Why this Northern Ireland beach is the UK's best

Times

08-07-2025

If you're driving along the coast road from the east, Portstewart is the first town you come to in Co Londonderry. It's 61 miles from Belfast by the shortest route; 87 miles by the prettiest.
The sun was shining as I cruised along the promenade, then down Strand Road to descend beside the golf course and drive straight on to the beach.
It was a Tuesday afternoon in late May and cars were parked along Portstewart's grand strand of blonde sand. The Inishowen peninsula in Co Donegal loomed large in the west, and a single freighter painted orange slid along the northern horizon.
A birthday party was being catered from the side of a van; a group of whooping wild swimmers was making sure we all noticed them; a kayaker headed out equipped for a fishing expedition; and a chilled-out surfer looked happy to be sitting on his board out there on the flat water.
There were dog walkers too, footballers, the folding-chair-and-Thermos-flask pensioners, and a man in shirt sleeves, his tie loose, asleep at the wheel of his company car.
Dave The Dog couldn't wait. He exited the camper van through the window and was chatting up a dachshund when I caught up, barefoot in the spindrift. It's just less than a two-mile walk from Portstewart's eastern end to where the River Bann, flowing 99 miles from Slieve Muck in the Mourne Mountains and through Lough Neagh, meets the sea.
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The outflow is protected by storm-battered concrete walls keeping open a channel that is perhaps more important for salmon than shipping. In Coleraine, five miles inland, you can see the monsters climbing the weir during their run upstream.
Castlerock lies on the far bank: 200 metres as the crow flies and 11 miles on foot via Coleraine's Millennium Footbridge. Nearly a decade ago a plan was hatched to build a bridge here, thus bringing an end to the so-called Bann Divide, but it hasn't happened, so I doubled back along the south side of dunes that are said to be 6,000 years old.
Dave was on the lead because of ground-nesting ringed plovers, which was a relief for the kindergarten of baby rabbits we surprised at the river's edge. By the time I got back to where I started, I'd become smitten with the strand's wild beauty and its easygoing vibe. I wondered to myself, does Portstewart have the charm, the pride and, most importantly, the chips necessary to be the Times and Sunday Times Beach of the Year?
The answer is yes. Harry's Shack at the back of the beach serves not only a cracking haddock and chips but also Carlingford oysters, fish tacos, Ardglass lobster, and sunset cocktails — the spiced arancello spritz is delicious (mains from £18; harrysshack.app).
As I passed St Patrick's holy well and followed the coastal path around Portstewart Point, it struck me that this is a town of believers. Slogans painted on the sea wall proclaim, 'The sea is His and He made it' and, 'Ye must be born again.' And the seafront lies beneath the stern crenellations of the Dominican College school. But Portstewart wasn't always so pious.
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The white castle bought by nuns in 1917 began life as a seaside party palace. Known as O'Hara's Castle, it was built in 1834 by Henry O'Hara, last squire of Craigbilly and a hellraiser who gambled away his 600-year-old estate and ended up mucking out stables in London, then dying penniless.
Before the whiskey and the cards got the better of him, though, he collaborated with the local landlord John Cromie to transform the fishing hamlet of Portstewart into what the 1837 Topographical Dictionary of Ireland described as 'a delightful and well frequented summer residence'.
The promenade is still delightful, beginning at the harbour, opposite the café/deli Born & Bread, and passing between the rocky shore and a busy strip of seafront shops. Yes, you'll find a chippy, Sheila's souvenir shop and two ice cream parlours (Morelli's and Roughans: the latter was the first I'd seen selling Dubai Chocolate flavour), but there is also a shoe shop, a kitchenware store and a furniture retailer. And perhaps that's the secret: this may be a seaside resort but the promenade is also a busy high street that's not dependent on seasonal business to pay the bills.
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There's a butcher and a baker, then a fork off the prom leads to the Crescent, where there's an outdoor play area with a boating lake, paddling pools, a kart track, dancing fountains and a bandstand. There's a candlestick maker somewhere too, I was told, but I couldn't find it. If it's there, then Portstewart truly has it all.Water quality: excellent | Lifeguards, loos, accessible, dog-friendly, café
All 50 beaches featured in this guide, and the 706 others that didn't make the cut, have been subjected to the same rigorous 11-point inspection, bathing water quality; accessibility; beach cleanliness; lifeguards, loos, car parking; café, shops for essentials, dog-friendliness, water sports and the vibe.
It all starts with water quality. Between May and September every year the Environment Agency collects between five and 20 samples of water from England's 450 designated bathing water sites and tests them for bacteria from faecal matter — specifically for E. coli and intestinal enterococci. The concentrations of these contaminants at each site determine the rating for the following year, and the good news is that 289, or 64.2 per cent, of England's designated bathing waters were rated excellent. In Wales, it was 75 out of 110; 50 out of 89 in Scotland and 22 out of 26 in Northern Ireland.
Sadly, the bad news outweighs the good. Agricultural run-off and raw sewage dumped by water companies continue to be a risk to even the cleanest beaches; 37 of England's designated bathing water sites are rated poor — ie too polluted to be safe — and hundreds of beaches simply aren't tested. So for this guide, where a beach is rated, I need it to be excellent. Two with the second-level 'good' ratings made it on to the list: Swanpool in Cornwall and Cushendall in Antrim — the first for a terrific restaurant and the second because of the outstanding natural beauty.
Lifeguarding is the next priority. In 2024 RNLI lifeguards carried out a staggering 2.3 million preventative actions and saved 85 lives, so if you're going to swim, do so between the flags. Then there's the matter of accessibility for those of reduced mobility, which continues to improve, albeit slowly, as more beaches introduce specialist equipment such as all-terrain wheelchairs and hoists.
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I expect toilets to be clean and free of charge, showers to work and bins to be emptied. With privately managed beaches such as Woolacombe that's a given, but not necessarily so with council-maintained facilities. And too many local authorities have handed car parks to the automatic number plate recognition (ANPR) cowboys who use cameras, hefty fines and the threat of court action to make huge profits.
I've inspected beach cafés and chippies — £14 seems to be the average price of takeaway haddock and chips — and noted the shops that have taken off sale the cheap polystyrene bodyboards that, once broken and discarded, then litter our sands.
Most importantly for Dave, my faithful Jack Russell, I check whether dogs are subject to seasonal bans (usually May to the start of October) or, on more enlightened beaches, if there are dog-friendly zones year round.
Finally there's the matter of beauty. It's always in the eye of the beholder, but after 17 years I've found that the best beaches stay beautiful whatever the weather.