Newquay

Atlantic swells pour through seven beach breaks, and the salt on your lips lasts from dawn patrol to the last light fading over Fistral. Newquay is the modern home of British surfing — and the town still runs on the rhythm of the tide and the swell forecast.

Newquay's seven beaches wrap the town's headlands, each with its own conditions: Fistral, facing the open Atlantic, produces the most consistent waves in England and hosts the country's biggest surf contests, while Crantock across the Gannel estuary shelters family swimming. The surf culture dates to the 1960s, when Australian lifeguards introduced boards to the Cornish coast, and surf schools have run ever since. The headland between Fistral and Towan keeps the remains of a medieval castle and the Huer's Hut, where a lookout once cried the pilchard shoals into the bay. The nightlife is the busiest on the Cornish coast, young and salt-crusted, and Watergate Bay and the Bedruthan Steps extend the beach menu ten minutes either side for anyone with a car and a forecast.