A lone gull catches the current and soars above us. My children shriek as the wind whips at their hoods. On one side, waves break gently on the shore, while on the other the water lies still and flat, as we walk along a deserted stretch of beach. A salty tang hangs in the air and, for a brief moment, it feels as though we are at the edge of the world. Which I suppose, in a way, we are.
Spurn Point, sometimes known as Spurn Head, is the lesser known “Land’s End” of Yorkshire. It receives around 80,000 visitors a year, according to Yorkshire Wildlife Trust, compared to the estimated 500,000 who make the journey to the Cornish original. It is this comparative sparsity of people which makes the northern alternative such a special place.
Curving between the North Sea and the Humber Estuary in Yorkshire, Spurn was formed by sediment washing down the rapidly eroding Holderness coast. At just over three miles long and as little as 50 metres (55 yards) wide at points, there’s something magical about the peninsula: it is constantly moving, ebbing and flowing with the water that surrounds it.
While it’s owned and managed by Yorkshire Wildlife Trust, there’s a sense that it can’t be tamed.
“Spurn is a seaside trip with a difference,” says Samantha Graves, Spurn’s visitor services manager.
“It’s a deceptively long drive to Spurn [from the main road; the A1033 from Hull].
“The winding road takes you through miles of fields and pretty villages, until you really begin to wonder where you’re driving to – it can feel like the edge of the world,” she adds.
“Maybe why it has been called [Yorkshire’s] Land’s End: it’s where the road ends, the furthest point [east] you can go in Yorkshire.”
Spurn’s unique landscape of beach, mudflats, saltmarsh, dunes and grassland means those who do make the pilgrimage are rewarded by an abundance of nature. In spring and autumn, migrating birds, including swallows, little terns and flycatchers, use it as a stopping point. While in winter, the mudflats attract flocks of wading birds, such as curlew, knot and redshank.
It is quiet in Spurn Discovery Centre over the February half-term, when we’re visiting (we see one other family and three couples) – although the staff tell me that it gets busier during the summer holidays. We check out the board listing recent bird sightings. A huge window in the cosy café overlooks the reserve and we spy on shelducks and Brent geese as we warm our hands on hot sausage rolls.
Other common wildlife sightings on land include roe deer and hares. While seals, harbour porpoises, and even the occasional passing minke whale, can be spotted in the water.
Yorkshire Wildlife Trust also has ambitious plans to restore the marine environment through its Wilder Humber programme. In 1936, Spurn was home to a seagrass meadow of 480 hectares. Now, due to pollution and coastal development, less than 5 per cent remains.
However, a restoration project on the mudflats aims to restore 80 hectares, which will provide shelter for juvenile fish and a feeding ground for wading birds.
As we pick our way across the seaweed strewn beach, my six-year-old daughter filling my hands with pebbles, a lone Unimog trundles by. The ex-military 4×4 truck seems incongruous in this deserted landscape, but it is one of the regular Spurn Safari Tours that offer fascinating insights into its military history.
The strategic location of the spit provided an important base during the First and Second World Wars, with many of the defences, including tunnels and gun emplacements, still visible today.
But no matter the human intervention, there’s always the feeling that this land belongs to nature. This is illustrated by the abandoned village of Spurn. The last families to leave, in 2012, were RNLI crew members. They departed due to erosion of the road and the fact they were increasingly cut off by tides. After the last residents left, a 2013 tidal surge washed away the road, cutting it off completely from the mainland.
“Spurn Point is a dramatic place to visit,” says Linda Scott, chief executive of Welcome to Yorkshire.
“It is a living geological laboratory where visitors can witness the raw power of nature at work.”
Having checked the tide times, my children and I cross the 1km of sand that is covered at high tide, creating Yorkshire’s second “island” (the other is Whitton Island, in the Humber Estuary). We pass a small wooden shack where unlucky visitors must wait if they get cut off – there’s a bench inside where they can rest for around two hours until the tide permits them to return.
It is then that we see the lighthouse, bathed in light by the fading February sun. The 128ft striped beacon calls us towards it and my children break into a run.
Built in 1895, Spurn lighthouse guided sailors around the coastline for 90 years, until it was decommissioned in 1985. Now manned by volunteers, it opens at weekends and during school holidays.
“I’m here to climb the lighthouse,” my three-year-old son announces at the welcome desk. A gentle suggestion that the ascent might prove challenging for little legs is immediately disregarded and climb the lighthouse he does, all 145 steps of it.
We follow him round and round the steep staircase, stopping occasionally to peer out of the windows at snapshots of sea. Finally we reach the lead-glazed lantern room gallery.
With a bird’s eye view of the sea in front and the narrow strip of land behind, the 360-degree outlook truly makes me appreciate Spurn’s remoteness. We have the view to ourselves.
So yes, you won’t find cream teas or ice cream shops here. There’s no Land’s End sign you can pay to take a photo next to. But the Land’s End of Yorkshire is as wild and wonderful as it gets.
Getting there
Public transport is available from Hull on weekends and bank holidays. Take the number 71 Spurn Explorer bus from Hull Interchange to Easington/Withernsea and get off at the Spurn Discovery Centre.By car, follow the A1033 from Hull to Patrington. Turn off (right) to the B1445 towards Easington and Kilnsea. Turn right at the T junction in Easington and continue along the minor road to Kilnsea. Turn right at the crossroads towards the Spurn Discovery Centre.
Staying there
Dunedin Country House has doubles from £110, dunedincountryhouse.co.uk
Westmere Farm B&B has doubles from £75, westmerefarm.co.uk
Spurn Bird Observatory has hostel-style accommodation with prices from £20pp, spurnbirdobservatory.co.uk/accommodationFurther information
ywt.org.uk/spurn
