Watergate Bay is the long, Atlantic-facing beach north of Newquay, below Tregurrian and the coast road towards Padstow. Its scale changes dramatically with the tide: the broad low-water beach is part of what makes the place feel so open.
The bay is now associated with surfing, beach holidays and its hotel. The hotel also belongs to a transport story: hopes for a railway connection were part of the ambitions around this coast, although the proposed line did not materialise. That is a different history from the railway which actually reached Newquay or the branch through Perranporth.
The surrounding coast has older working histories, too. Mining records name workings around Tregurrian and Watergate; farther south, Trevelgue Head preserves a much earlier settlement and ironworking landscape. The bay entry gives a newcomer the geography, with those more specific subjects linked separately. A hotel name, a beach and a mine named after the locality should not all share one undifferentiated pin.
Sources
Source: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Watergate_Bay Source: https://www.mindat.org/loc-1098.html
Connected subjects
Read on
- The Harbour That Would Have Turned Towan Head Into an Island
Meet the man behind Newquay’s unfinished harbour, follow the cargoes that made it worth attempting, and imagine the town that might have grown around it.
- Watergate Bay: The Hotel Waiting for a Railway That Never Came
Watergate Bay’s hotel was built for an expected railway arrival. The railway failed to turn up; the building found several other futures.