peace and Happiness Garden, a bouquet of fresh flowers lay at the feet of a statue of former St Annes resident Les Dawson.
Further along the shore, an exquisite row of pastel-coloured beach huts looked out to sea, and a lone boy flew a green and red kite. As I ventured over the dunes and across the mud-flats as darkness fell, it was possible to see the lights of Blackpool Tower twinkling on the horizon.
The following morning, after an “eggs Lancashire” breakfast (eggs benedict plus black pudding) at the Pavilion cafe in Ashton Gardens, I took a short bus ride to Lytham Hall. One of the finest Georgian buildings in England, surrounded by wooded parkland, this magnificent country house is now managed by the Heritage Trust for the North-West. A walk along East Beach then took in some splendid seafront houses and Lytham’s famous windmill, now open to the public and housing a museum. Spoilt for lunchtime choice in the main square, I chose Mediterranean fare at the Olive Tree Brasserie, before heading to the Heritage Centre opposite, which stages exhibitions by local artists.
A visit to Lytham’s renowned real ale pub, the Taps, seemed unavoidable. Sipping an excellent pint of dark mild and thoroughly relaxed, I almost felt ready for another singing session at Ma Kellys.
Julian Coman
Aberystwyth & the Dovey estuary
Promenade, ice-cream, paddling, a pier … this fine resort has it all in spades (and buckets)”
The Voyager 1 space probe that left the solar system in 2012 carried with it a recording of a human heartbeat, along with various other cultural artefacts. It’s a shame Nasa didn’t pack a stick of Aberystwyth rock. No other artefact so perfectly captures the spirit of one of humankind’s finer achievements. The seaside holiday.
Aberystwyth is one of the last bastions of this fast-disappearing treat. Promenade, ice-cream, paddling … it has it in spades (and buckets). Admittedly, to enjoy the experience you need to enter into the spirit of the place. It’s not supposed to be chic or sophisticated. The pleasure consists of partaking in an old-fashioned ritual without wondering too deeply about the point.
Disgruntled reviewers on Tripadvisor fail to understand this. They ride the funicular railway and moan that it is slow. What do they expect? This is 100-year-old engineering. The two cars, one up and one down, were powered by a water balance system before they were electrified in 1921. When you get to the top, having travelled there at 4mph, you find yourself squinting into the bright sea on the Wales Coastal Path, which offers 870 miles of sublime clifftop walking.
Another vital part of the ritual is a visit to Aberystwyth’s Royal Pier. As with many things in the town, it has seen better days. In Victorian times it had its own orchestra. But the end of the structure blew away in a storm.
The pier is the place for a drink, with sublime views, in its newly refurbished bar. As for dining, Aberystwyth has become surprisingly chic. On Pier Street, Ultracomida is a Spanish/Catalan delicatessen that serves excellent lunches. Further up the street, next to the town clock, is SY23 a Michelin-starred restaurant. It comes highly recommended and booking is essential.
There’s no shortage of hotels. The Glengower (doubles from £120 B&B) on the seafront is popular and well run. Slightly more upmarket is Nanteos Mansion (from £120 room-only), a restored stately home a few miles south-east of town.
But one of Aberystwyth’s other charms is its proximity to one of the most beautiful spots in Wales, the Dovey estuary, 10 miles to the north. The sliding and glittering waters are beautiful in any weather, and can be viewed from the huge sand dunes in the village of Ynyslas or, for a touch more metropolitan panache, the small town of Aberdovey on the river’s northern bank.
About 12 miles inland along the Dovey estuary, holidaymakers can be lulled to sleep by the sound of the water wheel at Felin Crewi cottages (from £75 for four) just beyond Machynlleth. This 15th-century former watermill has been restored and converted into three self-catering properties (and one caravan). The setting is wonderful – a picture-postcard image of genteel tranquillity. Wish you were here.
Malcolm Pryce, author of the Aberystwyth novels
Morecambe & Silverdale
A swirling bird-filled estuary, plus woods, orchards, butterflies and orchids a few miles north”
Morecambe Bay is magical. Where the rest of Lancashire’s Gold Coast (my nickname, but there’s sand all the way from Liverpool to the Lake District) looks out on the Irish Sea and a flat horizon, those who opt for the most northerly stretches of shore get a backdrop of the Cumbrian fells and a swirling, bird-filled, ever-changing estuary that didn’t need Turner to look Turneresque.
That’s why a visit to the seaside town of Morecambe (known as Bradford-on-Sea in its tourism heyday) links well with a stay in Silverdale, 10 miles to the north. The area has long been popular with families who prefer static caravan parks to B&Bs, but the village of Silverdale is quaint but unpretentious, has amenities and feels more agri-rural than bucket-and-spade. The village lies within the Arnside and Silverdale area of outstanding natural beauty (AONB), which is a collage of all the types of landscape you see at this latitude, including limestone pavements, ancient woodlands, lovely orchards, mosses and meadows.
The flora here is special and poetic-sounding –purple ramping-fumitory and, found only here, the Lancaster whitebeam. Thirty-four species of butterfly have been recorded in the area and the under-threat hazel dormouse was reintroduced two years ago. The AONB also has a food producers’ circuit.
Silverdale is a spit away from the RSPB’s Leighton Moss reserve, the largest reedbed in north-west England. Bitterns are the big-tick bird to spot, but there are marsh harriers and a breeding avocet colony, as well as otters and deer.
The Cumbrian Coastal Way starts here – it’s 182 miles to its finishing point south of Gretna – and the 66-mile Lancashire Coastal Way goes in the opposite direction to Freckleton on the Fylde coast. It’s a 10-mile coastal walk to downtown Morecambe via Bolton-le-Sands and Hest Bank (with plenty of pubs en route) or an hour by bike, and it’s 15 minutes by rail to Lancaster, where there are trains and regular buses into Morecambe.
Compared with Blackpool, Morecambe is genteel, and its front is more about wind and waves than rides and rock. But a day out there from Silverdale, by car or public transport, makes for a far richer, more varied holiday, adding in arcade fun, afternoon tea at the Midland hotel and the chance of a selfie with the seafront statue of Eric Morecambe, along with the birdlife that he loved to observe when he wasn’t making Britain giggle.
For an informative walk around Morecambe, the Heritage Trail takes in the Winter Gardens, Lakeland Panorama public artwork, Baxter’s Potted Shrimps and assorted wastegrounds – one of which will eventually be home to Eden Project Morecambe. Due to open in 2024, it will feature large shell-shaped pavilions overlooking Morecambe Bay. Botanical collections and art shows will focus on sustainability, the natural environment, solar and lunar rhythms, health and wellbeing – with lots of immersive, interactive theatrical and education displays.
Back in the village, the Silverdale hotel has family rooms sleeping four from £120 B&B.
Chris Moss
Largs & Great Cumbrae
After a fish supper in Largs, canny folk take a ferry to this pedestrian paradise island”
The jagged outline of the Arran mountains pokes out from behind Great Cumbrae when viewed from Largs’s Victorian promenade, where we sit and eat an exquisite haddock supper from the multi-award winning Fish Works, while being mildly harassed by seagulls.
Toddlers toddle along with ice-cream cones, staring up in awe at the five-metre steel statue of Magnus the Viking on the edge of the promenade, which stretches past the blaring chart music of the funfair and curves around the shingle beach.
The red sandstone of St Columba’s parish church dominated the high street when it was built in 1892 and still does. Most visitors to the “Costa del Clyde” come from Glasgow, combining the nostalgia of the seaside resort with a stroll around the glens and castle of Kelburn Estate. Those in the know then go to Great Cumbrae – Scotland’s most accessible island.
Great Cumbrae is reached by a 10-minute ferry ride from Largs. The island is a tiny, pedestrian paradise with far-reaching views over the Firth of Clyde. One 10-mile road circles the coastline: it can be cycled in a couple of hours or walked in a couple more. It’s best to leave the car in Largs.
The island’s only town, Millport, was established in the 1700s to house customs officers sent to crack down on smuggling. It’s fronted by an old stone harbour and a beach dotted with waders – oystercatchers, redshanks, curlews. Horse riders gallop up and down the sand, and families pose with Crocodile Rock, a painted stone beast (and Cumbrae’s signature landmark).
The high street is lined with artisan businesses, such as Isle of Cumbrae Distillers, one of Scotland’s only female-owned distilleries, which runs gin tastings. “It’s a tight-knit community,” says co-founder Juli Dempsey. “We want to help extend the tourist season beyond summer.” A couple of doors down at Mapes of Millport, Scott Ferris rents out bicycles. “The old joke was that come the end of October, you could roll up the pavements,” he laughs. “But a lot of second homes sold recently became high-end rental accommodation. That’s had a big impact on tourism.”
Jacks Alt Stays, started by two young cousins, is leading the charge. Its four bespoke cabins (from £129 a night for two) are stylishly fitted and as Instagrammable as it gets.
The west of Cumbrae has stunning views of Goatfell, which spikes out of the sea to 874 metres on the Isle of Arran, and of its dramatic, serrated ridgeline. Those views are interrupted only by the low-lying Isle of Bute. To the north, are the snow-capped peaks above Loch Lomond.
“Come rain, hail, sleet or snow, it’s just a lovely place to be,” says Ferris.
We’ll have to take his word for it. As we gaze out to Arran, there’s nothing but Scottish sun.
Stuart Kenny
Great Yarmouth & Gorleston-on-Sea
Dip into the tat and toffee apple atmosphere, then retire to its less-vast and less-crowded neighbour”
As with certain other seaside towns, Great Yarmouth has a history twisted by the word of Charles Dickens. He is often misquoted as having said that GY (as some locals call it) is “the finest place in the universe”. These were, in fact, the – potentially satirical – words of his character Peggotty in David Copperfield. Today, Yarmouth boasts a late-night party pub named after her. Yet, fiction or not, Dickens might have been on to something. As far as I can tell, it only takes one trip to the place to fall for it – hook, line and beach rubber ducks.
In recent years, the resort has risen from the post-package-holiday ashes by reinventing itself as a kind of “new Margate”. Despite becoming a hub for artists and circus training – and having had, fascinatingly, its very own Banksy (recently flogged at auction), Yarmouth has stuck true to its roots. After all, that particular neon seaside atmosphere is hard to wash out once it has soaked into the fabric of a place.
For those looking to only dip their toes into the tat and toffee apples, Gorleston-on-Sea remains the ideal, more reserved, base from which to explore. The little leafy suburb was put on the map in 2019, when it was heavily featured in the Danny Boyle and Richard Curtis Beatles film Yesterday.
Yarmouth’s expanse of beach pales in comparison with Gorleston’s quaint, three-mile counterpart, which is less vast, less gull inhabited – and less packed on a hot day. Moving with the times, Gorleston now boasts, as well as the standard fistful of traditional seaside cafes, a run of newer, flat-white-type joints and chic terraces for city folks suffering withdrawal symptoms. The Fig restaurant has converted its top floor, an old bucket-and-spade shop, into a rooftop bar with views across the cinematic sands.
There has been a boom in quality, family friendly eateries – from all-American burger joints to tapas – as well as scores of independent shops and businesses built from the ashes of the formerly mundane high street. The excellent 1930s Palace cinema, which was a bingo hall for many years, is showing films again, and by the water’s edge is the Pavilion, one of Europe’s last remaining 19th-century music halls, complete with oxidized green copper roof domes. For many years, the local rumour mill has been spinning yarns about the Tate soon making a move on Great Yarmouth, so now might be the time to get in early, before Damien Hirst starts dipping gulls in liquid gold. The Pier hotel, which featured in Yesterday, has doubles from £80, room only.
Ben White
Bognor Regis & Littlehampton
The atmospheric pier is where a very young Noël Coward won the song and dance competition in 1904”
There should be crowds, but this Wednesday lunchtime Bognor Regis is deserted. If the skies were blue, however, the windswept 2.7-mile West Sussex promenade, stretching from Felpham to Aldwick, would be heaving; after all, Bognor is among the sunniest towns in the UK.
As with many traditional resorts, the town has a rich history. Its regal suffix was gained when George V convalesced here in 1929. Near the seafront’s Royal Norfolk hotel is a blue plaque dedicated to WE “Billy” Butlin (1899-1980). His amusement arcade opened here in 1932, before the famous Bognor holiday camp.
The ping and whirr of modern-day amusements are in evidence around Bognor’s Waterloo Square, which is also home to a bowling green, mini golf and sunken gardens. The adjoining pier dominates, with its bleeping arcades, sports bar and Sheiks nightclub. The structure is far shorter today than when it opened in 1865: a widened section was lopped off in 2008 for safety reasons. But its tip is nonetheless an atmospheric spot from which to gaze back at the beach where a very young Noël Coward won the weekly song and dance competition in 1904.
Further along the promenade, past the soon-to-be-regenerated Regis Centre, a train whisks holidaymakers east from Whittington’s kiosk to Butlin’s – perhaps fuelled by chips from Yanni’s fish and chip shop (tip: a “small” £3 portion is huge). Behind is Hotham Park, with its boating lake and tropical gardens. For a caffeine hit, the Coastal Coffee Co (1 Waterloo Square) has sea views, and smart cafe-restaurant Mustards does coffee and a cake for £6 (set lunch from £29.95). Micropub the Dog & Duck (65 High Street) does a selection of local ales.
Eighteen minutes away by train is low-key Littlehampton; like Bognor, it has been a beneficiary of the government’s levelling up funding. At the end of its freshly repaved high street is an engaging museum with 600 pieces of art, while down on the seafront, which is about to have a £7.2m revamp, is the UK’s longest bench, a unique, twisty 324-metre artwork. Here, too, is the Riba award-winning East Beach Cafe: starchitect Thomas Heatherwick’s first UK building when it opened in 2007. The 40-metre-long rock-like silhouette is awe-inspiring, and its bright interior, packed on our midweek visit, offers panoramic views.
We perch on benches in the briny air, devouring sublime salt and pepper squid, ox cheek bites and cured salmon. Handily, the chic East Beach Guest House (doubles from £99 B&B), is a few minutes’ walk away on South Terrace. After lunch, it’s a pleasant stroll along the River Arun, past seafood bistro 47 Mussel Row, award-winning Fred’s fish and chips, the Harbour Lights Cafe and the Boat House in the marina. At the pedestrian bridge over to West Beach, the Arun View’s waterside terrace makes a welcome spot for a pint overlooking boats piled high with fishing nets.
Stephen Emms
Scarborough & Scalby
The queen of Yorkshire’s coast has weathered its decline gracefully, and with innovation aplenty”
Scarborough is the measure of all traditional seaside resorts, not only because it was Britain’s first – the spa waters were discovered in the 1620s and drew aristocratic visitors – but because it has everything: amusement arcades, noisy boozers, shellfish stalls, a funfair, a cliff railway, and Victorian hotels that have seen better days.
On bank holidays there are mods, rockers and punks, although some are on mobility scooters rather than Lambrettas. On sunny days the harbour walls are packed with kids hand-lining for crabs, and the beach is always golden.
Chuck Berry and Elvis still rule the roost on the funfair, but beyond it is a town rich in history, culture and quiet escapes. A lovely footpath sneaks up from opposite the funfair to St Mary’s Church where Ann Brönte is buried (the only tombstone with flowers in an overspill graveyard largely devoted to Victorian children).
There are ruins there, too, of a medieval castle built by Henry II, further fortified by King John and knocked about by Oliver Cromwell’s men, who set up a cannon in St Mary’s churchyard. Further damage was inflicted by the German navy in December 1914 during a bombardment of the town along with Whitby and Hartlepool.
By the seafront are dozens of fish and chip shops, one of which stands out: it’s the former premises of the Tunny Club, a relic of the 1930s when big game fishing was all the rage and a motley array of big game hunters, aristocrats and matinee idols came to try their luck with bluefin tuna. Specimens caught include the British record of 851lb (although a 900lb fish caught off Wales last year may supersede this). The chip shop has some interesting photos. The tuna, inevitably, were soon fished out, but there are hopes for a revival.
A walk south around Marine Parade may offer a sight of the resident harbour porpoises. Crabbing equipment and bait is sold all along the front, along with buckets and spades, windbreaks and seaside rock. The town has its rough edges, but has weathered its decline well and there’s plenty of innovation. The MV Southern Star, tied up in the harbour, is both a cafe and part of an offshore seaweed and shellfish farm.
Escaping to some peace and quiet requires an hour’s walk, or a short drive. Scalby is a couple of miles north, a quiet village with a good pub-with-rooms, the Plough (from £152 room only). It’s inland, so not as touristy as, say, Robin Hood’s Bay, but 30 minutes along footpaths brings you to the coastal Cleveland Way. There is good fossil-hunting on the rocky scars, with dinosaur footprints on some boulders.
Kevin Rushby
Swanage & the Isle of Purbeck
Traditional attractions and ‘natural surrealism’ on a stunning coast with Enid Blyton overtones”
Swanage, on Dorset’s Isle of Purbeck peninsula, is a perfect small-scale seaside town. On a visit this spring, I was struck by the number of traditional attractions: recently built beach huts, an amusements arcade, a funfair from which a plastic Tyrannosaurus rex roars, and pedalos with painted eyelashes. We bought fish and chips and sat by the harbour.
Swanage has an appealing edge. In the 1860s, George Burt, a building contractor who had made his money in London, began importing bits of the capital’s buildings to decorate the town. Close to the harbour is a clock tower that once stood on old London Bridge. Had Burt not moved it, it would today grace Lake Havasu City in Arizona, along with the rest of the structure.
Burt built himself a house that included marble chips from the Albert Memorial – then under construction – and elements of Billingsgate market and Millbank prison, mashing them into every imaginable architectural style. Most strikingly Burt gave the modest town hall a whole new facade – which had once been the frontage of Mercers’ Hall, off Cheapside in the City of London. Swanage’s quirks appealed to artists, especially to Paul Nash and Eileen Agar, who photographed Burt’s flourishes and were inspired by the town: Nash said it displayed a form of “natural surrealism”.
The Isle of Purbeck around Swanage boasts magnificent coastal walks towards Dancing Ledge, a natural shelf of flat rock jutting out into the sea, and to now-disused Winspit, one of the many quarries along this coast from which cathedrals were dug. We walked to the huge chalk stacks called Old Harry Rocks, an echo of the Isle of Wight’s Needles, which are visible in the distance.
If the landscape feels familiar it may be because Enid Blyton used the Purbeck countryside as her inspiration. On this visit, one friend, who loved the Famous Five series through childhood, was taken aback by the dramatic ruins of Corfe Castle, rendered even more Blyton-ish by the sight of the steam train that runs from Swanage to Wareham, huffing over the nearby bridge.
Edward I’s plan to establish a city on Poole Harbour’s southern shores was unsuccessful and Purbeck remains largely unpopulated. In her account of life in Tyneham, the now-ruined village requisitioned by the army during the second world war, local author Lilian Bond wrote of Purbeck’s “clean, cool air”; this, and the rugged coastline, make it a wonderful place to visit. In Studland, a few miles north of Swanage, we stayed at Littlecroft, a charming, book-filled B&B with just two rooms (from £125 B&B, which must usually be booked together). For a fancier night, there’s the Pig on the Beach (from £260 a night) on the north side of Studland, while the friendly Bankes Arms, which brews its own beer, has doubles from £85 B&B.
Jon Woolcott, author of Real Dorset
• This article was amended on 7 May 2023. An earlier photograph caption referred to the copper smelting chimney at Silverdale as a lime kiln. It was further amended on 11 May 2023 to remove references to lady’s-slipper orchids at Silverdale, as there are no longer any there, and “spaces” for metal-detecting, as permission must be granted by landowners.
