Yorkshire · Directions ↗
Landslides regularly reshape this coast — your route back may not look like the map. Check your return route on the way out.
Today at Ravenscar
Quiet dayWhy: Low tide falls towards evening, though it is not an especially big one. No recent storms, so expect a picked-over beach.
Safe window: 4:14pm – 6:33pm
Leave the beach by 6:33pm — the tide will cut off your route back.
Why: Low tide falls towards evening, though it is not an especially big one. No recent storms, so expect a picked-over beach.
13° · overcast · 2mm rain · Low tide: 5:53am (2.6 m), 6:14pm (3.0 m) · Wind up to 26 km/h · Waves 1.9 m
Safe window: 7:04am – 8:25am
Leave the beach by 8:25am — the tide will cut off your route back.
Why: Low tide falls first thing, though it is not an especially big one. No recent storms, so expect a picked-over beach.
12° · overcast · 14mm rain · Low tide: 7:25am (2.6 m), 7:50pm (3.0 m) · Wind up to 27 km/h · Waves 1.7 m
Safe window: 7:06am – 9:43am
Leave the beach by 9:43am — the tide will cut off your route back.
Why: Heavy rain in the last two days may have washed fresh material out of the cliffs. Low tide falls first thing, though it is not an especially big one.
12° · drizzle · 17mm rain · Low tide: 8:43am (2.3 m), 9:05pm (2.7 m) · Wind up to 25 km/h · Waves 1.5 m
Safe window: 7:40am – 10:40am
Leave the beach by 10:40am — the tide will cut off your route back.
Why: Heavy rain in the last two days may have washed fresh material out of the cliffs. Low tide falls mid-morning, though it is not an especially big one.
11° · clear · Low tide: 9:40am (2.0 m), 10:00pm (2.4 m) · Wind up to 19 km/h · Waves 0.9 m
No safe daylight window
Why: Winds gusting around 96 km/h forecast — not a day to be under cliffs.
12° · drizzle · 45mm rain · Low tide: 10:26am (1.6 m), 10:44pm (2.0 m) · Wind up to 53 km/h · Waves 1.0 m
Safe window: 9:06am – 12:06pm
Leave the beach by 12:06pm — the tide will cut off your route back.
Why: A recent north-westerly blow should have brought fresh cliff material onto the beach. An early-autumn blow like this restocks beaches after the quiet summer. Low tide falls at lunchtime, though it is not an especially big one.
10° · overcast · 2mm rain · Low tide: 11:06am (1.2 m), 11:24pm (1.6 m) · Wind up to 35 km/h · Waves 1.0 m
No safe daylight window
Why: Winds gusting around 72 km/h forecast — not a day to be under cliffs.
16° · drizzle · 3mm rain · Low tide: 10:45am (0.9 m), 11:01pm (1.3 m) · Wind up to 41 km/h · Waves 0.8 m
Search the boulder fields below the old alum works — ammonites here can be impressively large, showing as coils on boulder faces. Loose finds concentrate along the tideline; this remote shore is rarely picked over.
Ammonites and belemnites weather out of the soft clays; crushed white shell patches often mark productive spots. Jet is matt black and feather-light. Free identification: the Rotunda Museum in Scarborough — the birthplace of English geology — welcomes enquiries.
This coast is a protected site (SSSI). What does that mean?
Allowed: Collecting loose fossils from the beach is long-established and accepted here.
Never allowed: No digging into the cliffs or hammering in-place rock on this SSSI coast.
Important finds: Report significant finds to the Rotunda Museum, Scarborough.
Rules can change — check locally before you collect.
Detailed location guide at UK Fossils →
Roadside parking near the National Trust visitor centre, Ravenscar.
NT visitor centre and tearoom at the top; nothing at shore level.
Long steep path to a remote rocky shore — allow plenty of time and energy for the climb back.
Remote, with no quick exit: a turned tide or twisted ankle here is serious. Check tides carefully and carry a charged phone; signal is patchy.
Fossil Forecast